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Title: How to Stay Compliant While Raising Millions with Bronson Hill Summary: In this episode of the Mailbox Money Show, host Bronson Hill interviews Seth Bradley, an accomplished attorney and entrepreneur known for his efforts in passive and active investing. The discussion revolves around the significant shifts in the real estate market post-COVID-19, including rising interest rates and the challenges passive investors face with underperforming deals. Seth shares his experiences with multifamily investments and the importance of selecting the right financial structures, highlighting how his focus on fixed-rate loans has insulated his deals from the volatility that adjustable-rate loans often endure.   As they explore other investment avenues, Seth discusses their ventures into various businesses, including gyms, e-commerce, and oil and gas projects. Both entrepreneurs illustrate how innovation and technology, particularly artificial intelligence, can significantly improve investment decision-making and operational efficiency. Their combined expertise offers valuable insights into the world of multifamily syndications, risk management, and leveraging technology for investment insights. The episode concludes with Seth's perspectives on effective communication between investors and sponsors and the importance of due diligence documents in passive investing. Links to listen and subscribe: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/seth-bradley-what-can-i-do-if-a-deal-goes-bad/id1580397502?i=1000698697087 https://open.spotify.com/episode/4pogVHik6rHwh0k5yFLs1U Links to watch and subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xrvBhGtS5w&t=396s Bullet Point Highlights: Diverse Entrepreneurial Background: Seth Bradley is not only an attorney but also a successful entrepreneur with experience in gyms and startups, adding depth to the authenticity of his investment strategies. Impact of Rising Interest Rates: The podcast discusses how increasing interest rates have shifted the landscape of real estate investments, influencing cash flow and project viability. Importance of Fixed-Rate Loans: Seth emphasizes the protective benefits of using fixed-rate loans in investments to buffer against economic shifts and rising rates. Shifting Investment Focus: As traditional multifamily deals become tough, both Bronson and Seth explore alternative assets, including oil and gas, debt funds, and smaller multifamily properties. Gym Ventures: Seth shares insights from operating gyms, illustrating how franchise businesses can provide a structured path to entrepreneurship with community support. Navigating Passive Investing Challenges: The episode highlights the key steps passive investors should take when deals aren't performing as expected, including reviewing existing legal agreements. Leveraging Technology and AI: The discussion underscores the growing role of AI in analyzing investments and legal documents, showcasing how technology can enhance investment efficiency and accuracy. Transcript: hey guys this is Ken mroy and you are listening to the mailbox money show with Bronson Hill hello hello and thank you for joining the mailbox money show my name is Bronson Hill I'm very excited for this episode with Seth Bradley you're gonna really like him he's done a lot of things he's like the renaissance man like he has done uh passive investing he's done active investing he owns a couple gyms he's starting another one he's got a couple startups he does he's got all kinds of things speaking   very intelligently to a lot of different topics he also has a show called The passive income attorney actually also an attorney as well and puts together syndication paperwork so he does a lot of different things and so I always love talking to people that are doing many things because first of all inspires me that I'm not doing enough and then secondly um you know they'll speak very intelligently on kind of trends that are happening so he's talks about what what we're going to talk in this interview   about what happened over the last few years he's doing less real estate looking at some other things and just what do you do if a deal does not go well what are the steps you can take as an investor so I think you're really going to enjoy this we also get into Ai and some awesome other topics so let's jump in Seth welcome to the mailbox money show Bronson what's going on buddy good to see you again hey man we're both in Southern California I know we're not that far apart but you're in like the better part especially lately with all   the fires up in La recently uh you're in San Diego man I don't know anybody that says they don't love San Diego yeah man I mean there's no better place in the United States that's for sure I mean I've seen some some beautiful places around the world and I don't know San Diego still might beat it um I get a little bit used to it because I've been here for quite some time now but San Diego is really tough to beat yeah awesome man well I'm excited to have you here today I know you're an attorney you have your podcast called   the passive income attorney podcast and you also work with tri vest which helps investors and you have a lot you to say around uh diligence around deals going bad we've seen deals uh We've we've had a couple deals that have really struggled uh I've been an investor passively in deals some deals that have struggled people don't really talk about this as much and I think it's really important to talk about um but let's let's talk about kind of what's changed the last couple years interest rates have risen um obviously if you're a   multif family investor the deals maybe aren't as juicy as they were the projections are a little lower a a little little far between as far as you know deals that actually cash flow or deals that make as much sense but uh what have you seen the last couple years and how have you kind of shifted a little bit of your business and your investing for sure I mean it's been um it's been an experience right I think a lot of the past investors out there that are listening or if you're an operator or lead sponsor out there the same thing   I mean we've we've gone through a period of time starting I think back when Co hit in 2020 that was kind of the first dip in the market that we've we've seen in this kind of generation right like the jobs act well I I should say the previous dip was in you know 2008 2009 that was one cycle but that was before the jobs Act of 2012 so the jobs Act of 2012 is where some of these private Investments started being opened up to more people and more people like ourselves were able to get involved and start raising capital and and do deals   and you've just seen that market kind of exponentially grow since 2012 um so we haven't seen a downturn until Co hit in 20120 and that one was kind of weird right because it was just kind of a blip it wasn't because of the economy it was because of something that just you know nobody's going to be able to predict um but that's the first uh crack in the armor that we saw and then after that then we saw the interest rates go up in in 2020 towards the end of 2022 and the beginning of 2023 and that's what really   started um you know giving us this experience that I'll say that we're we're still kind of going through because the interest rates are still a little bit higher than what we've we've seen over the past years and we're we're seeing more deals go go bad right or or at least you know there maybe a capital call or or two or perhaps um you know some of your distributions if you're a passive investor might be on pause and these are things that we're just not used to seeing because we're just used to seeing over the past you know 10   years up till 2022 all the deals have just gone really really well so it's a surprise to us and it shouldn't be because you know it's it's cyclic but we we'll figure it out and you know you're just seeing these things that we've all been warned about and they're now coming to fruition yeah yeah it's interesting you know I think if you between 2010 and 2020 you know 2021 even if you just owned a multif family apartment you were a genius right because things were just only going up and to the right and and   then sudden like there's that quote by Warren Buffett says you can only tell who's been swimming naked when the tide goes out kind of thing the tide interest Rising the tide goes out it's like oh my gosh this isn't work in the way we planned it um and now you in your portfolio you guys have done very well you've had some some great you haven't done as many deals more recently but um your deals have done well is that because you did kind of fix interest rate or is just the markets you chose or I'd love to hear a little more about   that that's right I mean fixed interest rates to be honest were a huge thing um that that's one thing that we really pushed for in our deals and that's and that saved us a little bit when these interest rates started to r that protected us um you know you saw that those were the deals that got in trouble those those adjustable rates got people in trouble and you know there towards the end like let say 2021 22 it was really hard to make the deals start to like continue to work and get those returns that we promised those passive   investors without taking those adjustable rate loans so you know those folks that got in in 2021 2022 maybe the beginning of 2023 those deals had adjustable rate loans and that's where they got into some trouble yeah yeah it's interesting kind of how things have changed now it's interesting too there was um a time not even that you know just a few years ago that that real estate was Cash flowing pretty well especially multif family real estate and now it's pretty tough because you know you got rates are   higher uh cost you know the price maybe have come down a little bit but you got higher Insurance you got higher other costs other inflation things you know there's not a lot of cash flow so a lot of you know syndicators or multif family investors have kind of just stepped out or maybe they got pitched on a deal here and there so we we've shifted a little bit to do we still do some multif family in in specific situations but um we' switched to go really focus on oil and gas we're doing uh other types of   businesses like I mentioned we're buying this business that's a e-commerce business High cash flow and then there's also debt funds you know debt these days there are debt funds paying like Equity was paying with less risk than it was a few years ago right so if you can get not debt funds are the same there's some that are first position that are low leverage and things like that uh what are are there anything else that you're finding for cashow or that you're finding attractive right now as an   investor yeah I mean I think you got to just look a little bit deeper I mean there's still some decent multif family deals out there too and that's always going to be to me kind of like bread and butter right like that's something that we're always going to need it's always going to be um it's always going to be something that people are interested in um because we've all lived in apartments at some point in our lives and I think it's an easy thing to grasp mentally okay like I'm going to invest in a   multif family or apartment building because I've lived in one I know what it's like I know how they work people pay rent you collect you you know expenses that sort of thing um but it's it's a lot tougher to find those deals um so people have looked at other things so I've seen a lot of um you know debt funds like you said a lot of people pivoting to um you know even smaller multif Family Properties um you know before we were looking at like 100 200 250 unit properties um now I've seen a lot of people kind of Ratchet that down   a little bit and look for some better deals in in some smaller properties maybe in the 25 to 75 unit range range that sort of thing um I've seen people like get into mobile home parks and RV parks after cuz we saw that go quite up quite a bit during CO as well and then came rocketing back down um but now you can kind of see like where where it really sits like now you can see like what the value of that asset is so you can see that the you know what those what they really are without like that big spike for covid and those are   turning out to be some pretty good Investments to get involved in too yeah and I know um you know we talked about this before we started recording um you and your wife you guys also operate a business or you guys have a a gym a couple gyms that you operate tell us about that and it's that um I know you're sounds like you're spanning so it sounds like it's going well I need to pop into a gym I'm probably get my butt kicked if I pop in there and you g through the Seth Bradley workout there right so yeah man we have a we have a   couple of gyms right now we have one open in Oceanside this is in San Diego uh San Diego County one in Oceanside one in Poway getting ready to open up a third one in anas it's under the burn boot camp franchise fly FL so it's a franchise um and I got uh really interested in franchises for that and then I ended up buying into another franchise I ended up buying into a water restoration franchise called Al dry so we've got a few businesses going um but those gyms are great right like once we battled through again I hate to keep   bringing up Co but it keeps coming up um but we battled through Co we opened up right before that hit uh actually one week before it hit so then we had to shut it down and work out outside workout inside we had to do um on online workouts those sorts of things um had our lead trainer in our apartment recording videos and me and my wife were in the background doing the exercises um pretty insane what we had to go through but they're they're doing really well now and luckily my wife has taking over that business and she runs   the whole thing so I don't do anything she doesn't even want me involved anymore so it's fantastic it it's actually turned into passive income for me for you it's passive income right for her it's right it's it's Fitness income right but that's you know really a lot of people like um lifestyle businesses you know where you're like it's just I think it's just a cool thing to say I own a gym or own a restaurant or I own this thing I mean a lot of like really wealthy people be like oh yeah I own a   Vineyard or I own a I own a horse racing thing or something like that but is it is it I mean you don't have to get into specific numbers but is it pretty it's you're opening another one so it's pretty lucrative to do it it sounds like it's working out well the it's a boutique gy that does kind of boot camp type stuff and you have certain classes you go in and those have become super popular all over the us but especially in big metros like Southern California for sure and look I don't want to say   that it's easy because it's it's definitely not you have to have the right mindset you've got to be an entrepreneur you've got to be able to fight through the hard times but you know these these types of businesses they're they're kind of done for you to a certain extent they give you the marketing plan they give you the business plan they give you kind of the proforma that you should be aiming for um especially with a franchise there's there's dozens if not hundreds of other franchisees that are doing the exact   same thing you are so you any qu any question or any problem that you're going through they have already went through it or they're going through it so you can bounce ideas off of you know kind of similar to like a mastermind right something like that where you get involved with a few people and it's like oh how can I get around people that have the same problems as me in a franchise there's that's already built in and it's even more it's even more dialed in because these are very specific like   brand specific industry specific questions and problems that you can balance those ideas and have those questions answered by your your fellow franchisees um but as far as like profitability again it's great because you can you can predict it like the idea behind it you buy one you figure it out then you buy more and then you keep going you stack and stack and stack and that's how you really make a lot of money in franchises you hear people that own dozens or you know hundreds of Papa John and things like that like you need   to be able to stack them um but they're definitely profitable um and they're fun they're it's a fun business like you said it's fun to be able to say that you own a gym it's fun to like walk into your own place if it's a gym or a restaurant or whatever it is and you're the owner it just feels good right it's a little bit more um you know rewarding I should say than some of the other businesses that that we're involved in for me it's you know a law firm and um buying real estate and it's this is just   a little bit more rewarding just like being there just the presence and having a um you know having a a brick and mortar space it's pretty cool yeah know I love that it's really interesting you guys I didn't realize you guys are are really Ser serial entrepreneurs I you guys are really both as a couple um is that like tell me a little bit about that dynamic as a couple that you and your wife do that like how is that something you've more LED is it something she's done is it kind of like you just kind of stay in your lanes and   like because a lot of times one one spouse or partner will be really risk you know averse or one would be much more risk tolerant and so has that been just like a really you guys are both kind of willing to take risk and kind of move forward in that yeah I think we we both have a really good temperament for it as far as risk tolerance and for me personally that's that's interesting because I'm an attorney so typically attorneys are not risk tolerant um but I I am I have that trait and and she does too um we have certain   trust in each other to be able to handle and stay in our lanes um she especially for the gyms you know she's operations right now I handle finance and and Prof formas and those sorts of things and obviously the legal stuff that comes up and I'm the maintenance guy too of course but um but everything else like operations she does that and then when she knows that she needs me for these certain things she'll bring me in um we've explored trying to figure out some other businesses uh that we might be   able to get involved in together and I think you know having that experience in the gyms gives us a good idea of how it would work out with some others yeah as she ever teaching the class like if you're in the dogh house you got to take a boot camp with her and she'll be extra tough on you or something ah she's she's not a trainer luckily I would I would I would avoid those camps for sure I think that'd be pretty funny no I think it's great man I love how you've created that you know for yourself that you guys and of course   you know I think I've noticed this too a lot of uh there's a lot of people they'll have they'll be really excited about real estate they'll be really excited about investing and then you get one that's one spouse is very risk averse what what do you say to someone who guess their spouse is pretty risk averse and you know maybe they're concerned whether they're a passive investor or they're interested in doing business things are like this like how do how do they kind of get that person on board or what have you seen is kind   of work to kind of help them to kind of work forward with that move forward yeah I mean it's tough it's tough right like you have to you have to choose your significant other wisely and it's probably the biggest decision that you'll make in your life not only for personally but also in business because if you have someone that just can't get on board with what you're doing or doesn't understand what you're trying to do um and you don't mesh very well on that side of things it it makes things a lot more a lot more difficult right and   you see that all the time you see couples fighting about business and somebody's working too much and the other person's not working enough or those sorts of Dynamics um but I think a lot of it can be solved with education you know a lot of it is just kind of this other person doesn't know enough about the business or the investment or whatever it might be and they just need some education so they're not the person they're not like us every single day just immersed in this and getting on podcasts and you know   listening to podcasts and reading books and all this stuff about these Assets in these businesses so you have to keep that in mind like they need to they need to understand to a certain extent so they can get comfortable with it I mean that's you know when people are scared to make moves it's usually because they're just not educated enough to be able to to assess the risk and move forward or not now if they are educated enough and they do know enough about the asset and they still say look this is a   bad deal well then maybe maybe you should look at it again and make sure that it's not a not a bad deal but there there's definitely some you know give take there with personality types and how much risk that each person's comfortable with or not comfortable with yeah absolutely I think that's definitely I just I love when I see couples that are like really on the same page and are like yeah we're in this and you're you know you're doing it which is great and be both be active which is awesome um so let's talk a little bit   about um I guess you know kind of circle back to you know investing in deals you know as a passive investor um you know if if someone invests in a deal that doesn't go well um how to you know how should a passive investor respond to that or what are the things that you know someone can do if they're not getting the communication that they need I mean I know there's some legal things you can do but then it starts expensive and like what I guess what are some options as a passive investor let's say   your sponsor is having struggles or they're just not communicating is there some like what are the what are the what what can you do to try to get that to change yeah I mean this is why paperwork is so important like people don't want to deal with that and you know I'm an attorney so I'm on the front end all the time like telling you telling everybody hey like make sure we hash this out now like let's be have a a really transparent conversation let's figure out exactly what each part is getting   into and let's not like hold back at all you know a lot and some of this applies to passive investing some of it doesn't because you you know you have certain things that you can ask for certain things that you can't but be as transparent as possible upfront and with the paperwork and pay attention to what you sign and what you sign up for because at the end of the day when things start to go wrong that's what the fallback is the fallback is okay this person isn't communicating any longer or they're not doing the things that they   said vocally they're going to do what can I do and at that point that's when you have to look at the paperwork so if you have a contract and in this case it would be an operating agreement or a limited partnership agreement that you've signed or subscription agreement to you have to go back to that paperwork and look and sometimes they may have put in that paperwork for instance that they do agree to give you a quarterly report or maybe they agree to give you a an annual financial statement or maybe they   didn't I don't know it depends on what the paperwork says but that's the first step see what your rights are contractually and that's a good place to start because if you do have a contractual right that they have to give you a quarterly report or they have to give you annual financial statements or if you request it they have to give you certain Financial reports then that's the place to start and you say look I know things aren't going as well as they should be going I really want to get this thing back on track let's let's   start communicating but you know pursuing to the operating agreement I I need to see a quarterly report or I need to see this financial report um and put that in writing and writing can be just as simple as an email or text but get it in writing make sure that that communication is documented um not just verbally because if something does go wrong if if there is some sort of and this is unlikely but if there is some sort of fraud or gross negligence or anything like that going on at least you have that uh that written communication   between the parties that down the line you can be like look I asked for this five times I still haven't received it they said they would do this and then you can start saying okay at this point maybe we're not just talking about somebody not doing a great job or maybe we're not talking about the investment not going well as well as anticipated maybe now we're talking about some sort of negligence maybe now we're talking about somebody misrepresenting what they said they were going to do versus what   they do um but you need to have that in writing so that at the end of the day you can put that together um and and show it to whoever it might be your lawyer their lawyer or maybe a court yeah yeah it's interesting you know there's some new tools out there as well a lot of times these documents sometimes are 80 to 200 pages and there's a lot lot of you know legal Le and boilerplate stuff and just a lot of fine print and I found that one and I'd actually love to know your opinion on this but i' I've done this occasionally   where I'll take uh I'll take some some documents or ppms or marketing whatever I'll put them in chat GPT I'll just be like hey you know I'll start asking questions Hey what how does this work how does that work whatever and it'll kind of like go through and pull that out of there which is just kind of like a timesaver I just find for a lot of investors it's like I don't want to spend two hours reading this really you know thick language and I know you're an attorney so that's what you do and um   but I mean is that something that you've uh seen some people do or is it I know obviously things can be missed but it's it can kind of help you get to give you the gist of in this situation this happens or in this situation is that something that you kind of seen a little bit 100% and maybe not all attorneys would agree with this but I I encourage that I think it's perfectly fine like you've got to leverage technology and that technology is unbelievable it's unbelievable and it gets better every   single day like you just see a new iteration every couple of weeks now it's absolutely insane what it can do and you can certainly upload your PPM your operating agreement your subscription agreement into it and ask it questions now if it's something very nuanced it it won't it won't get to it if there's kind of like a lot of times there's like different Provisions that layer on top of each other it doesn't understand that yet it will at some point it'll be there and probably very very soon but a lot of   the questions you ask if they're nuanced um it won't understand it um so what I recommend is do that get a good high level overview you can also ask questions and then I would verify so like once it once it gives you an answer and it's something that's very important like you're like this is the answer that I was looking for ask it be like well what section did you pull this from and then get the section and then look it up yourself that particular section and verify that what it told you is actually   the answer yeah it's amazing the uh the tools we have I mean we really are in an an age where there's so much information everywhere but it's being able to access it quickly and it's like AI and some of these things can help with it and I don't think you know just a side note on AI I don't think it's that AI is going to be robots that's going to take over and kill us all or we're going to lose our jobs just to an AI bot or something but it's people using AI right that are are able to become a super employee or a   super business owner or super investor and really be able to get more information so I think it can be really powerful um what are uh what are some trends that you're kind of watching um I know actually I want you to talk about this too you're involved with a group called tribe vest which helps uh basically syndicators they have a portal and they can kind of have ways to be able to access uh certain deals and and and pass that information but what are what are also some Trends in relation what are some trends that you're seeing   as far as investing uh for Passive investors that are just things that can are good to watch or things that are helpful yeah I mean I think one really good thing is is what you you talked about already it's it's using Ai and and using software to make you a better investor so you can you like before you get this 200 Page PPM and you're like what what in the world do with this and maybe one out of a 100 investors will read that line for line if that and even if they could read it they probably don't understand it unless they they   happen to be a Securities attorney or some sort of transactional attorney they're not even going to get it um fun fact a PPM is actually supposed to be in non-legal ease it's supposed to be in in layman's terms that's the whole point of it is so that you can understand your investment in layman's terms but ppms have turned into you know a legal document so yeah even longer um but yeah I mean I think you can start leveraging Ai and software to just be a better investor and not just from you know   reading legal documents like we had mentioned earlier that's a good example of of you know when you're looking into an investment maybe put that PPM into chat gbt ask questions about the investment ask if there's any inconsistencies between the PPM and the operating agreement things like that um but you can also use it for underwriting and due diligence and things like that um I'm actually an adviser for a startup called brixley and we are working on kind of a due diligence type of process process where we're aggregating all the   due diligence documents we're putting them into a software and then you're able to evaluate the deal so you can evaluate that deal based on your buy box and those sorts of things and it's just it and things like that just change the game quickly right like before it just takes a lot of Manpower um a lot of hours and now it just takes minutes but you still have to have somebody skilled enough to prompt and skilled enough to ask the right questions and skilled enough to make sure that you're not believing the AI and it's not   hallucinating um that sort of thing because you've got to make sure that the information gives you is right because right now it does spit out some things that that don't make a lot of sense so you just gota gota be be very careful but people if you aren't leveraging AI in just your everyday life then you're you're getting left behind yeah yeah know you got a fact check on other stories of attorneys like I guess there was an attorney in New York that like just took his whole thing and put it into AI a chat jbt and it wasn't even   right it was like totally wrong and they got disbarred or something for doing that so it's obviously an investor the the risk is not going to be disbarred typically it's more you might lose your shorts or something so it's makeing sure you're doing it the right way yeah for sure yeah you gotta be careful you got to be careful but like I said it's getting better every single day like I I think in you know two years it's going to be unrecognizable in in five years we're going to have a humanoid robot in every home that we   have like yeah yeah it it really is changing so fast and that's where I think it is really important important to pay attention to technology to try new things if people are not like as a listener if you're if you haven't used chat GPT there's an app you can use for free there's the website get familiar with prompting which is just going in and just being commands I literally use it I'm going to Columbia we're recording this I'm going this week to Columbia and I want here's my nine days I'm going to   be here create an itinerary for me like literally created an itinerary based on my values what I want to do and and I can always like go off of that but it's like it's so helpful right it's amazing yeah it's such a time saer it's insane it's insane yeah it is it is uh well Seth I really appreciate you you being here today I just feel like you add so much value both as an investor a business owner an attorney um just love what you're creating with your content and uh can you just share how people can   follow your show and how they can hear about you and and some of the things that you're doing absolutely man best place to go would be Seth paaul bradley.com and that's where I have kind of all my social media links you'll have a link to raay law my Securities Law Firm as well as try best fun of funds in a box and the podcast as well awesome brother thanks for being here man all right thanks Bronson appreciate it all right I hope you enjoyed this interview with Seth I just I love the stuff at the   end there about AI if you you know you want to go back and Rel listen to that just using chat GPT in your life in your business to look at ppms and even as an attorney said yeah some attorneys don't like that because it will miss things but it's really a timesaver we use it all the time we use it all the time in our business I use it all the time in my personal life and it's just so helpful I literally it's kind of replace my Google search now because it's so much better and instead of we used to go spending   time on Google you spend 30 minutes researching something now it just kind of spit out the answer for you which is really great so I use it for health stuff for travel or business topics all kinds of different ideas just find it really really helpful so hopefully you got something out of this interview you enjoyed it if you have not en joined our investment Club you're not hearing about our amazing deals that we're doing right now and that we're really excited about so um if you want to check that out you   can check out the link in the uh show notes or the link below or you can go to Bronson equity.com and hit the join button we'll start a relationship with you set up a call with you and you can start hearing about our awesome upcoming deals so thank thank you for taking the time to educate yourself seriously it humbles me it excites me it gets me fired up because the best investment you make is in your own education we look forward to seeing you on the next episode you've been listening to the mailbox money podcast for more free   resources articles and videos go to Bronson equity.com there you can download your copy of the Special Report the single best investment strategy during and after a pandemic none of the information shared here is an offer to buy a specific investment and this is for education ational purposes only consult your financial legal and tax professionals and use your own Common Sense before making any investment decisions thanks for joining us and be sure to tune next time for more mailbox money [Music] Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xrvBhGtS5w&t=396s https://www.facebook.com/reel/1762572444669041 https://www.linkedin.com/posts/bronsonhill_when-deals-go-wrong-the-fallback-is-the-activity-7321649659108581377-87lt?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAFY-6nMBbbX5J6KeuEtIMcA9tcRG4F_1ItE Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en Bronson Hill's Links: https://bronsonequity.com/ https://www.instagram.com/bronsondavidhill/ https://www.instagram.com/bronsonequity/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/bronsonhill/ https://www.facebook.com/bronson.hill.37/ https://www.tiktok.com/@bronsonequity2020 https://open.spotify.com/show/7AQcShxvRMoD1U2zclQQVU

Title: How to Stay Compliant While Raising Millions with Bronson Hill Summary: In this episode of the Mailbox Money Show, host Bronson Hill interviews Seth Bradley, an accomplished attorney and entrepreneur known for his efforts in passive and active investing. The discussion revolves around the significant shifts in the real estate market post-COVID-19, including rising interest rates and the challenges passive investors face with underperforming deals. Seth shares his experiences with multifamily investments and the importance of selecting the right financial structures, highlighting how his focus on fixed-rate loans has insulated his deals from the volatility that adjustable-rate loans often endure.   As they explore other investment avenues, Seth discusses their ventures into various businesses, including gyms, e-commerce, and oil and gas projects. Both entrepreneurs illustrate how innovation and technology, particularly artificial intelligence, can significantly improve investment decision-making and operational efficiency. Their combined expertise offers valuable insights into the world of multifamily syndications, risk management, and leveraging technology for investment insights. The episode concludes with Seth's perspectives on effective communication between investors and sponsors and the importance of due diligence documents in passive investing. Links to listen and subscribe: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/seth-bradley-what-can-i-do-if-a-deal-goes-bad/id1580397502?i=1000698697087 https://open.spotify.com/episode/4pogVHik6rHwh0k5yFLs1U Links to watch and subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xrvBhGtS5w&t=396s Bullet Point Highlights: Diverse Entrepreneurial Background: Seth Bradley is not only an attorney but also a successful entrepreneur with experience in gyms and startups, adding depth to the authenticity of his investment strategies. Impact of Rising Interest Rates: The podcast discusses how increasing interest rates have shifted the landscape of real estate investments, influencing cash flow and project viability. Importance of Fixed-Rate Loans: Seth emphasizes the protective benefits of using fixed-rate loans in investments to buffer against economic shifts and rising rates. Shifting Investment Focus: As traditional multifamily deals become tough, both Bronson and Seth explore alternative assets, including oil and gas, debt funds, and smaller multifamily properties. Gym Ventures: Seth shares insights from operating gyms, illustrating how franchise businesses can provide a structured path to entrepreneurship with community support. Navigating Passive Investing Challenges: The episode highlights the key steps passive investors should take when deals aren't performing as expected, including reviewing existing legal agreements. Leveraging Technology and AI: The discussion underscores the growing role of AI in analyzing investments and legal documents, showcasing how technology can enhance investment efficiency and accuracy. Transcript: hey guys this is Ken mroy and you are listening to the mailbox money show with Bronson Hill hello hello and thank you for joining the mailbox money show my name is Bronson Hill I'm very excited for this episode with Seth Bradley you're gonna really like him he's done a lot of things he's like the renaissance man like he has done uh passive investing he's done active investing he owns a couple gyms he's starting another one he's got a couple startups he does he's got all kinds of things speaking   very intelligently to a lot of different topics he also has a show called The passive income attorney actually also an attorney as well and puts together syndication paperwork so he does a lot of different things and so I always love talking to people that are doing many things because first of all inspires me that I'm not doing enough and then secondly um you know they'll speak very intelligently on kind of trends that are happening so he's talks about what what we're going to talk in this interview   about what happened over the last few years he's doing less real estate looking at some other things and just what do you do if a deal does not go well what are the steps you can take as an investor so I think you're really going to enjoy this we also get into Ai and some awesome other topics so let's jump in Seth welcome to the mailbox money show Bronson what's going on buddy good to see you again hey man we're both in Southern California I know we're not that far apart but you're in like the better part especially lately with all   the fires up in La recently uh you're in San Diego man I don't know anybody that says they don't love San Diego yeah man I mean there's no better place in the United States that's for sure I mean I've seen some some beautiful places around the world and I don't know San Diego still might beat it um I get a little bit used to it because I've been here for quite some time now but San Diego is really tough to beat yeah awesome man well I'm excited to have you here today I know you're an attorney you have your podcast called   the passive income attorney podcast and you also work with tri vest which helps investors and you have a lot you to say around uh diligence around deals going bad we've seen deals uh We've we've had a couple deals that have really struggled uh I've been an investor passively in deals some deals that have struggled people don't really talk about this as much and I think it's really important to talk about um but let's let's talk about kind of what's changed the last couple years interest rates have risen um obviously if you're a   multif family investor the deals maybe aren't as juicy as they were the projections are a little lower a a little little far between as far as you know deals that actually cash flow or deals that make as much sense but uh what have you seen the last couple years and how have you kind of shifted a little bit of your business and your investing for sure I mean it's been um it's been an experience right I think a lot of the past investors out there that are listening or if you're an operator or lead sponsor out there the same thing   I mean we've we've gone through a period of time starting I think back when Co hit in 2020 that was kind of the first dip in the market that we've we've seen in this kind of generation right like the jobs act well I I should say the previous dip was in you know 2008 2009 that was one cycle but that was before the jobs Act of 2012 so the jobs Act of 2012 is where some of these private Investments started being opened up to more people and more people like ourselves were able to get involved and start raising capital and and do deals   and you've just seen that market kind of exponentially grow since 2012 um so we haven't seen a downturn until Co hit in 20120 and that one was kind of weird right because it was just kind of a blip it wasn't because of the economy it was because of something that just you know nobody's going to be able to predict um but that's the first uh crack in the armor that we saw and then after that then we saw the interest rates go up in in 2020 towards the end of 2022 and the beginning of 2023 and that's what really   started um you know giving us this experience that I'll say that we're we're still kind of going through because the interest rates are still a little bit higher than what we've we've seen over the past years and we're we're seeing more deals go go bad right or or at least you know there maybe a capital call or or two or perhaps um you know some of your distributions if you're a passive investor might be on pause and these are things that we're just not used to seeing because we're just used to seeing over the past you know 10   years up till 2022 all the deals have just gone really really well so it's a surprise to us and it shouldn't be because you know it's it's cyclic but we we'll figure it out and you know you're just seeing these things that we've all been warned about and they're now coming to fruition yeah yeah it's interesting you know I think if you between 2010 and 2020 you know 2021 even if you just owned a multif family apartment you were a genius right because things were just only going up and to the right and and   then sudden like there's that quote by Warren Buffett says you can only tell who's been swimming naked when the tide goes out kind of thing the tide interest Rising the tide goes out it's like oh my gosh this isn't work in the way we planned it um and now you in your portfolio you guys have done very well you've had some some great you haven't done as many deals more recently but um your deals have done well is that because you did kind of fix interest rate or is just the markets you chose or I'd love to hear a little more about   that that's right I mean fixed interest rates to be honest were a huge thing um that that's one thing that we really pushed for in our deals and that's and that saved us a little bit when these interest rates started to r that protected us um you know you saw that those were the deals that got in trouble those those adjustable rates got people in trouble and you know there towards the end like let say 2021 22 it was really hard to make the deals start to like continue to work and get those returns that we promised those passive   investors without taking those adjustable rate loans so you know those folks that got in in 2021 2022 maybe the beginning of 2023 those deals had adjustable rate loans and that's where they got into some trouble yeah yeah it's interesting kind of how things have changed now it's interesting too there was um a time not even that you know just a few years ago that that real estate was Cash flowing pretty well especially multif family real estate and now it's pretty tough because you know you got rates are   higher uh cost you know the price maybe have come down a little bit but you got higher Insurance you got higher other costs other inflation things you know there's not a lot of cash flow so a lot of you know syndicators or multif family investors have kind of just stepped out or maybe they got pitched on a deal here and there so we we've shifted a little bit to do we still do some multif family in in specific situations but um we' switched to go really focus on oil and gas we're doing uh other types of   businesses like I mentioned we're buying this business that's a e-commerce business High cash flow and then there's also debt funds you know debt these days there are debt funds paying like Equity was paying with less risk than it was a few years ago right so if you can get not debt funds are the same there's some that are first position that are low leverage and things like that uh what are are there anything else that you're finding for cashow or that you're finding attractive right now as an   investor yeah I mean I think you got to just look a little bit deeper I mean there's still some decent multif family deals out there too and that's always going to be to me kind of like bread and butter right like that's something that we're always going to need it's always going to be um it's always going to be something that people are interested in um because we've all lived in apartments at some point in our lives and I think it's an easy thing to grasp mentally okay like I'm going to invest in a   multif family or apartment building because I've lived in one I know what it's like I know how they work people pay rent you collect you you know expenses that sort of thing um but it's it's a lot tougher to find those deals um so people have looked at other things so I've seen a lot of um you know debt funds like you said a lot of people pivoting to um you know even smaller multif Family Properties um you know before we were looking at like 100 200 250 unit properties um now I've seen a lot of people kind of Ratchet that down   a little bit and look for some better deals in in some smaller properties maybe in the 25 to 75 unit range range that sort of thing um I've seen people like get into mobile home parks and RV parks after cuz we saw that go quite up quite a bit during CO as well and then came rocketing back down um but now you can kind of see like where where it really sits like now you can see like what the value of that asset is so you can see that the you know what those what they really are without like that big spike for covid and those are   turning out to be some pretty good Investments to get involved in too yeah and I know um you know we talked about this before we started recording um you and your wife you guys also operate a business or you guys have a a gym a couple gyms that you operate tell us about that and it's that um I know you're sounds like you're spanning so it sounds like it's going well I need to pop into a gym I'm probably get my butt kicked if I pop in there and you g through the Seth Bradley workout there right so yeah man we have a we have a   couple of gyms right now we have one open in Oceanside this is in San Diego uh San Diego County one in Oceanside one in Poway getting ready to open up a third one in anas it's under the burn boot camp franchise fly FL so it's a franchise um and I got uh really interested in franchises for that and then I ended up buying into another franchise I ended up buying into a water restoration franchise called Al dry so we've got a few businesses going um but those gyms are great right like once we battled through again I hate to keep   bringing up Co but it keeps coming up um but we battled through Co we opened up right before that hit uh actually one week before it hit so then we had to shut it down and work out outside workout inside we had to do um on online workouts those sorts of things um had our lead trainer in our apartment recording videos and me and my wife were in the background doing the exercises um pretty insane what we had to go through but they're they're doing really well now and luckily my wife has taking over that business and she runs   the whole thing so I don't do anything she doesn't even want me involved anymore so it's fantastic it it's actually turned into passive income for me for you it's passive income right for her it's right it's it's Fitness income right but that's you know really a lot of people like um lifestyle businesses you know where you're like it's just I think it's just a cool thing to say I own a gym or own a restaurant or I own this thing I mean a lot of like really wealthy people be like oh yeah I own a   Vineyard or I own a I own a horse racing thing or something like that but is it is it I mean you don't have to get into specific numbers but is it pretty it's you're opening another one so it's pretty lucrative to do it it sounds like it's working out well the it's a boutique gy that does kind of boot camp type stuff and you have certain classes you go in and those have become super popular all over the us but especially in big metros like Southern California for sure and look I don't want to say   that it's easy because it's it's definitely not you have to have the right mindset you've got to be an entrepreneur you've got to be able to fight through the hard times but you know these these types of businesses they're they're kind of done for you to a certain extent they give you the marketing plan they give you the business plan they give you kind of the proforma that you should be aiming for um especially with a franchise there's there's dozens if not hundreds of other franchisees that are doing the exact   same thing you are so you any qu any question or any problem that you're going through they have already went through it or they're going through it so you can bounce ideas off of you know kind of similar to like a mastermind right something like that where you get involved with a few people and it's like oh how can I get around people that have the same problems as me in a franchise there's that's already built in and it's even more it's even more dialed in because these are very specific like   brand specific industry specific questions and problems that you can balance those ideas and have those questions answered by your your fellow franchisees um but as far as like profitability again it's great because you can you can predict it like the idea behind it you buy one you figure it out then you buy more and then you keep going you stack and stack and stack and that's how you really make a lot of money in franchises you hear people that own dozens or you know hundreds of Papa John and things like that like you need   to be able to stack them um but they're definitely profitable um and they're fun they're it's a fun business like you said it's fun to be able to say that you own a gym it's fun to like walk into your own place if it's a gym or a restaurant or whatever it is and you're the owner it just feels good right it's a little bit more um you know rewarding I should say than some of the other businesses that that we're involved in for me it's you know a law firm and um buying real estate and it's this is just   a little bit more rewarding just like being there just the presence and having a um you know having a a brick and mortar space it's pretty cool yeah know I love that it's really interesting you guys I didn't realize you guys are are really Ser serial entrepreneurs I you guys are really both as a couple um is that like tell me a little bit about that dynamic as a couple that you and your wife do that like how is that something you've more LED is it something she's done is it kind of like you just kind of stay in your lanes and   like because a lot of times one one spouse or partner will be really risk you know averse or one would be much more risk tolerant and so has that been just like a really you guys are both kind of willing to take risk and kind of move forward in that yeah I think we we both have a really good temperament for it as far as risk tolerance and for me personally that's that's interesting because I'm an attorney so typically attorneys are not risk tolerant um but I I am I have that trait and and she does too um we have certain   trust in each other to be able to handle and stay in our lanes um she especially for the gyms you know she's operations right now I handle finance and and Prof formas and those sorts of things and obviously the legal stuff that comes up and I'm the maintenance guy too of course but um but everything else like operations she does that and then when she knows that she needs me for these certain things she'll bring me in um we've explored trying to figure out some other businesses uh that we might be   able to get involved in together and I think you know having that experience in the gyms gives us a good idea of how it would work out with some others yeah as she ever teaching the class like if you're in the dogh house you got to take a boot camp with her and she'll be extra tough on you or something ah she's she's not a trainer luckily I would I would I would avoid those camps for sure I think that'd be pretty funny no I think it's great man I love how you've created that you know for yourself that you guys and of course   you know I think I've noticed this too a lot of uh there's a lot of people they'll have they'll be really excited about real estate they'll be really excited about investing and then you get one that's one spouse is very risk averse what what do you say to someone who guess their spouse is pretty risk averse and you know maybe they're concerned whether they're a passive investor or they're interested in doing business things are like this like how do how do they kind of get that person on board or what have you seen is kind   of work to kind of help them to kind of work forward with that move forward yeah I mean it's tough it's tough right like you have to you have to choose your significant other wisely and it's probably the biggest decision that you'll make in your life not only for personally but also in business because if you have someone that just can't get on board with what you're doing or doesn't understand what you're trying to do um and you don't mesh very well on that side of things it it makes things a lot more a lot more difficult right and   you see that all the time you see couples fighting about business and somebody's working too much and the other person's not working enough or those sorts of Dynamics um but I think a lot of it can be solved with education you know a lot of it is just kind of this other person doesn't know enough about the business or the investment or whatever it might be and they just need some education so they're not the person they're not like us every single day just immersed in this and getting on podcasts and you know   listening to podcasts and reading books and all this stuff about these Assets in these businesses so you have to keep that in mind like they need to they need to understand to a certain extent so they can get comfortable with it I mean that's you know when people are scared to make moves it's usually because they're just not educated enough to be able to to assess the risk and move forward or not now if they are educated enough and they do know enough about the asset and they still say look this is a   bad deal well then maybe maybe you should look at it again and make sure that it's not a not a bad deal but there there's definitely some you know give take there with personality types and how much risk that each person's comfortable with or not comfortable with yeah absolutely I think that's definitely I just I love when I see couples that are like really on the same page and are like yeah we're in this and you're you know you're doing it which is great and be both be active which is awesome um so let's talk a little bit   about um I guess you know kind of circle back to you know investing in deals you know as a passive investor um you know if if someone invests in a deal that doesn't go well um how to you know how should a passive investor respond to that or what are the things that you know someone can do if they're not getting the communication that they need I mean I know there's some legal things you can do but then it starts expensive and like what I guess what are some options as a passive investor let's say   your sponsor is having struggles or they're just not communicating is there some like what are the what are the what what can you do to try to get that to change yeah I mean this is why paperwork is so important like people don't want to deal with that and you know I'm an attorney so I'm on the front end all the time like telling you telling everybody hey like make sure we hash this out now like let's be have a a really transparent conversation let's figure out exactly what each part is getting   into and let's not like hold back at all you know a lot and some of this applies to passive investing some of it doesn't because you you know you have certain things that you can ask for certain things that you can't but be as transparent as possible upfront and with the paperwork and pay attention to what you sign and what you sign up for because at the end of the day when things start to go wrong that's what the fallback is the fallback is okay this person isn't communicating any longer or they're not doing the things that they   said vocally they're going to do what can I do and at that point that's when you have to look at the paperwork so if you have a contract and in this case it would be an operating agreement or a limited partnership agreement that you've signed or subscription agreement to you have to go back to that paperwork and look and sometimes they may have put in that paperwork for instance that they do agree to give you a quarterly report or maybe they agree to give you a an annual financial statement or maybe they   didn't I don't know it depends on what the paperwork says but that's the first step see what your rights are contractually and that's a good place to start because if you do have a contractual right that they have to give you a quarterly report or they have to give you annual financial statements or if you request it they have to give you certain Financial reports then that's the place to start and you say look I know things aren't going as well as they should be going I really want to get this thing back on track let's let's   start communicating but you know pursuing to the operating agreement I I need to see a quarterly report or I need to see this financial report um and put that in writing and writing can be just as simple as an email or text but get it in writing make sure that that communication is documented um not just verbally because if something does go wrong if if there is some sort of and this is unlikely but if there is some sort of fraud or gross negligence or anything like that going on at least you have that uh that written communication   between the parties that down the line you can be like look I asked for this five times I still haven't received it they said they would do this and then you can start saying okay at this point maybe we're not just talking about somebody not doing a great job or maybe we're not talking about the investment not going well as well as anticipated maybe now we're talking about some sort of negligence maybe now we're talking about somebody misrepresenting what they said they were going to do versus what   they do um but you need to have that in writing so that at the end of the day you can put that together um and and show it to whoever it might be your lawyer their lawyer or maybe a court yeah yeah it's interesting you know there's some new tools out there as well a lot of times these documents sometimes are 80 to 200 pages and there's a lot lot of you know legal Le and boilerplate stuff and just a lot of fine print and I found that one and I'd actually love to know your opinion on this but i' I've done this occasionally   where I'll take uh I'll take some some documents or ppms or marketing whatever I'll put them in chat GPT I'll just be like hey you know I'll start asking questions Hey what how does this work how does that work whatever and it'll kind of like go through and pull that out of there which is just kind of like a timesaver I just find for a lot of investors it's like I don't want to spend two hours reading this really you know thick language and I know you're an attorney so that's what you do and um   but I mean is that something that you've uh seen some people do or is it I know obviously things can be missed but it's it can kind of help you get to give you the gist of in this situation this happens or in this situation is that something that you kind of seen a little bit 100% and maybe not all attorneys would agree with this but I I encourage that I think it's perfectly fine like you've got to leverage technology and that technology is unbelievable it's unbelievable and it gets better every   single day like you just see a new iteration every couple of weeks now it's absolutely insane what it can do and you can certainly upload your PPM your operating agreement your subscription agreement into it and ask it questions now if it's something very nuanced it it won't it won't get to it if there's kind of like a lot of times there's like different Provisions that layer on top of each other it doesn't understand that yet it will at some point it'll be there and probably very very soon but a lot of   the questions you ask if they're nuanced um it won't understand it um so what I recommend is do that get a good high level overview you can also ask questions and then I would verify so like once it once it gives you an answer and it's something that's very important like you're like this is the answer that I was looking for ask it be like well what section did you pull this from and then get the section and then look it up yourself that particular section and verify that what it told you is actually   the answer yeah it's amazing the uh the tools we have I mean we really are in an an age where there's so much information everywhere but it's being able to access it quickly and it's like AI and some of these things can help with it and I don't think you know just a side note on AI I don't think it's that AI is going to be robots that's going to take over and kill us all or we're going to lose our jobs just to an AI bot or something but it's people using AI right that are are able to become a super employee or a   super business owner or super investor and really be able to get more information so I think it can be really powerful um what are uh what are some trends that you're kind of watching um I know actually I want you to talk about this too you're involved with a group called tribe vest which helps uh basically syndicators they have a portal and they can kind of have ways to be able to access uh certain deals and and and pass that information but what are what are also some Trends in relation what are some trends that you're seeing   as far as investing uh for Passive investors that are just things that can are good to watch or things that are helpful yeah I mean I think one really good thing is is what you you talked about already it's it's using Ai and and using software to make you a better investor so you can you like before you get this 200 Page PPM and you're like what what in the world do with this and maybe one out of a 100 investors will read that line for line if that and even if they could read it they probably don't understand it unless they they   happen to be a Securities attorney or some sort of transactional attorney they're not even going to get it um fun fact a PPM is actually supposed to be in non-legal ease it's supposed to be in in layman's terms that's the whole point of it is so that you can understand your investment in layman's terms but ppms have turned into you know a legal document so yeah even longer um but yeah I mean I think you can start leveraging Ai and software to just be a better investor and not just from you know   reading legal documents like we had mentioned earlier that's a good example of of you know when you're looking into an investment maybe put that PPM into chat gbt ask questions about the investment ask if there's any inconsistencies between the PPM and the operating agreement things like that um but you can also use it for underwriting and due diligence and things like that um I'm actually an adviser for a startup called brixley and we are working on kind of a due diligence type of process process where we're aggregating all the   due diligence documents we're putting them into a software and then you're able to evaluate the deal so you can evaluate that deal based on your buy box and those sorts of things and it's just it and things like that just change the game quickly right like before it just takes a lot of Manpower um a lot of hours and now it just takes minutes but you still have to have somebody skilled enough to prompt and skilled enough to ask the right questions and skilled enough to make sure that you're not believing the AI and it's not   hallucinating um that sort of thing because you've got to make sure that the information gives you is right because right now it does spit out some things that that don't make a lot of sense so you just gota gota be be very careful but people if you aren't leveraging AI in just your everyday life then you're you're getting left behind yeah yeah know you got a fact check on other stories of attorneys like I guess there was an attorney in New York that like just took his whole thing and put it into AI a chat jbt and it wasn't even   right it was like totally wrong and they got disbarred or something for doing that so it's obviously an investor the the risk is not going to be disbarred typically it's more you might lose your shorts or something so it's makeing sure you're doing it the right way yeah for sure yeah you gotta be careful you got to be careful but like I said it's getting better every single day like I I think in you know two years it's going to be unrecognizable in in five years we're going to have a humanoid robot in every home that we   have like yeah yeah it it really is changing so fast and that's where I think it is really important important to pay attention to technology to try new things if people are not like as a listener if you're if you haven't used chat GPT there's an app you can use for free there's the website get familiar with prompting which is just going in and just being commands I literally use it I'm going to Columbia we're recording this I'm going this week to Columbia and I want here's my nine days I'm going to   be here create an itinerary for me like literally created an itinerary based on my values what I want to do and and I can always like go off of that but it's like it's so helpful right it's amazing yeah it's such a time saer it's insane it's insane yeah it is it is uh well Seth I really appreciate you you being here today I just feel like you add so much value both as an investor a business owner an attorney um just love what you're creating with your content and uh can you just share how people can   follow your show and how they can hear about you and and some of the things that you're doing absolutely man best place to go would be Seth paaul bradley.com and that's where I have kind of all my social media links you'll have a link to raay law my Securities Law Firm as well as try best fun of funds in a box and the podcast as well awesome brother thanks for being here man all right thanks Bronson appreciate it all right I hope you enjoyed this interview with Seth I just I love the stuff at the   end there about AI if you you know you want to go back and Rel listen to that just using chat GPT in your life in your business to look at ppms and even as an attorney said yeah some attorneys don't like that because it will miss things but it's really a timesaver we use it all the time we use it all the time in our business I use it all the time in my personal life and it's just so helpful I literally it's kind of replace my Google search now because it's so much better and instead of we used to go spending   time on Google you spend 30 minutes researching something now it just kind of spit out the answer for you which is really great so I use it for health stuff for travel or business topics all kinds of different ideas just find it really really helpful so hopefully you got something out of this interview you enjoyed it if you have not en joined our investment Club you're not hearing about our amazing deals that we're doing right now and that we're really excited about so um if you want to check that out you   can check out the link in the uh show notes or the link below or you can go to Bronson equity.com and hit the join button we'll start a relationship with you set up a call with you and you can start hearing about our awesome upcoming deals so thank thank you for taking the time to educate yourself seriously it humbles me it excites me it gets me fired up because the best investment you make is in your own education we look forward to seeing you on the next episode you've been listening to the mailbox money podcast for more free   resources articles and videos go to Bronson equity.com there you can download your copy of the Special Report the single best investment strategy during and after a pandemic none of the information shared here is an offer to buy a specific investment and this is for education ational purposes only consult your financial legal and tax professionals and use your own Common Sense before making any investment decisions thanks for joining us and be sure to tune next time for more mailbox money [Music] Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xrvBhGtS5w&t=396s https://www.facebook.com/reel/1762572444669041 https://www.linkedin.com/posts/bronsonhill_when-deals-go-wrong-the-fallback-is-the-activity-7321649659108581377-87lt?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAAFY-6nMBbbX5J6KeuEtIMcA9tcRG4F_1ItE Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en Bronson Hill's Links: https://bronsonequity.com/ https://www.instagram.com/bronsondavidhill/ https://www.instagram.com/bronsonequity/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/bronsonhill/ https://www.facebook.com/bronson.hill.37/ https://www.tiktok.com/@bronsonequity2020 https://open.spotify.com/show/7AQcShxvRMoD1U2zclQQVU

Title: How to Make Millions with Vending Machines with Mike Hoffman Summary: In this conversation, Seth Bradley and Mike Hoffman delve into the world of vending machines as a business opportunity. Mike shares his journey from a Midwest farm boy to a successful entrepreneur in the vending industry, highlighting the evolution of vending technology and the potential for passive income. They discuss the importance of location, understanding demographics, and the scalability of vending routes. Mike emphasizes the need for upfront work and learning before delegating tasks, while also addressing the misconceptions surrounding passive income in the vending business. In this conversation, Seth Bradley and Mike discuss various aspects of entrepreneurship, particularly in the vending machine business. They explore the importance of capital raising, the journey of self-discovery, influences that shape business decisions, and the definition of success. The dialogue emphasizes the significance of flexibility, discipline, and focus in achieving entrepreneurial goals, while also touching on financial milestones and the attributes that distinguish successful entrepreneurs. Links to Watch and Subscribe:   Bullet Point Highlights: Mike's journey from a classic Midwest farm boy to a successful entrepreneur. The evolution of vending machines from traditional to smart technology. Understanding the importance of location in the vending business. The analogy of baseball levels to describe starting in vending. Scaling up from single A to big leagues in vending routes. The significance of demographics in product selection for vending machines. The potential for passive income with proper systems in place. The need for upfront work before achieving passivity in business. Vending is not a get-rich-quick scheme; it requires dedication. The future opportunities in the vending industry are expanding rapidly. Raising capital can dilute ownership but may be necessary for rapid growth. Self-discovery often leads to unexpected career paths. Influences in business can come from personal experiences rather than just mentors. Success is often defined by the ability to prioritize family and flexibility. Entrepreneurs work harder than in traditional jobs but gain flexibility. Discipline is crucial for saying no to distractions. Successful entrepreneurs often focus on niche markets. High foot traffic locations are ideal for vending machines. AI is transforming business operations and efficiency. Networking and connections can lead to valuable opportunities. Transcript: Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:04.898) Mike, what's going on buddy? Doing great brother, doing great. How about you?   Mike (00:06.748) Don't worry,   Mike (00:11.664) Good, I'm a little flustered. I usually have my mic set up over here, but I guess we just moved and it's not here today. I guess, yeah, new office and it's been a whole hot mess.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:19.822) New office or what?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:27.862) Nice man, nice. I see you got the whiteboard cranking back there. Love to see that.   Mike (00:33.114) Always. I love your background. That's sweet.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:38.03) Thanks man, yeah, I'm on camera all the time so I like I need to just build this out instead of using like a green screen so Made the investment made it happen   Mike (00:44.86) Totally.   Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:49.442) Have we met in person or not? I don't know if we've met at a Wealth Without Wall Street event or I couldn't tell. Okay. No, I did not go to Nashville last year.   Mike (00:58.478) I don't think so. don't think you're... Were you in Nashville last year?   Mike (01:04.634) No, okay. No, I don't think we've met in person. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:08.256) Okay, all good, man. All good. Well, cool. I'll just go over the format real quick. We'll do kind of a shorter recording. We're do like 30 minutes, something like in that range. And then we'll just kind of like break. And then I'll, want to record a couple of other quick segments where I call it Million Dollar Monday. I'm kind of asking you about how you made your first, last and next million. And then 1 % closer, which would just be kind of what separates you, what makes you the   top 1 % in your particular vertical. So we'll just kind of record those separately. Those will be real short, like five minutes or so.   Mike (01:44.924) Okay, yeah, I'll follow your lead. All good.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:47.15) Cool. Cool. Let's see. I think I already have this auto recording. So we're already recording. So I'll just jump right in.   Mike (01:55.377) Okay.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:57.782) Welcome to Raise the Bar Radio, hosted by yours truly Seth Bradley. We today we've got Mr. Passive, Mike Hoffman. Mike, welcome to the show.   Mike (02:08.189) Thank you for having me fired up to be here.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:10.855) Absolutely man, really happy to have you on. I know it's been a little bit of a trek here to get our schedules lined up, but really stoked to have you on today, man. I see you said you moved into a new office. You've got the whiteboard cranking, so love to see it.   Mike (02:25.372) yeah, whiteboards are the only place I can get my thoughts down.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:29.399) Yeah, man, it makes a difference when you actually write something rather than type it or even on a mirror board where you're doing it online. just there's something about physically writing something down.   Mike (02:41.328) You know, I'm glad you said that because yesterday I flipped to Seattle for a quick work trip and I didn't have wifi and I literally had three pages of just, I, was so like the clarity of some of these kinds of bigger visions I have now from just being able to write for an hour on a flight was, I was like, man, I gotta do this more often.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:00.363) Yeah, for sure. The key though is once you write it down, it just doesn't go into the trash or into a black hole somewhere where you never see it again. So that's kind of the disadvantage there. If you have it on your computer and you're taking notes or you have it on a mirror board, at least it's there to reference all the time. If you write it down on paper, sometimes, I've got my Raze Masters book right here for notes, but it's like, it might go into the abyss and I'll never look at it again. So you gotta be careful about that.   Mike (03:27.184) Yeah, yeah, I need to check out the Miro boards. I've heard a lot of good things about them.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:31.467) Yeah, yeah. Awesome, Mike. Well, listen, for our audience who doesn't know anything about you, maybe just tell them, you know, tell them a little bit about your background. Tell them about your your main business and we can take it from there.   Mike (03:43.354) Yeah. So I think for those that don't know about me, I'm a classic Midwest farm boy started with a classic, you know, showing cattle at the county fair and all of that and had a lemonade stand growing up. And then my first job was actually at McDonald's, you know, thinking about the whole success of that business model. But when I was coaching and, out of college, I got my first rental and I was like, wow, this is crazy. making money without.   really much time involved. and then with my work in Silicon Valley, know, Seth, was classic Silicon Valley, you know, cutthroat job that, startup life and traveling three weeks out of the month. And I was on, I was in airports all the time. And was like, these vending machines I would run into at airports were just so archaic. And so I went down this path of like unattended retail and kind of the future of, of that. And that's really where I just see a huge opportunity right now.   And so it's kind of what led me into all these different income streams that I'm passionate about.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (04:49.431) That's awesome, man. Well, let's dive into that a little bit deeper. me about these income streams. It centers around vending machines, right? But I'm sure there's a lot more to it. I'm sure there's a lot of different entry points for people. Maybe just kind of give us a general synopsis to start out.   Mike (05:06.78) Yeah, so I think the big thing with, you know, if we're talking vending specifically as an income stream, you know, most people think of vending as the traditional machines where you enter in a code, you put your card on the machine and then a motor spirals down a Snickers bar or a soda and you go into the chute and grab it.   Nowadays, there's these smart machines that literally you just unlock the door, or even if you go into, land in the Vegas airport right at the bottom of the escalator where it says, welcome to Las Vegas, there's a 7-Eleven with gates and AI cameras, and there's no employees in the 7-Eleven. And it just tracks whatever you grab and to exit the gate, you have to pay for it. So like, there's just this huge market now where we just installed it in urgent care.   less than two months ago and we can do over the counter meds in that machine because it doesn't have to fit into a motor. It's just shelf space. You identify with the planogram with the AI cameras like, okay, Dayquil in this slot or Salad in this slot and then whatever they grab, gets charged to the person that pulls it from it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (06:15.469) That's interesting, man. Yeah, I mean, my initial thought too, was just like the traditional old vending machine where you're getting a candy bar or a cola out of there. But yeah, nowadays, now that you mentioned that, you see this more and more every single day where you've got these scanners, you've got kind of self-checkout, that sort of thing. So that's kind of, that expands that world and really opens it up to the future, right? Like it just really, that's what we're trying to get to, or at least we think we wanna get there, where we're kind of removing humans and...   kind of working with technologies and things like that.   Mike (06:49.488) Yeah, and I think, you know, removing the whole human thing. mean, those machines still got to get stocked and you know, there's not robots running around doing that. But I just come back to, I was a Marriott guy when I was on the road all the time and I'd go to these grab and goes at a Marriott and grab a, the end of the night, I'd grab like a little wine or an ice cream sandwich. And I literally had to go wait in line at the check-in desk behind three people checking in just to tell them, Hey, put these on.   room charge and I was like if I had a checkout kiosk in that grab-and-go I could have just removed all the friction for this customer experience.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:27.772) Right, 100%. Yeah, I mean, there's a place and time for it and there's more and more applications for it that just pop up every single day and you can kind of spot that in your life as you're just kind of moving through, whether you're checking into your hotel or whatever you're doing.   Mike (07:41.456) Yeah, yeah. So that's just kind of what excites me today.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:45.973) Yeah, yeah, so when a stranger asks you what you do just in the street, what do you tell them? Because I have a hard time answering that question sometimes too, but I'd love to hear what your answer is.   Mike (07:56.804) Yeah, I would just say it depends on the day. You know, what do you do or what's your, you know, it's like at the golf course when you get paired up with a stranger and they're like, tell me about what you do for your career. And I just say, I'm a classic entrepreneur. And then I'm like, well, what do you do? And it's like, well, tell me about the day. You know, what fire are you putting out? Like today we just got the go ahead for five more urgent cares for our local route. But then, you know, we have a community of operators across the country that we help really build.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:57.933) haha   Ha ha ha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (08:09.879) Yeah. Yeah.   Mike (08:25.616) Vending empires and so we had a group call this morning. So literally, there's a lot of just, you know, it's classic entrepreneurial life. You never know what the day's script is gonna be.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (08:36.161) Yeah, for sure. And you focus a lot on not only on your own business, but also teaching others, right? Teaching others how to kind of break into this business.   Mike (08:45.402) Yeah, that's my passion, Seth. When I got into my first investment out of college was a $70,000 rental, you know, putting 20 % down or 14K and using an emergency fund. like my background in going to college was as a coach. like I knew I wanted to kind of take that mindset of like coaching people, you know, teach them how to fish. I don't want to catch all the fish myself. It's just not fulfilling that way. So that's really where my passion is.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (09:15.373) Gotcha, gotcha. tell me about like, tell me about step one. I mean, how does somebody break into this business? Obviously your own personal business is probably very advanced. There's probably a lot more sophisticated investing strategies at this point and you've got different layers to it. But somebody just kind of starting out that said, hey, this sounds pretty interesting. This vending machine business sounds like it can be passive. How do you recommend that they get started?   Mike (09:40.57) Yeah, so I'm always, I view like the whole vending scale as similar to Major League Baseball. You got your single A all the way up to the big leagues. And if you're just starting out, I always recommend like find a location where you can put a machine and just learn the process. Like to me, that's single A analogy. you know, that always starts with, people want to jump right to like, well, what type of machines do you recommend?   products, how do you price products? And the first question I'll always ask Seth is, well, what location is this machine going in? And they're like, well, I don't know yet. I was just going to buy one and put it in my garage to start. And it's like, no, you need to have the location first. So understanding that, is it a pet hospital? Is it an apartment? Is it a gym? Where is the foot traffic? And then you can cater to what's the best machine for that type of location.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (10:36.887) Got it, got it. Now is this a kind of a rent, you rent the space to place the machine with that particular business or wherever you're gonna place it or how does that all come together?   Mike (10:47.644) not typically, some people are kind of more advanced, like apartment complexes are used to the revenue share model. So they're going to ask for a piece of the pie for sure, for you to put the machine in their lobby. but like, you know, when we're talking urgent carers or even pet hospitals are viewing it as an amenity. And so we probably have, I don't even know how many machines now 75 now, and we, you know, less than half of those actually,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (10:50.423) Okay.   Mike (11:15.1) us rent or ask for a revenue share to have them in there. So I never leave lead with that, but we'll do it if we need to get the location.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (11:23.989) Interesting gotcha. So it's really a value add for wherever you're gonna place it and that's how most people or I guess most businesses would look at that and then you're able to capture that that space   Mike (11:27.366) Mm-hmm.   Mike (11:34.236) Yeah, absolutely. So, um, a great case study is we have a 25 employee roughing business here in Oregon. And you might think like, only 25 employees. It's not going to make that much money. Well, we do $1,200 a month. And the cool thing about this, Seth, is the CEO of this roughing company literally did napkin math on how much it costs for his employees to drive to the gas station during their 20 minute break. And then   How much they're paying for an energy drink at the gas station and then how much gas they're using with the roofing like the work trucks to get to and from the gas station So he's like I want to bring a smart machine into our warehouse Set the prices as half off so that four dollar monster only costs his rofers two dollars and then we invoice him the the business owner every month for the other 50 % and so he actually   Calculated as a cost savings not asking for money to rent the space   Seth Bradley, Esq. (12:35.597) Yeah, gotcha, gotcha. That makes sense. That makes sense. I love the baseball analogy with the single A, double A, triple A, even into the big leagues here. know, a lot of the folks that listen to this are already kind of, you know, in the big leagues or maybe think about some capital behind them. Like how would they be able to jump right in, maybe skip single or double A or would they, or do you even suggest that? Do you suggest that they start, you know, small just to learn and then maybe invest some more capital into it to expand or can they jump right to the big leagues?   Mike (12:48.891) Yeah.   Yeah.   Mike (13:03.966) I think they can jump right to the big leagues. this is, I'm glad you brought this up because just listening to some of your episodes from the past, there's no doubt that you have people that could buy a route like a off biz buy sell today. And I think this is a prime opportunity. it's very similar to flipping a house. you, you know, there's a route in Chicago, I think it was for $1.1 million, you know, whatever negotiating terms or seller financing or, or what have you, got a lot of, your, your   audience that is experts in that. But the cool thing about these routes is they have the old school machines that have the motors and that are limited to, this type of machine, you can only fit a 12 ounce cannon. Well, guess what? The minute you buy that route, you swap out that machine with one of these micro markets or smart machines. Now you just went from selling a 12 ounce soda for $1.25 to now a 16 ounce monster for $4.50.   Well, you just bought that location based on its current revenue numbers and by swapping out that machine, you're going to two or three acts your revenue just at that location. And so it's truly just like a value play, a value upgrade, like flipping the house of, okay, there's a lot of deals right now of these routes being sold by baby boomers where it's like, they got the old school Pepsi machine. Doesn't have a credit card reader on it. They can't track inventory remotely via their cell phones. So   They're not keeping it stocked. Like all those types of things can really play in your favor as a buyer that just wants to get to the big leagues right away.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (14:37.651) I love that. When you say buy a route, what are you really buying? Tell me about the contractual agreement behind that. What are you really buying there?   Mike (14:47.184) You're just buying the locations and the equipment associated with it. So like this Chicago route, it's like, we have machines in 75 properties all across the Chicago suburbs. And they could be medical clinics. could be apartments. could be employee break rooms at businesses, but that's when you start diving into those locations. It's like, I have a snack machine and a soda machine here. Well, you swap that out with a micro market that now instead of.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (14:49.279) Okay. Okay.   Mike (15:13.626) that machine that'll only hold a small bag of Doritos that you charge two bucks, well now you get the movie size theater bags that you can really put in there in a micro market. Like naturally just that valuation of that route based on those 75 machines current revenue, I mean you're gonna be able to two or three X your revenue right by just swapping out those machines.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (15:35.959) Wow, yeah, I love that analogy with real estate, right? It's just like a value add. It's like, how can I bring in more income from what already exists? Well, I need to upgrade or I need to put in some capital improvements, whatever you want to call it. Here's the vending machine upgrades or a different kind of system in there. And you get more income. And obviously that business in itself is going to be worth more in a higher multiple.   Mike (15:58.396) Absolutely. mean, a great example of this is we had a machine in an apartment complex and it was your traditional machine with the motors and you have to enter in the code. Well, we could only put in four 12 ounce drinks and then chips. Well, we swapped that out with a micro market. Well, now that micro market, we literally put in bags of Tide Pods for laundry, like these big bags of Tide Pods. We'll sell those like hotcakes for 15 bucks. And our old machine,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:25.281) Yeah, let's say those aren't cheap.   Mike (16:27.246) Yeah, our old machine Seth, it would take us to get to 15 bucks, we'd have to sell eight Snickers. That's one transaction.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:33.547) Right, right. Yeah, yeah. How do you do an analysis kind of based on like what you think is gonna sell there, right? Like you're replacing, let's say a Dorito machine with Tide Pods, you know? So you have to individually go to each location and figure out what will work, what will sell.   Mike (16:47.738) Yeah.   Mike (16:51.834) It's all about demographic. Absolutely. So, you know, we have, we have, we have a micro market and a manufacturing plant that's, it's a pumpkin farm and there's a ton of Hispanic workers. So we do a lot of like spicy foods, a lot of spicy chips. do, we do a ton of, mean, the sugar or sorry, the glass bottle cokes. They do, they love their pastries.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:53.431) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (17:06.349) Yeah.   Mike (17:15.868) So we just doubled down on the demographics. So yesterday I was filming at one of our micro markets that's in a gym and they crushed the Fairlife protein shakes, like the more modern protein shakes, but they won't touch muscle milk. So we're literally taking out one row of muscle milk just to add an extra row of Fairlife shakes. So you're constantly just catering to the demographics and what's selling.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (17:40.632) Yeah, yeah, this is awesome. I mean, this is literally just like real estate, right? Like you go and you find a good market. You're talking about demographics, right? Find the market, see what they want, see how much you can upgrade, how you can upgrade. If it's an apartment, it's a unit. If it's here, it's the product that you're selling and the type of machine, or maybe it's a mini market. A lot of things to kind of tie your understanding to here.   Mike (17:45.926) Yeah.   Mike (18:05.904) Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (18:07.615) Yeah, awesome, man. Awesome, Where are you at in your business? Like what, you know, what are the big leagues looking like right now? You know, what are you doing to expand your business, raising the bar in your business?   Mike (18:18.692) Yeah, I'm going after that's a really good question. I'm going after kind of these newer markets and we're kind of past that point of like, okay, let's pilot in this location. For example, that urgent care, we didn't know if it was going to be a good location two months ago when we installed. Well now it's already crushing it. Well, there's six other urgent cares in town and we just got to go ahead on five of those six. So like for me, it's doubling down on our current proof points of where.   okay, we know that manufacturing plant, the pumpkin farm does really well. So let's start getting intros to all their, manufacturers of the products they need to grow pumpkin. know, like we're just doubling down on scaling because now we have the operational blueprint to really just kind of to go after it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:03.917) Gotcha, gotcha. Tell me about how passive this can really be, right? So I used to have, before we switched over to the new brand, Raise the Bar podcast, it was the Passive Income Attorney podcast, right? I was really focused on passive investments, focused on bringing in passive investors into my real estate deals, things like that. And I think that word passive gets thrown around quite a bit, right? And sometimes it's abused because people get into things that are not truly passive.   Mike (19:18.427) Yeah.   Mike (19:28.784) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:33.517) What's your take on that as it relates to the vending business?   Mike (19:38.49) Yeah, so I think as far as with the vending business, there's clearly upfront leg work that needs to be done, whether that's finding locations or any of those things. So I have a route that is here in Oregon, and then we bought a route last year in Illinois and have scaled that route. I spend 30 minutes a week on each route now. that these urgent cares and stuff, like we have an operator that's running the whole route.   Here's the problem, Seth. It's like people are so scared to build systems to ultimately systemize things or they're too cheap to hire help. And I'm the opposite. like, you know, kind of like Dan Martell's buy back your time. Like I have like a leverage calculator and like I constantly think about is this worth my time? Cause as you know, you're busier than me. Like it's so limited.   for me, my routes, I would consider them passive, like one hour a week is, is nothing in my mind. But as far as like, you know, I'm, I'm also a passive investor on, we're building a, an oil loop station in Florida and I sent my money a year ago to, to my, active investor and I haven't talked to him since. Like that's actually truly probably passive now, you know, I'm not doing anything, but there's, there's different levels to that. And I'm a huge believer like.   don't delegate something until you know what you're delegating. So people that want to start with the vending routes, sure, if you want to buy a route that already has an operator, that's one thing. but these, if you're starting a vending route for your kid or for your stay at home wife or whatever, as a side hustle, like get in the weeds and install that first machine. So when you hire help to take over the route, you know what you're delegating.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (21:09.773) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (21:27.021) Yeah, that's key. That's key. And you you described just like any other business, right? I think that's kind of where people get themselves into trouble. That sometimes they get sold the dream that is truly passive. And eventually it can be. I mean, you're talking about an hour a week. To me, that's pretty damn passive, right? But you know, upfront, you you've got to learn the business. You've got to know what you're getting yourself into. Like you said, you've got to learn before you delegate so that you know what you're delegating.   There is going to be some upfront work and then as you're able to kind of delegate and learn Then you can make it more and more passive as you go   Mike (22:00.88) Yeah, I mean, it's no different than what's the same when people tell you that they're busy. I mean, you're just not a priority. Like that's a fact. you're not. People say it's the same thing when people come to me and they're like, I'm so busy. It's like, okay, well let me, let me see your schedule. Where are you spending your time? You know, it's like when people are like, I can't lose weight. Okay, well let me see your food log. What did you eat yesterday? Did you have ice cream? Like this is like the same kind of thing. That's where passive I think has been really abused.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:16.097) Yeah. Yep.   Mike (22:29.638) To me, the bigger issue is like, vending is not get rich quick. And so like, if you're expecting to leave your nine to five tomorrow and vending is going to make up for that in one day, like that's not going to   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:41.089) Right, Makes sense. Speaking of passive, do you raise capital or do you have any kind of a fund or have you put together a fund for something like this?   Mike (22:51.48) We haven't put together a fun, we're definitely buying routes is definitely becoming more and more intriguing. And I know there's some PE players starting to get into the vending game, but it's something we've been definitely considering and on our radar of do we want to.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:58.541) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (23:10.231) Gotcha. Cool. I mean, you brought in money partners for some of those routes yet, or is that still something you're exploring too?   Mike (23:18.168) No, I think it's just something we're thinking about. mean, what do you recommend?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (23:21.089) Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'd recommend I mean, it depends, right? Like I'm I'm scared to turn you by trade, but I don't like to say you should always raise capital no matter what. Right. Like you've been able to scale your business as you have and grown it to where it is without bringing outside capital. It sounds which is great because you own 100 percent or with whatever business partners you might have. You know, when you start raising capital, you're giving a large chunk of that piece away, not necessarily your whole company. But if you're buying   you know, a set of routes or that sort of thing. You you're gonna give a big piece away to those past investors if you're starting a fund or even if it's up. Even a single asset syndication here for one of these, you know, these routes, you could put it together that way. You know, it's just something to consider. But a lot of times when people are looking to scale fast, right, if they wanna grow exponentially, you've gotta use other people's money to get there or hit the lottery.   Mike (24:08.294) Mm.   Mike (24:15.856) Absolutely, no, agree. That's spot-on and I actually before you know the Silicon Valley company That I was part of we had a we went through probably series a B C D C ground   Let's just say we weren't very fiscally responsible. So I come from the, you know, it's like the ex-girlfriend example. I don't want to just start taking everyone's money.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (24:42.413) Yeah, yeah, that tends to happen with some startups, right? Like before you get funding, you're super frugal because it's your money and every single dollar counts. And you're like, I don't want to pay, you if it's software, you don't want to pay the software engineers. I'm going to out, you know, put it, you know, hire Indian engineers, that sort of thing. And then once you get a few million bucks that you raised in that seed round, then it just goes and you're like, whoa, wait a minute, let's hire 20 people. You know, it's you got to be careful about that.   Mike (25:05.606) Yeah   Yeah, yeah, that's a great, great take on it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:11.245) Yeah, it's, yeah. It's a question I love to ask and I think it's about time for that. So, in a parallel universe, tell me about a different version of you. So a different but likely version, right? Like, for example, for me, I went to med school for a year and a half and then I dropped out and I ended up becoming an attorney. So that was like a big turning point, right? So I could have easily at some point just said screw it and became a doctor and that would have been a totally different route than I'm going down right now.   What's an example of something like that for you?   Mike (25:42.524) Wait, are you being serious about that? I took the MCAT too. I got into med school and then I, yeah, I was pretty mad in school. And then the more I learned about exercise science, I was like, organic chemistry is not fun.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:44.321) Yeah, totally.   yeah? There you go.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:57.39) It is not fun. I did not love that. I majored in exercise physiology and then I ended up switching to biology because it was just a little bit of an easier route to get my degree and go into med school and I went for a year and a half and then I dropped out because I absolutely hated it. I knew I didn't want to do it. I was just more attracted to business and that sort of thing.   Mike (26:16.346) Yeah, that's crazy. That's awesome. parallel universe. I, that's a really good question. I don't know. I, kinda, I have two kids under three and the other side of me wishes I would have traveled more.   you know, I mean, we'll get there hopefully when they get out of high school and someday. But right now I just think there's so many different cultural things and ways to skin the cat. And it's just fascinating to learn some of those things.   Mike (26:55.352) yourself in those cultures.   go to different cultures and really like understand how they did things for a time, a period of time to really just learn their thinking.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:07.777) Yeah, I love that man. I had a similar experience of what you're describing. I didn't travel abroad really other than like, you know, Canada and Mexico until I studied abroad in Barcelona during law school and I got to stay there for a couple of months. So you actually had some time. It wasn't like you're just visiting for a week or a weekend or anything like that. You got to kind of live there right for a couple of months and it just totally changed my, you know, my outlook on life and just the way that you see things like I feel like we're in the US and we just think   Mike (27:19.627) Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:37.76) US is number one and there's only one way to do things the way that we do things that kind of attitude. And then when you go to Western Europe and you see that culture and you drive or get on a train, it's like an hour away and you're in a totally different culture and they're doing it a certain way as well and it's working. You just see that other people are doing things differently and still being successful at it, still having a thriving culture and it's just awesome to see.   Mike (28:03.312) Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (28:06.251) Yeah. Tell me about some major influences in your life. What turned you or got you into that, the vending business? It's not one of those typical things. mean, I know you're in the education business, so you're kind of really spreading the word about this type of business. But I would say when you started, there might not have been a mastermind or educational courses around this. mean, how did you kind of get drawn into that? Were there any particular people or influences that brought you in?   Mike (28:29.308) you   Mike (28:36.188) Yeah. So the, biggest influence for me to get into vending, uh, wasn't actually a person. It was actually, was, um, I had landed, I was coming back from the Pentagon from a trip back to the Bay for the startup we were talking about. And I was in the Denver airport and 11 PM, you know, our flight was delayed. And then they're like, Hey, you have to stay in the airport tonight. The pilot went over their hours for the day, blah, blah, blah. So I went to a vending machine and I remember buying a bottle of water.   I think it costs like at the time three bucks or something. I knew that bottle of water cost 20 cents at Costco. And I was like, there is someone that's at home with their kids right now making money off me and they're not even at this mission. Like the machine is doing the work. So I had like an aha moment of like, what are my true priorities in life? And like, why am I chasing this cutthroat startup from.   Palo Alto and trying to make it when reality was my priorities are freedom to spend more time with my family. So that's really kind of what led me into this path of starting a vending machine side hustle to keep our lifestyle as we had kids. We wanted to have a nanny and we wanted to be able to still go on dates and things like that as a couple with my wife. So that's really kind of my family and just like...   having the freedom to do things. Like that's what I'm really passionate about.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (29:59.084) Yeah. Yeah. I mean, building on that, and you may have already answered that, but what does success look like for you?   Mike (30:01.766) next   Mike (30:06.268) an empty calendar.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:08.621) Good luck with that. Good luck with that.   Mike (30:11.516) Oh man, I was gonna say, how do we crack that code? No, yeah. No, but I think success to me is doing things like picking up my daughter at three and even being able to say no to the things that aren't gonna get you to where you need, like the discipline piece of this too.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:15.708) man.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:33.995) Yeah, yeah, mean, you know, for me, it's kind of similar, right? It's not going to be able to empty that calendar. Not yet, at least maybe here in the future. But for now, it's pretty filled. But it is it's flexible, right? Like us as entrepreneurs, you know, we probably work more than we ever worked when we were in our W-2s. But at the same time, it's you know, we're working in our own business for ourselves, for our families. And we have the   Flexibility, a lot of people will say the freedom, right? But we have the flexibility to move things around. And if you want to pick your kids up at school at three, or you do want to take a weekend off, or something comes up in your schedule, you have the flexibility to do that. Whereas if you're kind of slaving away at the nine to five, you can't really do it.   Mike (31:04.486) Yeah. Yeah.   Mike (31:20.198) Yeah, that's spot on. mean, I just wrote that down, but flexibility is, cause you're right. When you started becoming an entrepreneur, this is what I tell people all the time when they want to get a venting around is like running your own business. You are going to work harder than you do for your boss currently at your W-2. Like you have to do payroll. You have to do, like you gotta like make sure there's money to actually do pay, you know, like all those things that you just don't even think about when you have a W-2. It's like, today's   Seth Bradley, Esq. (31:39.543) Yeah   Mike (31:48.89) You know, this Friday I get paid. Well, when you run a business, mean, that money's got to come from somewhere.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (31:51.905) Yeah   Right, yeah, 100%, man, 100%. All right, Mike, we're gonna wrap it up. Thanks so much for coming on the show. Tell the listeners where they can find out more about you.   Mike (32:05.286) Yeah, so thanks for having me. This has been great. I have free content all over the place. can find me on the classic Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, but I also have vendingpreneurs.com is where we help people that are more interested in actually the vending stuff. But I've been really trying to double down on YouTube lately because there's just a lot of content and you can't get it off a one minute reel.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:32.417) Love it, man. All right, Mike, appreciate it. Thanks for coming on the show.   Mike (32:35.91) Thanks for having me.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:37.227) Hi brother. Alright man, got a couple more questions for you. We do like a quick, kind of do the full podcast episode and then I'll just do kind of a quick episode that'll follow up on a Monday and then another one on a Friday. Cool.   Mike (32:55.814) See you.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:59.693) We out here.   Welcome to Million Dollar Mondays, how to make, keep, and scale a million dollars. Mike is a super successful entrepreneur in the vending machine business and beyond. Tell us, how did you make your first million dollars?   Mike (33:20.922) Yeah, Seth. It was probably actually through real estate and just getting a little bit kind of lucky with timing with COVID and short-term rentals and some of that. But yeah, that's probably how I got the first million.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:25.229) Mm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:37.079) Gotcha, cool. Yeah, real estate usually plays a role in the everybody's strategy down the line, whether they're in that primary business or not, whether they start out there or they end up there, real estate usually plays a part. How'd you make your last million?   Mike (33:53.956) Yeah, that's a good question because it's completely different than real estate, but it's actually been vending machines. So that's been kind of fun. just, you you talk about product market fit whenever you're an entrepreneur with a business. And that was just kind of the perfect storm right now of traditional vending really kind of being outdated. And we found a product market fit with it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:57.57) Right. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:16.215) Gotcha. Cool. that was from, was this maybe mostly attributed to kind of buying those routes, those larger routes?   Mike (34:23.32) Exactly. Yeah. Buying old school routes and really kind of flipping them like a house with modern micro markets charging, with different products and what would fit in a vending machine, like more of the unorthodox, you know, toilet paper and tide pods and things that wouldn't fit in a traditional vending machine. I mean, we'll sell $35 bottles of shampoo in these micro markets. So just kind of, go and add it in a different way.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:49.857) Yeah, and then with the aging population, there's gotta be more and more of these things popping up. So there should be more opportunity for people to get involved or for people like yourself to just snag everything, right?   Mike (35:01.102) Yeah, I think there's no chance I could snag everything, not even just in this town alone that I'm currently in. I mean, machines are getting cheaper, the technology is getting way better with AI. And nowadays, it's not what fits in a vending machine motor. It's okay, what's shelf space? if it's a bottle of shampoo or a glass Coke, it doesn't matter because it's not just getting thrown down the chute of a traditional machine.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:05.387) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:27.521) Makes sense, makes sense. Last, how are you planning on making your next million dollars?   Mike (35:34.3) I think probably with AI, we're doing a lot of interesting stuff with helping people scale their, their vending routes. that is applicable to any, small business. And so I'm really intrigued. Just every time I go down a rabbit hole with some new AI tool, I feel like there's another better one that just came right behind it. So I just think it's kind of that time where you can really get ahead by just learning.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:06.209) Yeah, totally makes sense. mean people that are not paying attention to AI whether it's simply using chat GPT instead of Google search are getting left behind quickly because it's just advancing so fast. I can't even imagine what this world's gonna look like five years from now the way that things are moving.   Mike (36:23.132) It's crazy. Three years ago when I was working for a tech company selling software into the government, I would have to work with three secretaries to schedule a meeting with the general to sell their software. Now my EA is literally an AI bot and everyone that's scheduling time on my calendar, they don't even know they're talking to a non-human, which is pretty   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:43.479) Yeah, 100%. We're gonna, I predicted within five years, everybody's gonna have a humanoid robot in their home with AI instilled and they're gonna be doing physical things for us at our homes. Yeah. Yep. Yep. 100%. Awesome, All right, moving on to the next one.   Mike (36:50.181) Yeah!   Mike (36:57.917) I hope so. I hope they can go to Costco get all our groceries do our do our laundry The dishes   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:11.501) You're clearly in the top 1 % of what you do, Mike. What is it about you that separates you from the rest of the field?   Mike (37:19.056) Ooh, that's a good question, Seth. I think it's just discipline, know, discipline and focus. One of the hardest things is being able to say no with the things that don't align. And when I was growing up, I had a quote that has really stuck with me. That's like, it's better to be respected than liked. And I think that really resonates. Like naturally as a human, you want to be liked and help people, but the 1 % are really good at saying no.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:47.649) Yeah, I love that man. That's a great answer. Kind of building on that, what do you think the number one attribute is that makes a successful entrepreneur?   Mike (37:57.468) probably focus. Yeah. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:59.212) Yeah, focus. Yep. The one thing, right? The one thing.   Mike (38:04.186) Yep. That's why you come back to like the most successful entrepreneurs. They always niche down and they niche down because they just, got hyper-focused. Like this is kind of why for me, you know, I started this passive Mr. Passive on social media before I even got into Vendi. Well, now everyone's like, well, how passive is Vendi? And well, it's like, what's really interesting is I was posting all these different, what I thought passive income streams in the time, but everyone, 95 % of the questions I got about   Airbnbs are all my different investments was about bending. So I just niche down on, on bending and I just looked back on that and I was like, it really forced me to focus.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (38:43.263) Awesome, awesome. What's one thing someone could do today to get 1 % closer to success in the vending machine business if they are really interested in learning more?   Mike (38:53.892) tap into your connections and find a location that has high foot traffic, whether that's a friend that works at an urgent care, a sister that lives at an apartment. You know, you take your kid to that gymnastics studio that has a ton of foot traffic between 4 PM and 8 PM. Like all those locations are prime locations to put one of these modern smart machines in. so, tapping into your connections, well, you know,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:24.567) Love that man. Awesome. All right, Mike, I appreciate it, brother. We'll to meet in person sometime,   Mike (39:30.574) I would love to. Where are you based, Seth?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:31.789) I'm in San Diego, where you at?   Mike (39:34.78) I am in Eugene. Yeah, Oregon. I'll come down your way though.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:37.39) Cool We're planning on doing yeah, we're planning on doing so me and my wife we have a Sprinter van and Last May we did we did going back to the flexibility piece, right? We did 32 days in the van up through Wyoming Montana and then into like Into Canada and they're like Banff and Jasper and all the way up to Jasper and then we circled back on the west coast Through Vancouver and then down back to San Diego Yeah   Mike (40:05.52) What?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:06.829) Pretty wild, pretty awesome. And the reason I brought that up is this year we're gonna do shorter trip. We're probably gonna do two, maybe three weeks at the most, but we're gonna do kind of the Pacific Northwest. So Oregon, Washington, and Vancouver and all those parks and stuff up there.   Mike (40:17.254) Yeah.   Mike (40:21.744) Yeah, you definitely have a, have you been to Bend before? Bend is like my, that whole area, Central Oregon is, and even Idaho, like all those kind of, yeah. That's awesome. Please let me know when you're up this way. I mean, I'll come meet you wherever. That'd be amazing. Absolutely. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:24.641) Yeah, yeah I have.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:38.861) Sure man grab a coffee or beer. I appreciate it. Yeah, let's do it. Yeah all right brother great to meet you and I will send the information on when this is gonna get released and give you you materials and all that stuff so we can collaborate on social media   Mike (40:51.964) Okay. Okay. Yeah. Is a lot of your audience, like passive investors?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:58.593) So most of that, so now I'm rebranding. I rebranded because I'm gonna be speaking more towards like active entrepreneurs, Active entrepreneurs, people raising capital, that sort of thing. Whereas before it was based on passive investors and people really focused on attorneys. So I'm an attorney and I was raising capital from attorneys for my real estate deals. Now I'm really more into selling shovels. I'm scaling my law firm. I'm chief legal officer for Tribest, which is, we've got a fund to fund.   Mike (41:20.262) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:28.085) legal product there as well. So we're really trying to bring in active, active entrepreneurs and people raising capital.   Mike (41:29.777) Yeah.   Mike (41:36.572) Okay, because I got that, I was just thinking through when we talking about that oil development project, that could be a good, the guy that runs that fund could be a good interview for you. Just thinking through your audience, because he's always looking for investors into his fund and like these oil lubs are just crushing it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:49.901) Cool. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:58.464) Yeah, cool. Who is it? Just, I don't know if I know him or not.   Mike (42:02.183) Um, Robert Durkey, he's out of Florida. has, his problem is he's sitting on a gold mine that has no, like he's old school, doesn't know social media, any of that. So that's why I think he'd be perfect for you. Cause I think you could help him and he could definitely help you with some kickback. Yeah. So cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully we meet soon. Okay. See you Seth. Bye.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:05.645) I don't think I know. I don't think I know.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:13.889) Yeah. Gotcha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:20.705) Cool, okay, sounds good man. Yeah, I appreciate the introduction.   Yeah, all right brother. Talk soon. See ya. Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en Mike Hoffman's Links: https://www.instagram.com/mikehoffmannofficial/ https://x.com/mrpassive_?lang=en https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikedhoffmann/ https://www.tiktok.com/@mr.passive

Title: How to Make Millions with Vending Machines with Mike Hoffman Summary: In this conversation, Seth Bradley and Mike Hoffman delve into the world of vending machines as a business opportunity. Mike shares his journey from a Midwest farm boy to a successful entrepreneur in the vending industry, highlighting the evolution of vending technology and the potential for passive income. They discuss the importance of location, understanding demographics, and the scalability of vending routes. Mike emphasizes the need for upfront work and learning before delegating tasks, while also addressing the misconceptions surrounding passive income in the vending business. In this conversation, Seth Bradley and Mike discuss various aspects of entrepreneurship, particularly in the vending machine business. They explore the importance of capital raising, the journey of self-discovery, influences that shape business decisions, and the definition of success. The dialogue emphasizes the significance of flexibility, discipline, and focus in achieving entrepreneurial goals, while also touching on financial milestones and the attributes that distinguish successful entrepreneurs. Links to Watch and Subscribe:   Bullet Point Highlights: Mike's journey from a classic Midwest farm boy to a successful entrepreneur. The evolution of vending machines from traditional to smart technology. Understanding the importance of location in the vending business. The analogy of baseball levels to describe starting in vending. Scaling up from single A to big leagues in vending routes. The significance of demographics in product selection for vending machines. The potential for passive income with proper systems in place. The need for upfront work before achieving passivity in business. Vending is not a get-rich-quick scheme; it requires dedication. The future opportunities in the vending industry are expanding rapidly. Raising capital can dilute ownership but may be necessary for rapid growth. Self-discovery often leads to unexpected career paths. Influences in business can come from personal experiences rather than just mentors. Success is often defined by the ability to prioritize family and flexibility. Entrepreneurs work harder than in traditional jobs but gain flexibility. Discipline is crucial for saying no to distractions. Successful entrepreneurs often focus on niche markets. High foot traffic locations are ideal for vending machines. AI is transforming business operations and efficiency. Networking and connections can lead to valuable opportunities. Transcript: Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:04.898) Mike, what's going on buddy? Doing great brother, doing great. How about you?   Mike (00:06.748) Don't worry,   Mike (00:11.664) Good, I'm a little flustered. I usually have my mic set up over here, but I guess we just moved and it's not here today. I guess, yeah, new office and it's been a whole hot mess.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:19.822) New office or what?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:27.862) Nice man, nice. I see you got the whiteboard cranking back there. Love to see that.   Mike (00:33.114) Always. I love your background. That's sweet.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:38.03) Thanks man, yeah, I'm on camera all the time so I like I need to just build this out instead of using like a green screen so Made the investment made it happen   Mike (00:44.86) Totally.   Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (00:49.442) Have we met in person or not? I don't know if we've met at a Wealth Without Wall Street event or I couldn't tell. Okay. No, I did not go to Nashville last year.   Mike (00:58.478) I don't think so. don't think you're... Were you in Nashville last year?   Mike (01:04.634) No, okay. No, I don't think we've met in person. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:08.256) Okay, all good, man. All good. Well, cool. I'll just go over the format real quick. We'll do kind of a shorter recording. We're do like 30 minutes, something like in that range. And then we'll just kind of like break. And then I'll, want to record a couple of other quick segments where I call it Million Dollar Monday. I'm kind of asking you about how you made your first, last and next million. And then 1 % closer, which would just be kind of what separates you, what makes you the   top 1 % in your particular vertical. So we'll just kind of record those separately. Those will be real short, like five minutes or so.   Mike (01:44.924) Okay, yeah, I'll follow your lead. All good.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:47.15) Cool. Cool. Let's see. I think I already have this auto recording. So we're already recording. So I'll just jump right in.   Mike (01:55.377) Okay.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (01:57.782) Welcome to Raise the Bar Radio, hosted by yours truly Seth Bradley. We today we've got Mr. Passive, Mike Hoffman. Mike, welcome to the show.   Mike (02:08.189) Thank you for having me fired up to be here.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:10.855) Absolutely man, really happy to have you on. I know it's been a little bit of a trek here to get our schedules lined up, but really stoked to have you on today, man. I see you said you moved into a new office. You've got the whiteboard cranking, so love to see it.   Mike (02:25.372) yeah, whiteboards are the only place I can get my thoughts down.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (02:29.399) Yeah, man, it makes a difference when you actually write something rather than type it or even on a mirror board where you're doing it online. just there's something about physically writing something down.   Mike (02:41.328) You know, I'm glad you said that because yesterday I flipped to Seattle for a quick work trip and I didn't have wifi and I literally had three pages of just, I, was so like the clarity of some of these kinds of bigger visions I have now from just being able to write for an hour on a flight was, I was like, man, I gotta do this more often.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:00.363) Yeah, for sure. The key though is once you write it down, it just doesn't go into the trash or into a black hole somewhere where you never see it again. So that's kind of the disadvantage there. If you have it on your computer and you're taking notes or you have it on a mirror board, at least it's there to reference all the time. If you write it down on paper, sometimes, I've got my Raze Masters book right here for notes, but it's like, it might go into the abyss and I'll never look at it again. So you gotta be careful about that.   Mike (03:27.184) Yeah, yeah, I need to check out the Miro boards. I've heard a lot of good things about them.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (03:31.467) Yeah, yeah. Awesome, Mike. Well, listen, for our audience who doesn't know anything about you, maybe just tell them, you know, tell them a little bit about your background. Tell them about your your main business and we can take it from there.   Mike (03:43.354) Yeah. So I think for those that don't know about me, I'm a classic Midwest farm boy started with a classic, you know, showing cattle at the county fair and all of that and had a lemonade stand growing up. And then my first job was actually at McDonald's, you know, thinking about the whole success of that business model. But when I was coaching and, out of college, I got my first rental and I was like, wow, this is crazy. making money without.   really much time involved. and then with my work in Silicon Valley, know, Seth, was classic Silicon Valley, you know, cutthroat job that, startup life and traveling three weeks out of the month. And I was on, I was in airports all the time. And was like, these vending machines I would run into at airports were just so archaic. And so I went down this path of like unattended retail and kind of the future of, of that. And that's really where I just see a huge opportunity right now.   And so it's kind of what led me into all these different income streams that I'm passionate about.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (04:49.431) That's awesome, man. Well, let's dive into that a little bit deeper. me about these income streams. It centers around vending machines, right? But I'm sure there's a lot more to it. I'm sure there's a lot of different entry points for people. Maybe just kind of give us a general synopsis to start out.   Mike (05:06.78) Yeah, so I think the big thing with, you know, if we're talking vending specifically as an income stream, you know, most people think of vending as the traditional machines where you enter in a code, you put your card on the machine and then a motor spirals down a Snickers bar or a soda and you go into the chute and grab it.   Nowadays, there's these smart machines that literally you just unlock the door, or even if you go into, land in the Vegas airport right at the bottom of the escalator where it says, welcome to Las Vegas, there's a 7-Eleven with gates and AI cameras, and there's no employees in the 7-Eleven. And it just tracks whatever you grab and to exit the gate, you have to pay for it. So like, there's just this huge market now where we just installed it in urgent care.   less than two months ago and we can do over the counter meds in that machine because it doesn't have to fit into a motor. It's just shelf space. You identify with the planogram with the AI cameras like, okay, Dayquil in this slot or Salad in this slot and then whatever they grab, gets charged to the person that pulls it from it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (06:15.469) That's interesting, man. Yeah, I mean, my initial thought too, was just like the traditional old vending machine where you're getting a candy bar or a cola out of there. But yeah, nowadays, now that you mentioned that, you see this more and more every single day where you've got these scanners, you've got kind of self-checkout, that sort of thing. So that's kind of, that expands that world and really opens it up to the future, right? Like it just really, that's what we're trying to get to, or at least we think we wanna get there, where we're kind of removing humans and...   kind of working with technologies and things like that.   Mike (06:49.488) Yeah, and I think, you know, removing the whole human thing. mean, those machines still got to get stocked and you know, there's not robots running around doing that. But I just come back to, I was a Marriott guy when I was on the road all the time and I'd go to these grab and goes at a Marriott and grab a, the end of the night, I'd grab like a little wine or an ice cream sandwich. And I literally had to go wait in line at the check-in desk behind three people checking in just to tell them, Hey, put these on.   room charge and I was like if I had a checkout kiosk in that grab-and-go I could have just removed all the friction for this customer experience.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:27.772) Right, 100%. Yeah, I mean, there's a place and time for it and there's more and more applications for it that just pop up every single day and you can kind of spot that in your life as you're just kind of moving through, whether you're checking into your hotel or whatever you're doing.   Mike (07:41.456) Yeah, yeah. So that's just kind of what excites me today.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:45.973) Yeah, yeah, so when a stranger asks you what you do just in the street, what do you tell them? Because I have a hard time answering that question sometimes too, but I'd love to hear what your answer is.   Mike (07:56.804) Yeah, I would just say it depends on the day. You know, what do you do or what's your, you know, it's like at the golf course when you get paired up with a stranger and they're like, tell me about what you do for your career. And I just say, I'm a classic entrepreneur. And then I'm like, well, what do you do? And it's like, well, tell me about the day. You know, what fire are you putting out? Like today we just got the go ahead for five more urgent cares for our local route. But then, you know, we have a community of operators across the country that we help really build.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (07:57.933) haha   Ha ha ha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (08:09.879) Yeah. Yeah.   Mike (08:25.616) Vending empires and so we had a group call this morning. So literally, there's a lot of just, you know, it's classic entrepreneurial life. You never know what the day's script is gonna be.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (08:36.161) Yeah, for sure. And you focus a lot on not only on your own business, but also teaching others, right? Teaching others how to kind of break into this business.   Mike (08:45.402) Yeah, that's my passion, Seth. When I got into my first investment out of college was a $70,000 rental, you know, putting 20 % down or 14K and using an emergency fund. like my background in going to college was as a coach. like I knew I wanted to kind of take that mindset of like coaching people, you know, teach them how to fish. I don't want to catch all the fish myself. It's just not fulfilling that way. So that's really where my passion is.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (09:15.373) Gotcha, gotcha. tell me about like, tell me about step one. I mean, how does somebody break into this business? Obviously your own personal business is probably very advanced. There's probably a lot more sophisticated investing strategies at this point and you've got different layers to it. But somebody just kind of starting out that said, hey, this sounds pretty interesting. This vending machine business sounds like it can be passive. How do you recommend that they get started?   Mike (09:40.57) Yeah, so I'm always, I view like the whole vending scale as similar to Major League Baseball. You got your single A all the way up to the big leagues. And if you're just starting out, I always recommend like find a location where you can put a machine and just learn the process. Like to me, that's single A analogy. you know, that always starts with, people want to jump right to like, well, what type of machines do you recommend?   products, how do you price products? And the first question I'll always ask Seth is, well, what location is this machine going in? And they're like, well, I don't know yet. I was just going to buy one and put it in my garage to start. And it's like, no, you need to have the location first. So understanding that, is it a pet hospital? Is it an apartment? Is it a gym? Where is the foot traffic? And then you can cater to what's the best machine for that type of location.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (10:36.887) Got it, got it. Now is this a kind of a rent, you rent the space to place the machine with that particular business or wherever you're gonna place it or how does that all come together?   Mike (10:47.644) not typically, some people are kind of more advanced, like apartment complexes are used to the revenue share model. So they're going to ask for a piece of the pie for sure, for you to put the machine in their lobby. but like, you know, when we're talking urgent carers or even pet hospitals are viewing it as an amenity. And so we probably have, I don't even know how many machines now 75 now, and we, you know, less than half of those actually,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (10:50.423) Okay.   Mike (11:15.1) us rent or ask for a revenue share to have them in there. So I never leave lead with that, but we'll do it if we need to get the location.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (11:23.989) Interesting gotcha. So it's really a value add for wherever you're gonna place it and that's how most people or I guess most businesses would look at that and then you're able to capture that that space   Mike (11:27.366) Mm-hmm.   Mike (11:34.236) Yeah, absolutely. So, um, a great case study is we have a 25 employee roughing business here in Oregon. And you might think like, only 25 employees. It's not going to make that much money. Well, we do $1,200 a month. And the cool thing about this, Seth, is the CEO of this roughing company literally did napkin math on how much it costs for his employees to drive to the gas station during their 20 minute break. And then   How much they're paying for an energy drink at the gas station and then how much gas they're using with the roofing like the work trucks to get to and from the gas station So he's like I want to bring a smart machine into our warehouse Set the prices as half off so that four dollar monster only costs his rofers two dollars and then we invoice him the the business owner every month for the other 50 % and so he actually   Calculated as a cost savings not asking for money to rent the space   Seth Bradley, Esq. (12:35.597) Yeah, gotcha, gotcha. That makes sense. That makes sense. I love the baseball analogy with the single A, double A, triple A, even into the big leagues here. know, a lot of the folks that listen to this are already kind of, you know, in the big leagues or maybe think about some capital behind them. Like how would they be able to jump right in, maybe skip single or double A or would they, or do you even suggest that? Do you suggest that they start, you know, small just to learn and then maybe invest some more capital into it to expand or can they jump right to the big leagues?   Mike (12:48.891) Yeah.   Yeah.   Mike (13:03.966) I think they can jump right to the big leagues. this is, I'm glad you brought this up because just listening to some of your episodes from the past, there's no doubt that you have people that could buy a route like a off biz buy sell today. And I think this is a prime opportunity. it's very similar to flipping a house. you, you know, there's a route in Chicago, I think it was for $1.1 million, you know, whatever negotiating terms or seller financing or, or what have you, got a lot of, your, your   audience that is experts in that. But the cool thing about these routes is they have the old school machines that have the motors and that are limited to, this type of machine, you can only fit a 12 ounce cannon. Well, guess what? The minute you buy that route, you swap out that machine with one of these micro markets or smart machines. Now you just went from selling a 12 ounce soda for $1.25 to now a 16 ounce monster for $4.50.   Well, you just bought that location based on its current revenue numbers and by swapping out that machine, you're going to two or three acts your revenue just at that location. And so it's truly just like a value play, a value upgrade, like flipping the house of, okay, there's a lot of deals right now of these routes being sold by baby boomers where it's like, they got the old school Pepsi machine. Doesn't have a credit card reader on it. They can't track inventory remotely via their cell phones. So   They're not keeping it stocked. Like all those types of things can really play in your favor as a buyer that just wants to get to the big leagues right away.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (14:37.651) I love that. When you say buy a route, what are you really buying? Tell me about the contractual agreement behind that. What are you really buying there?   Mike (14:47.184) You're just buying the locations and the equipment associated with it. So like this Chicago route, it's like, we have machines in 75 properties all across the Chicago suburbs. And they could be medical clinics. could be apartments. could be employee break rooms at businesses, but that's when you start diving into those locations. It's like, I have a snack machine and a soda machine here. Well, you swap that out with a micro market that now instead of.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (14:49.279) Okay. Okay.   Mike (15:13.626) that machine that'll only hold a small bag of Doritos that you charge two bucks, well now you get the movie size theater bags that you can really put in there in a micro market. Like naturally just that valuation of that route based on those 75 machines current revenue, I mean you're gonna be able to two or three X your revenue right by just swapping out those machines.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (15:35.959) Wow, yeah, I love that analogy with real estate, right? It's just like a value add. It's like, how can I bring in more income from what already exists? Well, I need to upgrade or I need to put in some capital improvements, whatever you want to call it. Here's the vending machine upgrades or a different kind of system in there. And you get more income. And obviously that business in itself is going to be worth more in a higher multiple.   Mike (15:58.396) Absolutely. mean, a great example of this is we had a machine in an apartment complex and it was your traditional machine with the motors and you have to enter in the code. Well, we could only put in four 12 ounce drinks and then chips. Well, we swapped that out with a micro market. Well, now that micro market, we literally put in bags of Tide Pods for laundry, like these big bags of Tide Pods. We'll sell those like hotcakes for 15 bucks. And our old machine,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:25.281) Yeah, let's say those aren't cheap.   Mike (16:27.246) Yeah, our old machine Seth, it would take us to get to 15 bucks, we'd have to sell eight Snickers. That's one transaction.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:33.547) Right, right. Yeah, yeah. How do you do an analysis kind of based on like what you think is gonna sell there, right? Like you're replacing, let's say a Dorito machine with Tide Pods, you know? So you have to individually go to each location and figure out what will work, what will sell.   Mike (16:47.738) Yeah.   Mike (16:51.834) It's all about demographic. Absolutely. So, you know, we have, we have, we have a micro market and a manufacturing plant that's, it's a pumpkin farm and there's a ton of Hispanic workers. So we do a lot of like spicy foods, a lot of spicy chips. do, we do a ton of, mean, the sugar or sorry, the glass bottle cokes. They do, they love their pastries.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (16:53.431) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (17:06.349) Yeah.   Mike (17:15.868) So we just doubled down on the demographics. So yesterday I was filming at one of our micro markets that's in a gym and they crushed the Fairlife protein shakes, like the more modern protein shakes, but they won't touch muscle milk. So we're literally taking out one row of muscle milk just to add an extra row of Fairlife shakes. So you're constantly just catering to the demographics and what's selling.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (17:40.632) Yeah, yeah, this is awesome. I mean, this is literally just like real estate, right? Like you go and you find a good market. You're talking about demographics, right? Find the market, see what they want, see how much you can upgrade, how you can upgrade. If it's an apartment, it's a unit. If it's here, it's the product that you're selling and the type of machine, or maybe it's a mini market. A lot of things to kind of tie your understanding to here.   Mike (17:45.926) Yeah.   Mike (18:05.904) Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (18:07.615) Yeah, awesome, man. Awesome, Where are you at in your business? Like what, you know, what are the big leagues looking like right now? You know, what are you doing to expand your business, raising the bar in your business?   Mike (18:18.692) Yeah, I'm going after that's a really good question. I'm going after kind of these newer markets and we're kind of past that point of like, okay, let's pilot in this location. For example, that urgent care, we didn't know if it was going to be a good location two months ago when we installed. Well now it's already crushing it. Well, there's six other urgent cares in town and we just got to go ahead on five of those six. So like for me, it's doubling down on our current proof points of where.   okay, we know that manufacturing plant, the pumpkin farm does really well. So let's start getting intros to all their, manufacturers of the products they need to grow pumpkin. know, like we're just doubling down on scaling because now we have the operational blueprint to really just kind of to go after it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:03.917) Gotcha, gotcha. Tell me about how passive this can really be, right? So I used to have, before we switched over to the new brand, Raise the Bar podcast, it was the Passive Income Attorney podcast, right? I was really focused on passive investments, focused on bringing in passive investors into my real estate deals, things like that. And I think that word passive gets thrown around quite a bit, right? And sometimes it's abused because people get into things that are not truly passive.   Mike (19:18.427) Yeah.   Mike (19:28.784) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (19:33.517) What's your take on that as it relates to the vending business?   Mike (19:38.49) Yeah, so I think as far as with the vending business, there's clearly upfront leg work that needs to be done, whether that's finding locations or any of those things. So I have a route that is here in Oregon, and then we bought a route last year in Illinois and have scaled that route. I spend 30 minutes a week on each route now. that these urgent cares and stuff, like we have an operator that's running the whole route.   Here's the problem, Seth. It's like people are so scared to build systems to ultimately systemize things or they're too cheap to hire help. And I'm the opposite. like, you know, kind of like Dan Martell's buy back your time. Like I have like a leverage calculator and like I constantly think about is this worth my time? Cause as you know, you're busier than me. Like it's so limited.   for me, my routes, I would consider them passive, like one hour a week is, is nothing in my mind. But as far as like, you know, I'm, I'm also a passive investor on, we're building a, an oil loop station in Florida and I sent my money a year ago to, to my, active investor and I haven't talked to him since. Like that's actually truly probably passive now, you know, I'm not doing anything, but there's, there's different levels to that. And I'm a huge believer like.   don't delegate something until you know what you're delegating. So people that want to start with the vending routes, sure, if you want to buy a route that already has an operator, that's one thing. but these, if you're starting a vending route for your kid or for your stay at home wife or whatever, as a side hustle, like get in the weeds and install that first machine. So when you hire help to take over the route, you know what you're delegating.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (21:09.773) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (21:27.021) Yeah, that's key. That's key. And you you described just like any other business, right? I think that's kind of where people get themselves into trouble. That sometimes they get sold the dream that is truly passive. And eventually it can be. I mean, you're talking about an hour a week. To me, that's pretty damn passive, right? But you know, upfront, you you've got to learn the business. You've got to know what you're getting yourself into. Like you said, you've got to learn before you delegate so that you know what you're delegating.   There is going to be some upfront work and then as you're able to kind of delegate and learn Then you can make it more and more passive as you go   Mike (22:00.88) Yeah, I mean, it's no different than what's the same when people tell you that they're busy. I mean, you're just not a priority. Like that's a fact. you're not. People say it's the same thing when people come to me and they're like, I'm so busy. It's like, okay, well let me, let me see your schedule. Where are you spending your time? You know, it's like when people are like, I can't lose weight. Okay, well let me see your food log. What did you eat yesterday? Did you have ice cream? Like this is like the same kind of thing. That's where passive I think has been really abused.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:16.097) Yeah. Yep.   Mike (22:29.638) To me, the bigger issue is like, vending is not get rich quick. And so like, if you're expecting to leave your nine to five tomorrow and vending is going to make up for that in one day, like that's not going to   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:41.089) Right, Makes sense. Speaking of passive, do you raise capital or do you have any kind of a fund or have you put together a fund for something like this?   Mike (22:51.48) We haven't put together a fun, we're definitely buying routes is definitely becoming more and more intriguing. And I know there's some PE players starting to get into the vending game, but it's something we've been definitely considering and on our radar of do we want to.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (22:58.541) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (23:10.231) Gotcha. Cool. I mean, you brought in money partners for some of those routes yet, or is that still something you're exploring too?   Mike (23:18.168) No, I think it's just something we're thinking about. mean, what do you recommend?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (23:21.089) Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'd recommend I mean, it depends, right? Like I'm I'm scared to turn you by trade, but I don't like to say you should always raise capital no matter what. Right. Like you've been able to scale your business as you have and grown it to where it is without bringing outside capital. It sounds which is great because you own 100 percent or with whatever business partners you might have. You know, when you start raising capital, you're giving a large chunk of that piece away, not necessarily your whole company. But if you're buying   you know, a set of routes or that sort of thing. You you're gonna give a big piece away to those past investors if you're starting a fund or even if it's up. Even a single asset syndication here for one of these, you know, these routes, you could put it together that way. You know, it's just something to consider. But a lot of times when people are looking to scale fast, right, if they wanna grow exponentially, you've gotta use other people's money to get there or hit the lottery.   Mike (24:08.294) Mm.   Mike (24:15.856) Absolutely, no, agree. That's spot-on and I actually before you know the Silicon Valley company That I was part of we had a we went through probably series a B C D C ground   Let's just say we weren't very fiscally responsible. So I come from the, you know, it's like the ex-girlfriend example. I don't want to just start taking everyone's money.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (24:42.413) Yeah, yeah, that tends to happen with some startups, right? Like before you get funding, you're super frugal because it's your money and every single dollar counts. And you're like, I don't want to pay, you if it's software, you don't want to pay the software engineers. I'm going to out, you know, put it, you know, hire Indian engineers, that sort of thing. And then once you get a few million bucks that you raised in that seed round, then it just goes and you're like, whoa, wait a minute, let's hire 20 people. You know, it's you got to be careful about that.   Mike (25:05.606) Yeah   Yeah, yeah, that's a great, great take on it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:11.245) Yeah, it's, yeah. It's a question I love to ask and I think it's about time for that. So, in a parallel universe, tell me about a different version of you. So a different but likely version, right? Like, for example, for me, I went to med school for a year and a half and then I dropped out and I ended up becoming an attorney. So that was like a big turning point, right? So I could have easily at some point just said screw it and became a doctor and that would have been a totally different route than I'm going down right now.   What's an example of something like that for you?   Mike (25:42.524) Wait, are you being serious about that? I took the MCAT too. I got into med school and then I, yeah, I was pretty mad in school. And then the more I learned about exercise science, I was like, organic chemistry is not fun.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:44.321) Yeah, totally.   yeah? There you go.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (25:57.39) It is not fun. I did not love that. I majored in exercise physiology and then I ended up switching to biology because it was just a little bit of an easier route to get my degree and go into med school and I went for a year and a half and then I dropped out because I absolutely hated it. I knew I didn't want to do it. I was just more attracted to business and that sort of thing.   Mike (26:16.346) Yeah, that's crazy. That's awesome. parallel universe. I, that's a really good question. I don't know. I, kinda, I have two kids under three and the other side of me wishes I would have traveled more.   you know, I mean, we'll get there hopefully when they get out of high school and someday. But right now I just think there's so many different cultural things and ways to skin the cat. And it's just fascinating to learn some of those things.   Mike (26:55.352) yourself in those cultures.   go to different cultures and really like understand how they did things for a time, a period of time to really just learn their thinking.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:07.777) Yeah, I love that man. I had a similar experience of what you're describing. I didn't travel abroad really other than like, you know, Canada and Mexico until I studied abroad in Barcelona during law school and I got to stay there for a couple of months. So you actually had some time. It wasn't like you're just visiting for a week or a weekend or anything like that. You got to kind of live there right for a couple of months and it just totally changed my, you know, my outlook on life and just the way that you see things like I feel like we're in the US and we just think   Mike (27:19.627) Seth Bradley, Esq. (27:37.76) US is number one and there's only one way to do things the way that we do things that kind of attitude. And then when you go to Western Europe and you see that culture and you drive or get on a train, it's like an hour away and you're in a totally different culture and they're doing it a certain way as well and it's working. You just see that other people are doing things differently and still being successful at it, still having a thriving culture and it's just awesome to see.   Mike (28:03.312) Yeah, absolutely.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (28:06.251) Yeah. Tell me about some major influences in your life. What turned you or got you into that, the vending business? It's not one of those typical things. mean, I know you're in the education business, so you're kind of really spreading the word about this type of business. But I would say when you started, there might not have been a mastermind or educational courses around this. mean, how did you kind of get drawn into that? Were there any particular people or influences that brought you in?   Mike (28:29.308) you   Mike (28:36.188) Yeah. So the, biggest influence for me to get into vending, uh, wasn't actually a person. It was actually, was, um, I had landed, I was coming back from the Pentagon from a trip back to the Bay for the startup we were talking about. And I was in the Denver airport and 11 PM, you know, our flight was delayed. And then they're like, Hey, you have to stay in the airport tonight. The pilot went over their hours for the day, blah, blah, blah. So I went to a vending machine and I remember buying a bottle of water.   I think it costs like at the time three bucks or something. I knew that bottle of water cost 20 cents at Costco. And I was like, there is someone that's at home with their kids right now making money off me and they're not even at this mission. Like the machine is doing the work. So I had like an aha moment of like, what are my true priorities in life? And like, why am I chasing this cutthroat startup from.   Palo Alto and trying to make it when reality was my priorities are freedom to spend more time with my family. So that's really kind of what led me into this path of starting a vending machine side hustle to keep our lifestyle as we had kids. We wanted to have a nanny and we wanted to be able to still go on dates and things like that as a couple with my wife. So that's really kind of my family and just like...   having the freedom to do things. Like that's what I'm really passionate about.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (29:59.084) Yeah. Yeah. I mean, building on that, and you may have already answered that, but what does success look like for you?   Mike (30:01.766) next   Mike (30:06.268) an empty calendar.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:08.621) Good luck with that. Good luck with that.   Mike (30:11.516) Oh man, I was gonna say, how do we crack that code? No, yeah. No, but I think success to me is doing things like picking up my daughter at three and even being able to say no to the things that aren't gonna get you to where you need, like the discipline piece of this too.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:15.708) man.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (30:33.995) Yeah, yeah, mean, you know, for me, it's kind of similar, right? It's not going to be able to empty that calendar. Not yet, at least maybe here in the future. But for now, it's pretty filled. But it is it's flexible, right? Like us as entrepreneurs, you know, we probably work more than we ever worked when we were in our W-2s. But at the same time, it's you know, we're working in our own business for ourselves, for our families. And we have the   Flexibility, a lot of people will say the freedom, right? But we have the flexibility to move things around. And if you want to pick your kids up at school at three, or you do want to take a weekend off, or something comes up in your schedule, you have the flexibility to do that. Whereas if you're kind of slaving away at the nine to five, you can't really do it.   Mike (31:04.486) Yeah. Yeah.   Mike (31:20.198) Yeah, that's spot on. mean, I just wrote that down, but flexibility is, cause you're right. When you started becoming an entrepreneur, this is what I tell people all the time when they want to get a venting around is like running your own business. You are going to work harder than you do for your boss currently at your W-2. Like you have to do payroll. You have to do, like you gotta like make sure there's money to actually do pay, you know, like all those things that you just don't even think about when you have a W-2. It's like, today's   Seth Bradley, Esq. (31:39.543) Yeah   Mike (31:48.89) You know, this Friday I get paid. Well, when you run a business, mean, that money's got to come from somewhere.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (31:51.905) Yeah   Right, yeah, 100%, man, 100%. All right, Mike, we're gonna wrap it up. Thanks so much for coming on the show. Tell the listeners where they can find out more about you.   Mike (32:05.286) Yeah, so thanks for having me. This has been great. I have free content all over the place. can find me on the classic Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, but I also have vendingpreneurs.com is where we help people that are more interested in actually the vending stuff. But I've been really trying to double down on YouTube lately because there's just a lot of content and you can't get it off a one minute reel.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:32.417) Love it, man. All right, Mike, appreciate it. Thanks for coming on the show.   Mike (32:35.91) Thanks for having me.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:37.227) Hi brother. Alright man, got a couple more questions for you. We do like a quick, kind of do the full podcast episode and then I'll just do kind of a quick episode that'll follow up on a Monday and then another one on a Friday. Cool.   Mike (32:55.814) See you.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (32:59.693) We out here.   Welcome to Million Dollar Mondays, how to make, keep, and scale a million dollars. Mike is a super successful entrepreneur in the vending machine business and beyond. Tell us, how did you make your first million dollars?   Mike (33:20.922) Yeah, Seth. It was probably actually through real estate and just getting a little bit kind of lucky with timing with COVID and short-term rentals and some of that. But yeah, that's probably how I got the first million.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:25.229) Mm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:37.079) Gotcha, cool. Yeah, real estate usually plays a role in the everybody's strategy down the line, whether they're in that primary business or not, whether they start out there or they end up there, real estate usually plays a part. How'd you make your last million?   Mike (33:53.956) Yeah, that's a good question because it's completely different than real estate, but it's actually been vending machines. So that's been kind of fun. just, you you talk about product market fit whenever you're an entrepreneur with a business. And that was just kind of the perfect storm right now of traditional vending really kind of being outdated. And we found a product market fit with it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (33:57.57) Right. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:16.215) Gotcha. Cool. that was from, was this maybe mostly attributed to kind of buying those routes, those larger routes?   Mike (34:23.32) Exactly. Yeah. Buying old school routes and really kind of flipping them like a house with modern micro markets charging, with different products and what would fit in a vending machine, like more of the unorthodox, you know, toilet paper and tide pods and things that wouldn't fit in a traditional vending machine. I mean, we'll sell $35 bottles of shampoo in these micro markets. So just kind of, go and add it in a different way.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (34:49.857) Yeah, and then with the aging population, there's gotta be more and more of these things popping up. So there should be more opportunity for people to get involved or for people like yourself to just snag everything, right?   Mike (35:01.102) Yeah, I think there's no chance I could snag everything, not even just in this town alone that I'm currently in. I mean, machines are getting cheaper, the technology is getting way better with AI. And nowadays, it's not what fits in a vending machine motor. It's okay, what's shelf space? if it's a bottle of shampoo or a glass Coke, it doesn't matter because it's not just getting thrown down the chute of a traditional machine.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:05.387) Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (35:27.521) Makes sense, makes sense. Last, how are you planning on making your next million dollars?   Mike (35:34.3) I think probably with AI, we're doing a lot of interesting stuff with helping people scale their, their vending routes. that is applicable to any, small business. And so I'm really intrigued. Just every time I go down a rabbit hole with some new AI tool, I feel like there's another better one that just came right behind it. So I just think it's kind of that time where you can really get ahead by just learning.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:06.209) Yeah, totally makes sense. mean people that are not paying attention to AI whether it's simply using chat GPT instead of Google search are getting left behind quickly because it's just advancing so fast. I can't even imagine what this world's gonna look like five years from now the way that things are moving.   Mike (36:23.132) It's crazy. Three years ago when I was working for a tech company selling software into the government, I would have to work with three secretaries to schedule a meeting with the general to sell their software. Now my EA is literally an AI bot and everyone that's scheduling time on my calendar, they don't even know they're talking to a non-human, which is pretty   Seth Bradley, Esq. (36:43.479) Yeah, 100%. We're gonna, I predicted within five years, everybody's gonna have a humanoid robot in their home with AI instilled and they're gonna be doing physical things for us at our homes. Yeah. Yep. Yep. 100%. Awesome, All right, moving on to the next one.   Mike (36:50.181) Yeah!   Mike (36:57.917) I hope so. I hope they can go to Costco get all our groceries do our do our laundry The dishes   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:11.501) You're clearly in the top 1 % of what you do, Mike. What is it about you that separates you from the rest of the field?   Mike (37:19.056) Ooh, that's a good question, Seth. I think it's just discipline, know, discipline and focus. One of the hardest things is being able to say no with the things that don't align. And when I was growing up, I had a quote that has really stuck with me. That's like, it's better to be respected than liked. And I think that really resonates. Like naturally as a human, you want to be liked and help people, but the 1 % are really good at saying no.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:47.649) Yeah, I love that man. That's a great answer. Kind of building on that, what do you think the number one attribute is that makes a successful entrepreneur?   Mike (37:57.468) probably focus. Yeah. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (37:59.212) Yeah, focus. Yep. The one thing, right? The one thing.   Mike (38:04.186) Yep. That's why you come back to like the most successful entrepreneurs. They always niche down and they niche down because they just, got hyper-focused. Like this is kind of why for me, you know, I started this passive Mr. Passive on social media before I even got into Vendi. Well, now everyone's like, well, how passive is Vendi? And well, it's like, what's really interesting is I was posting all these different, what I thought passive income streams in the time, but everyone, 95 % of the questions I got about   Airbnbs are all my different investments was about bending. So I just niche down on, on bending and I just looked back on that and I was like, it really forced me to focus.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (38:43.263) Awesome, awesome. What's one thing someone could do today to get 1 % closer to success in the vending machine business if they are really interested in learning more?   Mike (38:53.892) tap into your connections and find a location that has high foot traffic, whether that's a friend that works at an urgent care, a sister that lives at an apartment. You know, you take your kid to that gymnastics studio that has a ton of foot traffic between 4 PM and 8 PM. Like all those locations are prime locations to put one of these modern smart machines in. so, tapping into your connections, well, you know,   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:24.567) Love that man. Awesome. All right, Mike, I appreciate it, brother. We'll to meet in person sometime,   Mike (39:30.574) I would love to. Where are you based, Seth?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:31.789) I'm in San Diego, where you at?   Mike (39:34.78) I am in Eugene. Yeah, Oregon. I'll come down your way though.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (39:37.39) Cool We're planning on doing yeah, we're planning on doing so me and my wife we have a Sprinter van and Last May we did we did going back to the flexibility piece, right? We did 32 days in the van up through Wyoming Montana and then into like Into Canada and they're like Banff and Jasper and all the way up to Jasper and then we circled back on the west coast Through Vancouver and then down back to San Diego Yeah   Mike (40:05.52) What?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:06.829) Pretty wild, pretty awesome. And the reason I brought that up is this year we're gonna do shorter trip. We're probably gonna do two, maybe three weeks at the most, but we're gonna do kind of the Pacific Northwest. So Oregon, Washington, and Vancouver and all those parks and stuff up there.   Mike (40:17.254) Yeah.   Mike (40:21.744) Yeah, you definitely have a, have you been to Bend before? Bend is like my, that whole area, Central Oregon is, and even Idaho, like all those kind of, yeah. That's awesome. Please let me know when you're up this way. I mean, I'll come meet you wherever. That'd be amazing. Absolutely. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:24.641) Yeah, yeah I have.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:38.861) Sure man grab a coffee or beer. I appreciate it. Yeah, let's do it. Yeah all right brother great to meet you and I will send the information on when this is gonna get released and give you you materials and all that stuff so we can collaborate on social media   Mike (40:51.964) Okay. Okay. Yeah. Is a lot of your audience, like passive investors?   Seth Bradley, Esq. (40:58.593) So most of that, so now I'm rebranding. I rebranded because I'm gonna be speaking more towards like active entrepreneurs, Active entrepreneurs, people raising capital, that sort of thing. Whereas before it was based on passive investors and people really focused on attorneys. So I'm an attorney and I was raising capital from attorneys for my real estate deals. Now I'm really more into selling shovels. I'm scaling my law firm. I'm chief legal officer for Tribest, which is, we've got a fund to fund.   Mike (41:20.262) Mm-hmm.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:28.085) legal product there as well. So we're really trying to bring in active, active entrepreneurs and people raising capital.   Mike (41:29.777) Yeah.   Mike (41:36.572) Okay, because I got that, I was just thinking through when we talking about that oil development project, that could be a good, the guy that runs that fund could be a good interview for you. Just thinking through your audience, because he's always looking for investors into his fund and like these oil lubs are just crushing it.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:49.901) Cool. Yeah.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (41:58.464) Yeah, cool. Who is it? Just, I don't know if I know him or not.   Mike (42:02.183) Um, Robert Durkey, he's out of Florida. has, his problem is he's sitting on a gold mine that has no, like he's old school, doesn't know social media, any of that. So that's why I think he'd be perfect for you. Cause I think you could help him and he could definitely help you with some kickback. Yeah. So cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully we meet soon. Okay. See you Seth. Bye.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:05.645) I don't think I know. I don't think I know.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:13.889) Yeah. Gotcha.   Seth Bradley, Esq. (42:20.705) Cool, okay, sounds good man. Yeah, I appreciate the introduction.   Yeah, all right brother. Talk soon. See ya. Links from the Show and Guest Info and Links: Seth Bradley's Links: https://x.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.youtube.com/@sethbradleyesq www.facebook.com/sethbradleyesq https://www.threads.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.instagram.com/sethbradleyesq/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/sethbradleyesq/ https://passiveincomeattorney.com/seth-bradley/ https://www.biggerpockets.com/users/sethbradleyesq https://medium.com/@sethbradleyesq https://www.tiktok.com/@sethbradleyesq?lang=en Mike Hoffman's Links: https://www.instagram.com/mikehoffmannofficial/ https://x.com/mrpassive_?lang=en https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikedhoffmann/ https://www.tiktok.com/@mr.passive

Title: How does the world respond to Jesus? Bible Focus - Luke 4:14-30 Preacher - Stephen Cuthbert Date - 27/07/2025

⸻ Podcast: Redefining Society and Technologyhttps://redefiningsocietyandtechnologypodcast.com Title: How to hack Global Activism with Tech, Music, and Purpose: A Conversation with Michael Sheldrick, Co-Founder of Global Citizen and Author of “From Ideas to Impact”Guest: Michael SheldrickCo-Founder, Global Citizen | Author of “From Ideas to Impact” (Wiley 2024) | Professor, Columbia University | Speaker, Board Member and Forbes.com ContributorWebSite: https://michaelsheldrick.comOn LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-sheldrick-30364051/Global Citizen: https://www.globalcitizen.org/Host: Marco CiappelliCo-Founder & CMO @ITSPmagazine | Master Degree in Political Science - Sociology of Communication l Branding & Marketing Consultant | Journalist | Writer | Podcasts: Technology, Cybersecurity, Society, and Storytelling.WebSite: https://marcociappelli.comOn LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marco-ciappelli/_____________________________This Episode's SponsorsBlackCloak provides concierge cybersecurity protection to corporate executives and high-net-worth individuals to protect against hacking, reputational loss, financial loss, and the impacts of a corporate data breach.BlackCloak:  https://itspm.ag/itspbcweb_____________________________⸻ Podcast Summary ⸻ Michael Sheldrick returns to Redefining Society and Technology to share how Global Citizen has mobilized billions in aid and inspired millions through music, tech, and collective action. From social media activism to systemic change, this conversation explores how creativity and innovation can fuel a global movement for good.⸻ Article ⸻ Sometimes, the best stories are the ones that keep unfolding — and Michael Sheldrick's journey is exactly that. When we first spoke, Global Citizen had just (almost) released their book From Ideas to Impact. This time, I invited Michael back on Redefining Society and Technology because his story didn't stop at the last chapter.From a high school student in Western Australia who doubted his own potential, to co-founding one of the most influential global advocacy movements — Michael's path is a testament to what belief and purpose can spark. And when purpose is paired with music, technology, and strategic activism? That's where the real magic happens.In this episode, we dig into how Global Citizen took the power of pop culture and built a model for global change. Picture this: a concert ticket you don't buy, but earn by taking action. Signing petitions, tweeting for change, amplifying causes — that's the currency. It's simple, smart, and deeply human.Michael shared how artists like John Legend and Coldplay joined their mission not just to play music, but to move policy. And they did — unlocking over $40 billion in commitments, impacting a billion lives. That's not just influence. That's impact.We also talked about the role of technology. AI, translation tools, Salesforce dashboards, even Substack — they're not just part of the story, they're the infrastructure. From grant-writing to movement-building, Global Citizen's success is proof that the right tools in the right hands can scale change fast.Most of all, I loved hearing how digital actions — even small ones — ripple out globally. A girl in Shanghai watching a livestream. A father in Utah supporting his daughters' activism. The digital isn't just real — it's redefining what real means.As we wrapped, Michael teased a new bonus chapter he's releasing, The Innovator. Naturally, I asked him back when it drops. Because this conversation isn't just about what's been done — it's about what comes next.So if you're wondering where to start, just remember Eleanor Roosevelt's quote Michael brought back:“The way to begin is to begin.”Download the app. Take one action. The world is listening.Cheers,Marco⸻ Keywords ⸻ Society and Technology, AI ethics, generative AI, tech innovation, digital transformation, tech, technology, Global Citizen, Michael Sheldrick, ending poverty, pop culture activism, technology for good, social impact, digital advocacy, Redefining Society, AI in nonprofits, youth engagement, music and change, activism app, social movements, John Legend, sustainable development, global action, climate change, eradicating polio, tech for humanity, podcast on technology__________________ Enjoy. Reflect. Share with your fellow humans.And if you haven't already, subscribe to Musing On Society & Technology on LinkedIn — new transmissions are always incoming.https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/musing-on-society-technology-7079849705156870144You're listening to this through the Redefining Society & Technology podcast, so while you're here, make sure to follow the show — and join me as I continue exploring life in this Hybrid Analog Digital Society.End of transmission.____________________________Listen to more Redefining Society & Technology stories and subscribe to the podcast:

Title: How to Help the Helpless Passage: Esther 4:16; Luke 22:32; Acts 2:42; Romans 12:15; Philippians 2:4; 1 Thessalonians 5:11, 14: 1 Timonthy 2:1 Speaker: Pastor Daniel Weierbach Listen/watch us live on Rumble: https://rumble.com/user/ODBaptist Don't forget to share and subscribe Listen/watch us on sermons at https://www.sermonaudio.com/source_detail.asp?sourceid=odbaptist Follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Open-Door-115705998459103 1128 Oates Road Prattville, AL 36066 United States

Title: How the Work of Your Pastor Can Help You – Covenant ServiceIn this enlightening Covenant Service sermon, teaches on the divine role of your pastor and how their labor in the Word, prayer, and spiritual guidance is designed to benefit your life. Discover how aligning with your pastor's assignment can open doors to growth, protection, and purpose. Learn why honoring, supporting, and connecting with their work isn't just a church duty—it's a spiritual advantage for your destiny.Listen, Subscribe And Share....Stay Blessed!!!....

Title: How to Launch Therapy Intensives in Private Practice: An Interview with Steffeny Feld, LCSW Description:Curt and Katie chat with Steffeny Feld, LCSW, Therapist and Creator of the Intensive Design Lab, about how therapists can bring therapy intensives into private practice. We explore how therapy intensives differ from traditional therapy, how to structure and prepare for intensives, clinical considerations for both clients and clinicians, and why this model can be particularly supportive for highly sensitive or neurodivergent therapists. About Our Guest:Steffeny Feld is a Therapist, Copywriter, and the Creator of the Intensive Design Lab where she supports therapists of all backgrounds and modalities to launch therapy intensives in private practice. Steffeny believes that therapy intensives are powerful and transformative for clients and the clinicians who offer them. She supports therapists to bring intensives into their practice so that they can work less and earn more while helping clients heal. Steffeny lives in St Louis, Missouri with her partner and 4-year-old son, Felix. Key Takeaways: Therapy intensives offer a distinct therapy format, not just longer sessions. Therapists must assess client readiness and window of tolerance carefully. Intensives can support therapist sustainability, especially for highly sensitive and neurodivergent clinicians. Practical considerations include session structure, pacing, and client comfort. Therapy intensives provide an opportunity for deep clinical work and income diversification. Link to Transcripts and Full Show Notes: https://mtsgpodcast.com Join the Modern Therapist Community:Linktree: https://linktr.ee/therapyreimagined Creative Credits:Voice Over by DW McCann - https://www.facebook.com/McCannDW/ Music by Crystal Grooms Mangano - https://groomsymusic.com/

More Top ESG ETFs and Companies. Includes reviews and links to 16 articles with great ETF and stock recommendations globally. By Ron Robins, MBA Transcript & Links, Episode 154, June 13, 2025 Hello, Ron Robins here. Welcome to my podcast episode 154, published June 13, 2025, titled “More Top ESG ETFs and Companies.” So, this podcast is presented by Investing for the Soul. Investingforthesoul.com is your site for vital global ethical and sustainable investing mentoring, news, commentary, information, and resources. Remember that you can find a full transcript and links to content, including stock symbols and bonus material, on this episode's podcast page at investingforthesoul.com/podcasts. Also, a reminder. I do not evaluate any of the stocks or funds mentioned in these podcasts, and I don't receive any compensation from anyone covered in these podcasts. Furthermore, I will reveal any investments I have in the investments mentioned herein. Additionally, please visit this podcast's webpage for links to the articles and additional company and stock information. I have a great crop of 16 articles for you in this podcast! ------------------------------------------------------------- More Top ESG ETFs and Companies (1) My first review article appeared on a favourite investor website, morningstar.com. It's titled Five Top ESG ETFs for US Investors and is written by Hannah Hummel. Here are some brief comments on each ETF from Ms. Hummel. “To find these 174 sustainable ETFs, we applied multiple screens across all exchange-traded funds in Morningstar's database, selecting only equity investments that are both domiciled in the United States and traded on a United States Exchange. Next, we filtered the remaining ETFs down to only those Morningstar designates as an ‘ESG Intentional Investment – Overall.' (Read here.)… All fund sizes are as of June 2, 2025. 1. iShares ESG Aware MSCI USA ETF ESGU Morningstar Category: Large Blend Morningstar Medalist Rating: Silver Morningstar ESG Risk Rating: Above Average Analyst: Lan Anh Tran IShares ESG Aware MSCI USA ETF tops our screen with $13.37 billion in assets under management. Incepted in December 2016, the fund has returned 0.48% year to date, trailing a 1.06% return for the S&P 500 and a 0.86% return for the Morningstar US Market Index in 2025. Over the past three years, the fund has posted a 13.59% annualized return, underperforming the S&P 500 at 14.41% and the Morningstar US Market Index at 14.05%. This passively managed fund tracks the MSCI USA Extended ESG Focus Index. 2. Vanguard ESG US Stock ETF ESGV Morningstar Category: Large Blend Morningstar Medalist Rating: Silver Morningstar ESG Risk Rating: Above Average Analyst: Lan Anh Tran The only ETF offered by a provider other than iShares that places among our screen's five largest vehicles is the $10.16 billion Vanguard ESG US Stock ETF. The Silver Morningstar Medalist was launched… in September 2018. Year to date, investors have seen a negative 0.21% return, leaving the fund trailing the S&P 500 and the Morningstar US Market Index by 1.27 percentage points and 1.07 percentage points, respectively. In the past three years, however, the fund has delivered a 14.45% annualized return, slightly overperforming the S&P 500 at 14.41%. Like the other four largest funds in our screen, Vanguard ESG US Stock ETF is passively managed, designed to replicate the performance of the FTSE USA All Cap Choice Index. 3. iShares ESG Aware MSCI EAFE ETF ESGD Morningstar Category: Foreign Large Blend Morningstar Medalist Rating: Silver Morningstar ESG Risk Rating: Above Average Analyst: Zachary Evens The largest ETF falling under the foreign large-blend Morningstar Category and the third largest across our screen overall is the $9.73 billion iShares ESG Aware MSCI EAFE ETF. Opened to investors in June 2016, this Silver medalist has returned an impressive 16.7% year to date against a 5.22% return for the Morningstar Global Markets Index. The fund's three-year annualized return is 11.3%, trailing the Morningstar Global Markets Index by 0.42 percentage points. In keeping with the remainder of the five largest funds in our screen, iShares ESG Aware MSCI EAFE ETF is passively managed, tracking the MSCI EAFE Extended ESG Focus Index. 4. iShares ESG Aware MSCI EM ETF ESGE Morningstar Category: Diversified Emerging Markets Morningstar Medalist Rating: Bronze Morningstar ESG Risk Rating: Above Average Analyst: Lan Anh Tran IShares ESG Aware MSCI EM ETF ranks fourth in our screen with $4.73 billion in assets under management. Launched in June 2018, the IShares ESG Aware MSCI EM ETF has returned 9.74% in 2025, beating a 7.54% return for the Morningstar Emerging Markets Index. Looking over a longer horizon, the fund's three-year annualized return is 4.62%, trailing a 5.46% return for the Morningstar Emerging Markets Index. This Bronze Morningstar Medalist is passively managed, seeking to replicate the performance of the MSCI Emerging Markets Extended ESG Focus Index. 5. iShares ESG MSCI KLD 400 ETF DSI Morningstar Category: Large Blend Morningstar Medalist Rating: Bronze Morningstar ESG Risk Rating: High Analyst: Ryan Jackson Rounding out our list of the top five largest US-domiciled ESG Equity ETFs is iShares ESG MSCI KLD 400 ETF with $4.5 billion in assets under management. Incepted in November 2006, it is the oldest fund among the five largest in our screen by nearly a decade. Year to date, DSI has returned negative 0.88%, trailing the S&P 500 by 0.18 percentage points, but outperforming the Morningstar US Market Index by 0.02 percentage points. This Bronze Morningstar Medalist passive fund seeks to replicate the performance of the MSCI KLD 400 Social Index.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- More Top ESG ETFs and Companies (2) Now, another article by Hannah Hummel on morningstar.com. This one is titled 2 Top Undervalued EV Stocks to Watch Now. Again, some brief quotes on each stock by her. Morningstar Data as of May 13, 2025. “1. Analog Devices ADI Morningstar Economic Moat Rating: Wide Price/Fair Value: 0.93 Morningstar Rating: 4 stars Sector: Technology Analog Devices is a leading global manufacturer of mixed-signal and analog chips. [Its] chips function by translating environmental conditions like temperature and sound into viable digital signals. The company supplies chips to a diverse range of end markets, including automotive companies, as well as manufacturers of medical devices, robots, and industrial machinery. In both fiscal 2022 and 2023, the adjusted operating margin for the firm hit 49%, though it has since declined to 41% in fiscal 2024. Morningstar anticipates, however, that the adjusted operating margin for Analog Devices could reach 50% by fiscal 2028, bolstered by a projected 9% average annual growth in sales. Considering Morningstar's current fair value estimate of $245 per share, projections for fiscal 2025 are in line with a 3% free cash flow yield. At a recent $226.68 per share, Analog Devices was trading at a 7% discount to Morningstar's fair value estimate. 2. NXP Semiconductors NXPI Morningstar Economic Moat Rating: Wide Price/Fair Value: 0.76 Morningstar Rating: 4 stars Sector: Technology NXP Semiconductors is a prominent player among automotive semiconductor manufacturers. Like Analog Devices, the firm's expertise is not limited solely to automotive chipmaking, as it also sells to the mobile, communications infrastructure, and industrial markets. Moreover, through enabling near-field communication, or NFC, NXP Semiconductors powers the mobile wallet offerings of multiple high-profile clients, the likes of which include Google GOOGL and Apple AAPL. Although the firm lost 5.0% in revenue in 2024 and Morningstar models an 8.5% decrease in revenue this year amid tariff-related market challenges, Morningstar anticipates a recovery by 2026. Indeed, Morningstar models indicate that NXP Semiconductors' revenue could increase 6% in 2026 as EV designs call for an increasing proportion of chips embedded into their systems. Morningstar's fair value estimate for NXP Semiconductors currently sits at $280 per share, indicating a 6% free cash flow yield for 2025. At a recent $212.40 per share, NXP Semiconductors was trading at a 24% discount to Morningstar's fair value estimate.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- More Top ESG ETFs and Companies (3) My third article brings us back to a favourite sector for ethical and sustainable investors. The article is titled 3 Alternative Energy Stocks to Watch Amid Escalated Tariff Uncertainty and was found on zacks.com and is by analyst Aparajita Dutta. Her article is a comprehensive review and analysis of the industry and a few of its leading companies. Here are some quotes by Ms. Dutta from her article. “The Alternative Energy Industry has outperformed its sector as well as the Zacks S&P 500 composite over the past year. The stocks in this industry have collectively surged 41.9% in the past year against the Oils-Energy sector's 9.8% decline. The Zacks S&P 500 composite has gained 11.7% in the same time frame… 1. Ormat Technologies ORA Based in Reno, NV, the company is primarily engaged in the geothermal energy power business. On May 27, 2025, Ormat Technologies announced a $62 million Hybrid Tax Equity partnership with Morgan Stanley Renewables to support its Lower Rio and Arrowleaf energy storage and solar projects, expected to be operational by the end of 2025. This innovative financing will help Ormat monetize $160 million in tax benefits in 2025, boosting profitability and supporting its long-term energy storage growth strategy. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the company's 2025 sales implies an improvement of 8.4% from the previous year's estimated figure. The stock boasts a long-term (three-to-five years) earnings growth rate of 10%. The company currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Ormat Technologies, Inc. (ORA): Free Stock Analysis Report. 2. Standard Lithium SLI Based in Vancouver, Canada, Standard Lithium is a technology and lithium development company. Its flagship project is located in southern Arkansas, where it is engaged in the testing and proving of the commercial viability of lithium extraction. On May 29, 2025, it was announced that Smackover Lithium, a joint venture between Standard Lithium and Equinor, has secured AOGC approval for a 2.5% lithium royalty rate for Phase I of its South West Arkansas Project, marking the first such approval in the state. This milestone sets a regulatory precedent and enhances Standard Lithium's pathway to commercial production by 2028. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Standard Lithium's 2025 bottom line is pegged at a loss of 8 cents per share, suggesting a solid improvement from the year-ago quarter's reported loss of 13 cents. The bottom line beat the consensus estimate in the last reported quarter. Standard Lithium currently carries a Zacks Rank #2. Standard Lithium Ltd. (SLI): Free Stock Analysis Report. 3. Bloom Energy BE.VI Based in San Jose, CA, the company generates and distributes renewable energy. On April 30, 2025, Bloom Energy posted its first-quarter 2025 results. Revenues of $326 million reflected an increase of 38.6% year over year. Bloom Energy's gross margin was 27.2%, reflecting a 110 basis points improvement over last year's reported figure. The stock holds a long-term earnings growth rate of 24.4%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for 2025 sales implies an improvement of 19.3% from the previous year's reported figure. The company currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Bloom Energy Corporation (BE): Free Stock Analysis Report.” End quotes ------------------------------------------------------------- More articles of interest from around the world for ethical and sustainable investors 1. Title: Best Natural and Organic Food Stocks to Keep an Eye On in 2025 on finance.yahoo.com. (Updated.) By Sumit Singh of Zacks. Original article featured in my Podcast: The Low-Carbon Stocks for Sustainable Investors. 2. Title: 5 Best Sustainable Investment Platforms for UK Investors on moneymagpie.com. By Ruby Layram. 3. Title: Triodos Investment Fund Earns Rare Perfect Score on financial-news.co.uk. By Danielle Trigg. 4. Title: Triodos Bank UK Recognised as Ethical ‘Best Buy' for Investment Funds and Stocks & Shares ISAs. On and by ffnews.com. 5. Title: Top 10: Sustainable Supply Chains on sustainabilitymag.com. By James Darley. 6. Title: M & T Bank a Top Socially Responsible Dividend Stock With 2.9% Yield (MTB) on nasdaq.com. By BNK Invest. 7. Title: Top 10: ESG Ratings Providers on sustainabilitymag.com. By James Darley. 8. Title: Australian Ethical Investment Leads These 3 Promising Small Caps with Strong Potential on and by simplywall.st/stocks/au. 9. Title: These 3 Nuclear Stocks Should Be on Your Energy Radar on oilprice.com. By Alex Kimani. 10. Title: There's Absolutely Massive Demand Growth Ahead for This Well-Positioned High-Yield Stock on finance.yahoo.com. By Reuben Gregg Brewer. 11. Title: Our top rated ESG ETFs on morningstar.com.au. By Simonelle Mody. 12. Title: How to Invest in Green Bonds on morningstar.com. (Lists 6 green bond funds). By Charity Blue and Leslie P. Norton. 13. Title: The 50 most sustainable companies in Europe on corporateknights.com. Introduction by Tristan Bronca. ------------------------------------------------------------- Ending Comment These are my top news stories with their stock and fund tips for this podcast, “More Top ESG ETFs and Companies.” Please click the like and subscribe buttons wherever you download or listen to this podcast. That helps bring these podcasts to others like you. And please click the share buttons to share this podcast with your friends and family. Let's promote ethical and sustainable investing as a force for hope and prosperity in these deeply troubled times! Contact me if you have any questions. Thank you for listening. I'll talk to you next on June 27th. Bye for now.   © 2025 Ron Robins, Investing for the Soul

Title: How a Solar Certification Boosted Jacob Benzaquen's Career   Description: In this episode of Sean White's Solar and Energy Storage Podcast, special guest Jacob Benzaquen shares his journey in the solar industry, highlighting how obtaining a NABCEP PV Design Specialist (PVDS) certification has significantly enhanced his career from kilowatts to megawatts. Sean and Jacob engage in a lively discussion covering Jacob's transition from residential to community solar, the importance of understanding solar regulations and codes, and the exciting prospects for larger commercial solar projects. They also dive into the evolving landscape of electric vehicles, sustainable energy technologies, and the impact of ethical practices in the solar industry. Join us for an insightful and motivating conversation about the future of solar energy and career growth in this dynamic field.   Topics covered: NABCEP = North American Board of Certified Energy Practitioners PV Design Specialist Sean's PVDS exam prep class www.solarSEAN.com/PVDS Community Solar Virtual Net-metering CCA = Community Choice Aggregation Net-metering Solar DIY Off Grid Tesla Powershare EV = Electric Vehicle EV Charging Nissan Leaf DC Fast Charging Supercharge CHAdeMO Fermata Energy www.fermataenergy.com Bidirectional Inverter Battery Bidirectional Charger Tesla 1 Charger J1772 / J plug Charger Adaptors Tesla Model S Protest Solar Bros Door to Door Salespeople Up in the Air Liquidating Pacific Lumber Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters www.headwaterspreserve.org Yuval Noah Harari   Reach out to Jacob Benzaquen Here: Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/jacob-benzaquen   Learn more at www.solarSEAN.com and be sure to get NABCEP certified by taking Sean's classes at www.heatspring.com/sean

Title: How to overcome our setbacks through Faith? | பின்னடைவுகளை விசுவாசத்தினால் நாம் எப்படி வெல்லலாம்?Event: Sunday Service Sermon Speaker: Rev. Dr. Jim Reuben ElliotDate: May 25, 2025Watch the Sermon as a video on YouTube: https://youtube.com/live/qZlDhOSZUr4 FOLLOW US!https://linktr.ee/agapebangaloreFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/agapebangalore Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/agapebangaloreYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@AgapeBangaloreYouTube TV: https://www.youtube.com/@AgapeBangaloreTVTwitter: https://twitter.com/abcabfindia Website: https://agapebangalore.orgVISIT US!Location: Agape Bible Church BangaloreGoogle Map: https://goo.gl/maps/fvEzXTwigMbRRTxz5CONTACT US!Email: abcabfindia@gmail.comWhatsApp & Telegram: +91-9900167714 & +91-9901613901#AgapeBangalore #WordofGod #JimReubenElliot#Truths #Sermon #TamilSermon #SundayService

Today's Gospel installment: 05/25/2025 Title: How much more Text: Luke 12 vs 22-34 1. The Lord was a gospel preacher and one has to use a gospel mind to properly read His words. 2. In this section of Luke he spoke to the matter of what is important. 3. And in the life of the world, riches is what is on people's hearts and minds and unfortunately it does not end there. 4. Many falsely or mistakenly associate earthly riches with Divine favor and salvation. 5. And the Lord Jesus came to straighten things out and said, you have your priorities ALL WRONG. 6. First, you have no power to cause anything. Secondly, God knows exactly all that you need and will see to it, so prioritize God because the very things that you are anxious about cannot save you and guess what, that IS WHAT THE WHOLE WORLD IS CHASING AFTER? 7. Will expand on this and other related matters and IT IS FREE!

Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles! Features analyst stock picks in sustainable technology, healthcare, fashion, jewelry, manufacturing, and more. By Ron Robins, MBA Transcript & Links, Episode 153, May 16, 2025 Hello, Ron Robins here. Welcome to my podcast episode 153, published May 16, 2025, titled “Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles!” So, this podcast is presented by Investing for the Soul. Investingforthesoul.com is your site for vital global ethical and sustainable investing mentoring, news, commentary, information, and resources. Remember that you can find a full transcript and links to content, including stock symbols and bonus material, on this episode's podcast page at investingforthesoul.com/podcasts. Also, a reminder. I do not evaluate any of the stocks or funds mentioned in these podcasts, and I don't receive any compensation from anyone covered in these podcasts. Furthermore, I will reveal any investments I have in the investments mentioned herein. Additionally, please visit the podcast's webpage for links to the articles and additional company and stock information. I have a great crop of 19 articles for you in this podcast! ------------------------------------------------------------- Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles! (1) The first article I'm reviewing appeared on insidermonkey.com. It's titled 11 Cheap ESG Stocks to Buy According to Hedge Funds by Rameen Kasana. Ms. Kasana employs fascinating methodology to arrive at her stock selection. Here are some quotes on her process and, importantly, her stock picks. “We have compiled a list of 11 companies ranked by Sustainalytics (by Morningstar) in its recent ESG Top-Rated Companies report. From the report, we identified companies with a forward P/E less than 15, extracted from FINVIZ. From there, we picked companies with the highest number of hedge fund investors, as per Insider Monkey's database of Q4 2024. 11. Flex Ltd. (NASDAQ:FLEX) Number of Hedge funds holding: 52 Flex Ltd. operates as a contract manufacturing company that offers design, manufacturing, and product management solutions to electronic and technology companies. While the Flex Agility Solutions (FAS) segment is centered on communications, consumer devices, and lifestyle, the Flex Reliability Solutions (FRS) segment encompasses markets like Automotive, Health Solutions, and Industrial. 10. Seagate Technology Holdings plc (NASDAQ:STX) Hedge funds holding: 52 Seagate Technology Holdings plc is a leading provider of hard disk drives for data storage for both enterprise and consumer markets. With a presence in Singapore, the United States, the Netherlands, and internationally, the core offerings of the company include mass capacity storage products, legacy applications, and the Lyve edge-to-cloud mass capacity platform. 9. Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) Hedge funds holding: 53 Crown Holdings is a global packaging powerhouse operating through the Americas Beverage, European Beverage, Asia Pacific, and Transit Packaging segments. Founded in 1892, the company manufactures and markets recyclable aluminum beverage and non-beverage cans, steel crowns, glass bottles, ends, and closures. From food to household and industrial industries, the company serves a wide clientele. 8. Tapestry, Inc. (NYSE:TPR) Hedge funds holding: 57 Tapestry, Inc. is a global house of leading fashion brands, particularly Coach, Kate Spade New York, and Stuart Weitzman. Headquartered in New York, the company offers its products directly and indirectly via wholesale and licensing businesses. The enterprise claims to use its strengths to empower communities and make the fashion industry more sustainable, equitable, inclusive, and diverse. 7. Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company (NYSE:HPE) Hedge funds holding: 66 Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company is a U.S.-based leading information technology company that provides smart solutions and cloud-based services. The core offerings of the company include servers, storage devices, networking products, software, IT support, and customized financial solutions. From retailers and distribution partners to direct sales management, independent software vendors, and equipment manufacturers, the tech giant markets through a range of experts. 6. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ:REGN) Hedge funds holding: 68 Regeneron Pharmaceuticals is a leading biotechnology company serving people living with eye disease, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and inflammation. Headquartered in New York, the company develops and markets life-changing medicines for people with severe illnesses. Driven by its ‘Doing Well by Doing Good' philosophy, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals facilitates a culture that promotes integrity and builds sustainable communities. 5. The Cigna Group (NYSE:CI) Hedge funds holding: 72 The Cigna Group is a global health company providing insurance and related products. With two main segments: Evernorth Health Services and Cigna Healthcare, it has a vast offering including coordinated and point solution health services, and pharma-related care. Based in Connecticut. 4. Elevance Health, Inc. (NYSE:ELV) Hedge funds holding: 73 Elevance Health is a U.S.-based health insurer that operates through four segments, including Health Benefits, CarelonRx, Carelon Services, and Corporate & Other. Incepted in 2001, the company also provides pharmaceutical services, managed care services, health products, and behavioral health management, among others. 3. QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) Hedge funds holding: 79 QUALCOMM Incorporated headquartered in California, is a digital telecommunications provider, operating through three segments, namely Qualcomm CDMA Technologies (QCT), Qualcomm Technology Licensing (QTL), and Qualcomm Strategic Initiatives (QSI). With a market capitalization of $162.449 billion, the company is recognized as the 158th most trusted company in America by Forbes. The core values of the company include empowering people, transforming communities, and protecting the planet. 2. Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO) Hedge funds holding: 84 Cisco Systems is a U.S.-based firm that offers information technology and networking services. Incepted in 1984, the company also offers network security and access management services. Cisco delivers its products and services directly and indirectly through system integrators, service providers, and other distributors. 1. Western Digital Corporation (NYSE:WDC) Hedge funds holding: 85 Western Digital Corporation is a California-based global leader in the hard disk drive market. While providing data storage solutions, the giant is fully dedicated to preserving and protecting the planet. The company's initiatives revolve around reducing, recycling, reusing, and saving for the generations to come.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles! (2) The second article comes to us from the renowned Morningstar site. It's titled 2 Undervalued Automation Companies for Sustainable Investors. It's by Liz Angeles. Now, some quotes from her article. “The Morningstar Rating compares a stock's current price with Morningstar's estimate of its fair value, which is based on the present value of the company's future cash flow. A 4-star stock is undervalued, and a 5-star stock is significantly undervalued. 1) Sika Group (SKFOF) Established in 1910, Switzerland-based Sika produces specialty chemicals primarily used by the construction sector (85% of sales). Its products are mainly used for bonding, sealing, reinforcing, and protecting in the construction and automotive industries. Approximately 70% of its products have a positive impact on sustainability for customers. Sika has a global manufacturing footprint of more than 400 factories spread across over 100 countries. Price/Quantitative Fair Value: 0.89 Quantitative Morningstar Rating: ★★★★★ ESG Risk Rating Assessment: Medium Sector: Basic Materials 2) Zebra Technologies (ZBRA) Zebra Technologies is a leading provider of automatic identification and data capture technology to enterprises. Its solutions include barcode printers and scanners, mobile computers, and workflow optimization software. The firm primarily serves the retail, transportation logistics, manufacturing, and healthcare markets, designing custom solutions to improve efficiency for its customers. Analyst: William Kerwin, CFA Price/Fair Value: 0.75 Morningstar Rating: ★★★★ ESG Risk Rating Assessment: Negligible Sector: Technology” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles! (3) This third article has a perspective that many investors concur with and posits it regarding Netflix. The title of the article is Possible Stock Split? This Stock Has Surged 284% Since 2023 -- Here's Why You Shouldn't Wait to Buy It. It's by Adam Levy of The Motley Fool and found on finance.yahoo.com. Here are a few brief quotes from Mr. Levy's article. “But enacting a stock split can be a very strong signal from management to investors. Management will usually initiate a stock split after a run-up in the price of the stock. When it announces a split, it's suggesting the current run-up in price is justified and that it expects the price to continue climbing. On the other hand, the confidence boost provided by a stock split will only go as far as the company's next earnings report or news item. If the fundamentals of the business are no good, or the stock has gotten ahead of itself, it doesn't make sense to buy it just because of a stock-split announcement. One stock I've had my eye on looks poised for a stock split this year. It's up 284% since the start of 2023, and investors have an opportunity to get in now, whether management announces a split in the near future or not. [That stock is] Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX).” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles! (4) The fourth article I'm posting appeared recently on one of the finest sites I know. That is corporateknights.com. The article's title is Pandora's big bet on sustainability pays off. It's by Naomi Buck. Here are a few quotes from that article. “Pandora (PNDORA.CO) According to those who study consumer habits, millennials and Gen Zs are looking for two things when they go shopping: sustainability and individuality. One jewellery company is capturing hearts and wallets by offering both. Pandora, launched as a family-run jewellery shop in Copenhagen in 1982, has grown to become the world's largest jewellery maker, by pieces sold. And unlike much of its industry in recent years, Pandora's star is rising. As competitors like Tiffany and Signet see diminishing returns, Pandora ended 2024 with 31.7 billion krone (US$4.5 billion) in annual revenue, representing 13% organic growth… In 2019, following several years of declining sales, Pandora embarked on a new strategy: to expand its product line beyond the luxury charm bracelets for which it had become famous and go all in on sustainability. It established three new priorities: to decarbonize, push circularity and promote a more diverse corporate culture. While sustainability may be front of mind for younger buyers, [Pandora CEO Alexander] Lacik admits that the average jewellery shopper is looking primarily at design and price. But even if customers weren't clamouring for it, Pandora's sustainability push has proven a sound business decision; according to its 2024 annual report, the company has grown by 45% since 2019. No doubt, others in the industry are watching with interest.” End quotes. Also, see this New York Times article on Pandora How the World's Largest Jeweler Is Surviving the Trade War. It's by Eshe Nelson. ------------------------------------------------------------- Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles! (5) This fifth article was also posted on corporateknights.com with the same author as the previous article, Naomi Buck. Its title is Italy's ERG proves you can trade oil for renewables and win. Again, here are a few quotes from the article. “ERG (ERG.MI) In 2008, the Italian oil company ERG faced a crossroads. Having sold its 49% stake in a Sicilian refinery to Russian oil giant Lukoil just before the markets crashed, it had cash to burn. And it had a fundamental choice to make… By 2013, ERG had become Italy's leading producer of wind energy. It now has installed capacity in the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and Sweden, making it one of the continent's top 10 wind companies. It also owns major solar installations in Italy, Spain, France and the United States.  ERG's wholesale transition from black to green took little over a decade, and with it the company redefined itself: no longer responding to Italy's demand for oil, it sees itself – in its own words – ‘inspiring change to power the future.'” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- More articles of interest for ethical and sustainable investors from around the world 1. Title: Top 3 Mutual Funds to Invest in India (2025) on shariahsecurities.com. By Shariah Securities. 2. Title: Top Halal Mutual Funds For 2025 on tradersunion.com. By Alamin Morshed. 3. Title: Investing in Green Bonds: Your Complete Guide on fool.com. By Benjamin Locke. 4. Title: Making sense of a rough quarter for ESG funds on ft.com. By Simon Mundy. 5. Title: 11 Most Carbon-Friendly AI Companies Leading the Sustainable Technology Revolution on theimpactinvestor.com. By Kyle Kroeger. 6. Title: Simon Property Group a Top Socially Responsible Dividend Stock With 5.3% Yield (SPG) on nasdaq.com. By BNK Invest. 7. Title: How some companies are rapidly adapting to the energy transition on corporateknights.com. By Naomi Buck. 8. Title: 3 Large-Cap Stocks with Solid Fundamentals on finance.yahoo.com. By Kayode Omotosho. 9. Title: Understanding ESG scores and their impact on investment choices on equities.com. By Shane Neagle. 10. Title: ADP Named A Top Socially Responsible Dividend Stock on theonlineinvestor.com. By Online Investor Staff. 11. Title: The Best AI ETFs to Buy in 2025 on moneymagpie.com. By Ruby Layram. 12. Title: 13 Best AI Stocks to Buy Under $10 on insidermonkey.com. By Abdul Rahman. ------------------------------------------------------------- Ending Comment These are my top news stories with their stock and fund tips for this podcast, “Great Stock Picks in 18 New Articles!” Please click the like and subscribe buttons wherever you download or listen to this podcast. That helps bring these podcasts to others like you. And please click the share buttons to share this podcast with your friends and family. Let's promote ethical and sustainable investing as a force for hope and prosperity in these troubled times! Contact me if you have any questions. Thank you for listening. I'll talk to you next on May 30th. Bye for now.   © 2025 Ron Robins, Investing for the Soul

Title: How to Maximize a New Listing (Seller Agent Mastery) with Michael J. Maher Host: Michael J. Maher Description: In this high-impact solo episode, Michael J. Maher reveals how to turn one listing into many opportunities. Inspired by a conversation in the GenGen Facebook group, this training dives deep into the strategies agents can implement immediately to gain more exposure, generate more leads, and get listings sold faster. Michael breaks down the three core components of listing success—Pricing, Product, and Promotion—and shares both timeless principles and out-of-the-box ideas (like limousines to open houses!) that are working right now in today's market. Whether you're a seasoned pro or just starting out, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you maximize every listing. (7L) Referral Strategies and Podcast Topics: Seller Agent Mastery Special Offer: Become a member of our Generosity Generation group! A safe place for referral minded professionals to learn and connect. www.JoinGenGen.com

Title: How to Maximize a New Listing (Seller Agent Mastery) with Michael J. Maher Host: Michael J. Maher Description: In this high-impact solo episode, Michael J. Maher reveals how to turn one listing into many opportunities. Inspired by a conversation in the GenGen Facebook group, this training dives deep into the strategies agents can implement immediately to gain more exposure, generate more leads, and get listings sold faster. Michael breaks down the three core components of listing success—Pricing, Product, and Promotion—and shares both timeless principles and out-of-the-box ideas (like limousines to open houses!) that are working right now in today's market. Whether you're a seasoned pro or just starting out, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you maximize every listing. (7L) Referral Strategies and Podcast Topics: Seller Agent Mastery Special Offer: Become a member of our Generosity Generation group! A safe place for referral minded professionals to learn and connect. www.JoinGenGen.com

More Top Sustainable Stocks To Consider includes several articles featuring terrific renewable energy, healthcare, branded consumer and natural food stocks. By Ron Robins, MBA Transcript & Links, Episode 152, April 18, 2025 Hello, Ron Robins here. Welcome to my podcast episode 152, published April 18, 2025, titled “More Top Sustainable Stocks To Consider.” It's presented by Investing for the Soul. Investingforthesoul.com is your site for vital global ethical and sustainable investing mentoring, news, commentary, information, and resources. Remember that you can find a full transcript and links to content, including stock symbols and bonus material, on this episode's podcast page at investingforthesoul.com/podcasts. Also, a reminder. I do not evaluate any of the stocks or funds mentioned in these podcasts, and I don't receive any compensation from anyone covered in these podcasts. Furthermore, I will reveal any investments I have in the investments mentioned herein. Additionally, quotes about individual companies are brief. Please visit the podcast's webpage for links to the articles and additional company and stock information. ------------------------------------------------------------- More Top Sustainable Stocks To Consider (1) Now, the following articles offer some interesting investment ideas. The first article is titled ESG Still Matters. 3 Defensive Stocks That Make the Grade. It's by Teresa Rivas and seen on barrons.com. Here are a few quotes from her article. “Portfolio manager Bill Davis is shutting out all the noise and sticking to his guns. The term ESG has been a lightning rod for a long time, but it is—and always has been—simply ‘a proxy for finding a well managed company…' Davis puts his money where his mouth when it comes to the actively managed Hennessy Stance ESG ETF, which doesn't invest in tobacco, fossil fuel, weapons, and similar areas. He does make exceptions based on company principles. The fund uses an algorithm to rank S&P 500 companies by various risk factors and metrics, and identifies those most likely to generate positive alpha and minimize harm. It also helps avoid being reactionary to the zigzags of U.S. policy these days. That strategy, which also avoids large positions, hasn't distinguished itself in these past few years when the Magnificent Seven tech stocks and a handful of other megacaps drove index performance—the fund, though, does have positions in Google, Apple, and Netflix. Still, Davis stands firm. The strategy can show its worth when investors are more concerned with downside risk protection. There are plenty of companies, though, that Davis feels differently about. He likes drug distributor  Cardinal Health CAH —peer to Barron's pick McKesson—because healthcare remains a safe haven and Cardinal has done particularly well—doubling the S&P 500 in recent years. Its earnings growth profile is good and ‘it's a solid company with large enough scale to have pricing power.' Also making the cut is Atmos Energy AIO Davis cites the natural-gas utility's relative momentum—the shares are up nearly 30% in the past year—and its defensive qualities. Although the fund shies away from fossil fuels, distributors like Atmos that are transparent, focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, do fit the bill. Davis owns staple General Mills GIS as well, again for its defensive qualities, including a 4% yield, and its size—big enough to exert pricing power. He does see only modest upside, but also ‘low downside, so it's a good fit for our portfolio.'” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- More Top Sustainable Stocks To Consider (2) This second article brings us back to the most likely favourite sector for ethical and sustainable investors. Its title is 5 Renewable Energy Stocks to Buy Amid Growing Market Demand by Nalak Das at Zacks and seen on finance.yahoo.com. Here's some of what Mr. Das says about his picks. “These five renewable stocks have strong long-term potential. These stocks have seen positive earnings estimate revisions in the last 60 days. Each of our picks currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). At the same time, these companies pay dividends regularly at an attractive rate. 1. The AES Corp. AES is one of the forerunners in the utility industry's transition to clean energy by investing in sustainable growth and innovative solutions while delivering superior results. AES continues to invest in clean energy projects. In 2024, AES completed the construction of 3 gigawatts (GW) of wind, solar, gas and energy storage. [The company] expects to add a total of 3.2 GW of new renewables to its operating portfolio by the end of 2025… AES has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 3.1% and -1.4%, respectively, for the current year… AES has a current dividend yield of 6.32%. The AES Corporation (AES): Free Stock Analysis Report. 2. OGE Energy Corp. OGE has been investing steadily to expand its renewable generation assets. The company is focused on reducing its carbon dioxide emissions to 50-52% by 2030. As of Dec. 31, 2024, OGE owned the 120 megawatts (MW) Centennial, 101 MW OU Spirit and 228 MW Crossroads wind farms. It also owns and operates six solar sites across the state of Oklahoma and one in Arkansas, which comes with a cumulative generation capacity of 32.2 MW… OGE has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 0.8% and 3.7%, respectively, for the current year… [The company] has a current dividend yield of 3.88%. OGE Energy Corporation (OGE): Free Stock Analysis Report. 3. WEC Energy Group Inc. WEC is investing in cost-effective zero-carbon generation like solar and wind. During 2025-2029, WEC plans to invest $28 billion, out of which $9.1 billion will be invested in regulated renewable projects. The idea is to further strengthen WEC's renewable portfolio… WEC Energy Group has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 9.2% and 8.5%, respectively, for the current year…[It] has a current dividend yield of 3.42%. WEC Energy Group, Inc. (WEC): Free Stock Analysis Report. 4. NiSource Inc. NI expects to invest $19.4 billion during 2025-2029 to modernize infrastructure, which will enhance the reliability of its operations. NISource continues to add clean assets to its portfolio and retire coal-based units. [The company] is set to retire its 100% coal-generating sources between 2026 and 2028 and replace the production volumes with reliable and cleaner options at lower costs. NISource aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 90% by 2030 from the 2005 levels. This initiative can help NISource lower the cost of operations by focusing on new and advanced assets. New products and services can lead to added revenue streams… NiSource has expected revenue and earnings growth rates of 11.1% and 6.9%, respectively, for the current year… [it] has a current dividend yield of 2.94%. NiSource, Inc (NI): Free Stock Analysis Report. 5. CMS Energy Corp. CMS remains one of the primary utility providers in Michigan. CMS plans to invest $20 billion in infrastructure upgrades, repair and clean energy generation during 2025-2029. In November 2024, CMS filed its 20-year renewable energy plan, which includes the addition of nine GW of solar and four GW of wind to its generation portfolio during 2025-2045… CMS Energy has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 7.4% and 7.8%, respectively, for the current year… [it] has a current dividend yield of 3.05%. CMS Energy Corporation (CMS): Free Stock Analysis Report.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- More Top Sustainable Stocks To Consider (3) This third article is an updated version of a February 20, 2025, story. It was featured in my Podcast: The Low-Carbon Stocks for Sustainable Investors. Its new title is Best Natural and Organic Food Stocks to Buy Now in 2025 by Sumit Singh. Again, it's from the great Zacks research group and found on finance.yahoo.com. Here are some quotes from the new article. “Companies like The Hain Celestial Group, Inc. HAIN, General Mills, Inc. GIS and Vital Farms, Inc. VITL are responding to the rising demand for organic, clean-label and ethically sourced foods. With consumers prioritizing transparency, sustainability and minimal processing, the market for natural foods continues to grow. Expanding farm networks, plant-based innovations and a focus on humane, eco-friendly production are shaping the industry's future… The global healthy foods market is expected to reach $2.26 trillion by 2035. 3 Natural Food Stocks to Watch 1. United Natural Foods, Inc. UNFI stands as a prominent player in the natural food sector, serving as one of the largest distributors of organic and natural products in North America. Through its extensive network, United Natural Foods supplies a vast array of products, including fresh produce, pantry staples, dairy alternatives and plant-based foods. With its diverse portfolio, the company caters to both retail giants and independent natural food stores, meeting the growing demand for cleaner, healthier eating options. United Natural Foods has made a strategic shift by realigning its wholesale business into two product-centric divisions — one of which is solely dedicated to natural, organic, specialty and fresh products… This Zacks Rank #2 (Buy) company is increasingly focusing on innovation and sustainability within the natural foods space. The company has committed to enhancing its supply-chain practices, reducing waste and supporting regenerative agriculture initiatives. United Natural Foods is also working closely with suppliers to accelerate food innovation. Upgrades in automation and warehouse processes are leading to better order accuracy, less product waste and faster deliveries. United Natural Foods, Inc. (UNFI): Free Stock Analysis Report. 2. Sprouts Farmers Market, Inc. SFM has been at the forefront of the natural and organic food movement, catering to health-conscious consumers seeking fresh, high-quality and ethically sourced products. The company's commitment to fresh, organic and attribute-driven products sets it apart. This strategic positioning not only resonates with a growing base of wellness-focused consumers but also aligns with broader food industry trends favoring transparency, sustainability and nutritional value… In addition to product innovation, this Zacks Rank #2 company excelled at enhancing customer engagement through strategic merchandising events and effective marketing campaigns. Seasonal events like the Summer Cherry Festival shine a spotlight on fresh, specialty items and educate consumers on better-for-you choices. This approach not only drove strong traffic across its channels but also contributed to its robust e-commerce growth, surpassing $1 billion in sales in 2024. Sprouts Farmers Market, Inc. (SFM): Free Stock Analysis Report. 3. Beyond Meat, Inc. BYND has strategically realigned its product innovation to strengthen its appeal among health-conscious and natural-food-seeking consumers. A standout development in this direction is the launch of Beyond IV and the extended Beyond Steak line. These new offerings have been designed not only to deliver flavor and texture improvements but also to meet heightened consumer expectations around nutrition and ingredient transparency. These products have earned accreditations from respected health organizations, including the American Heart Association, American Diabetes Association and Clean Label Project. This Zacks Rank #2 company has taken a proactive stance, using nutritional credentials and transparent messaging to reposition its products as a better-for-you choice. By doubling down on natural and functional food innovation, the brand is not only aiming to win over skeptical customers but also elevate its products to a new standard that aligns more closely with organic and wellness-oriented trends in the food industry. Beyond Meat, Inc. (BYND): Free Stock Analysis Report. End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- Additional article links 1. Title: Analog Devices a Top Socially Responsible Dividend Stock With 2.2% Yield (ADI) on nasdaq.com. By BNK Invest. 2. Title: How to Invest in IonQ (IONQ) on fool.com. By Rachel Warren. 3. Title: 11 Climate-Tech Companies to Watch in 2025 on inc.com. By Chloe Aiello. UK article link Title: Triodos Bank Recognised as Top-Scoring Best Buy by Ethical Consumer on ffnews.com. By Ethical Consumer. ------------------------------------------------------------- Ending Comment These are my top news stories with their stock and fund tips for this podcast, “More Top Sustainable Stocks To Consider.” Please click the like and subscribe buttons wherever you download or listen to this podcast. That helps bring these podcasts to others like you. And please click the share buttons to share this podcast with your friends and family. Let's promote ethical and sustainable investing as a force for hope and prosperity in these troubled times! Contact me if you have any questions. Thank you for listening. I'll talk to you next on May 2nd. Bye for now.   © 2025 Ron Robins, Investing for the Soul

Title: How to Train Your Virtual Assistant to Be Proactive, Accountable, and Results-Driven Description: Struggling to ensure your Virtual Assistant (VA) knows exactly what to do every day? In this episode, Daniel Ramsey, CEO of MyOutDesk, shares a foolproof 3-step training method to help your VA become proactive, accountable, and results-driven.

Title: How the Good Life RollsScripture Reading: Matthew 5:3-12Series: Sermon on the MountCoinciding with the start of Lent, we are beginning a new series on Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapters 5-7. Today we look at the introductory part of Jesus' sermon known as "The Beatitudes." We explore these attitudes that a disciple of Jesus ought to be through three "S"s: 1. The Sense of the word "Blessed" 2. There's a Surprise of those who are blessed. 3. The Significance for disciples of Jesus. Please join us in Pastor Bill's challenge to read through the entire sermon, Matthew 5-7, at least once per week. Share your stories and takeaways on our shout out board here: https://t.ly/pvx50

Title: How to Make It Through Temptations?Speaker: Creston ThomasSeries: MatthewDate: March 16, 2025Bible: Matthew 4:1-11Full Sermon:

Title: How can we have peace - Predigt von Johann Siegel am 9.03.2025 im Christlichen Zentrum Villingen-Schwenningen.

Title: How to Sell Someone on PovertyScripture Reading: Matthew 5:1-12Series: Sermon on the MountCoinciding with the start of Lent, we are beginning a new series on Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapters 5-7. Today we look at Jesus introduction to the sermon through five body parts: 1. Feet 2. Eyes 3. Ears 4. Head 5. Heart to discover that Matthew 5:3 is the key to the entire sermon. Please join us in Pastor Bill's challenge to read through the entire sermon, Matthew 5-7, at least once per week. Share your stories and takeaways on our shout out board here: https://t.ly/pvx50

Title: How to Build Resilience: Future-Proofing Cybersecurity in Healthcare. In this episode of FINN Voices, host Beth Friedman speaks with Greg Surla, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer at FinThrive, a leader in revenue cycle management solutions. Greg discusses key insights from the Change Healthcare cybersecurity breach and the importance of rigorous backup systems to ensure operational continuity for revenue cycle operations during cyber incidents. Listeners assess a comprehensive game plan for outage management and data integrity assurance while promoting a culture of security awareness across their organizations. Join us to learn how FinThrive helps healthcare organizations tackle cybersecurity challenges and strengthen their resilience in revenue cycle management. Find all of our network podcasts on your favorite podcast platforms and be sure to subscribe and like us. Learn more at www.healthcarenowradio.com/listen/

Consider These Top ESG Stocks! ESG fund ownership offers great insight into the best stocks to own for potential returns. By Ron Robins, MBA Transcript & Links, Episode 143, November 29, 2024 Hello, Ron Robins here. Welcome to this podcast episode 143 published November 29, 2024, titled “Consider These Top ESG Stocks!” It's presented by Investing for the Soul. Investingforthesoul.com is your site for vital global ethical and sustainable investing mentoring, news, commentary, information, and resources. Remember that you can find a full transcript and links to content – including stock symbols and bonus material – on this episode's podcast page at investingforthesoul.com/podcasts. Also, a reminder. I do not evaluate any of the stocks or funds mentioned in these podcasts, and I don't receive any compensation from anyone covered in these podcasts. Furthermore, I will reveal any investments I have in the investments mentioned herein. Additionally, quotes about individual companies are brief. Please go to this podcast's webpage for links to the articles and more company and stock information. ------------------------------------------------------------- Consider These Top ESG Stocks! (1) I'm beginning this podcast episode with a great article titled The Top Stocks Widely Owned by ESG Funds. It's by Frances Aufderheide and found on morningstar.com. Here are some quotes from the article. “We found five stocks owned exclusively by large-cap sustainable funds in the industrials, materials, and healthcare sectors. We describe them below, with insight from Morningstar analysts and Sustainalytics. Source: Morningstar Direct. Weights as of Oct. 31, 2024. Data as of Nov. 5, 2024. 1. Ecolab (ECL) Morningstar Rating: 2 Stars Morningstar ESG Risk Rating Assessment: 3 Globes Price/Fair Value: 1.14 Total Return Year to Date (Month-End): 24.75 ‘As the global leader in the cleaning and sanitation industry, Ecolab provides products that help its hospitality, foodservice, and life-sciences customers do laundry, wash dishes, maintain clean manufacturing environments, and ensure regulatory compliance. With unmatched scale and a solid razor-and-blade business model, Ecolab's competitive advantages are firmly in place.' ‘Ecolab's largest growth driver over the next decade will be the water business, which generates the majority of revenue in the industrial segment. During the quarter, water revenue grew 3% versus the prior-year quarter on an organic basis, excluding currency movements.' —Seth Goldstein, Morningstar Strategist 2. Agilent Technologies (A) Morningstar Rating: 4 Stars Morningstar ESG Risk Rating Assessment: 4 Globes Price/Fair Value: 0.91 Total Return Year to Date (Month-End): (5.76) Agilent provides instruments, software and services for laboratories. ‘Agilent offers differentiated technology that is protected by various intangible assets, including patents, copyrights, and trademarks. This portfolio of intellectual property and its innovation prowess in chosen fields keep competitors from directly copying its technology.' —Julie Utterback, Morningstar Senior Equity Analyst 3. Xylem (XYL) Morningstar Rating: 3 Stars Morningstar ESG Risk Rating Assessment: 3 Globes Price/Fair Value: 1.07 Total Return Year to Date (Month-End): 7.43 ‘Xylem is one of the leading water technology companies in the world. Its extensive portfolio spans a wide range of equipment and solutions for the water industry, including the transport, treatment, testing, and efficient use of water for public utilities as well as industrial, commercial, and residential customers. Xylem operates four business segments: water infrastructure, applied water, measurement and control solutions, and water solutions and services.' —Krysztof Smalec, Morningstar Equity Analyst 4. W.W. Grainger (GWW) Morningstar Rating: 1 Star Morningstar ESG Risk Rating Assessment: 4 Globes Price/Fair Value: 1.66 Total Return Year to Date (Month-End): 34.57 W.W. Grainger distributes maintenance, repair, and operations products to more than 4.5 million customers. ‘We've raised our fair value estimate for narrow-moat-rated Grainger by 12% to $660 per share as we've become more confident of the firm's ability to maintain long-term operating margin above 14%. Even so, the current stock price remains well above our revised fair value estimate.' ‘Our confidence (of a narrow moat) is rooted in Grainger's ability to fend off competitive pressures from both new and existing players in the maintenance, repair, and operations market.' —Brian Bernard, Morningstar Senior Director 5. Veralto (VLTO) Morningstar Rating: None Morningstar ESG Risk Rating Assessment: 3 Globes Total Return Year to Date (Month-End): 24.56 Veralto provides technology solutions to improve the quality and reliability of water and product innovations through a suite of brands. ‘This tax-free spinoff is just the latest example of Danaher's business pruning.' —Julie Utterback, Morningstar Senior Equity Analyst” End quotes. Also, go to the link on this podcast page to this article for additional research on the “Top 10 widely held in US Sustainable Large-Cap Fund Universe” and “Top 5 Overweight Securities in the US Sustainable Large-Cap Fund Universe”. ------------------------------------------------------------- Consider These Top ESG Stocks! (2) The second article today reviews a company that is an old favorite of ethical and sustainable investors. The article is titled Buy First Solar Stock on the Dip. Solar Energy Will Be Too Good an Opportunity for President-Elect Trump to Pass Up. It's by James Brumley and found on fool.com. Here are a few of his comments on First Solar stock. “First Solar (FSLR) Investors suspect pro-oil President-elect Donald Trump could also prove unsupportive of renewable energy. In fact, most clean energy stocks are down since his Nov. 5 election on this very worry. First Solar has been no exception to the industrywide sell-off. This weakness, however, is also a buying opportunity for anyone interested in owning a piece of the solar panel maker, or in adding exposure to the solar industry as a whole. The solar power movement is too big and too well-developed for Donald Trump to bring to a halt now. First Solar is also well-positioned to sidestep one of the few meaningful actions the president-elect could take to disrupt the solar industry's growth. Solar is just too competitive to stop now Data gathered by Wood Mackenzie and reported by the U.S. Department of Energy indicates that utility-scale solar power is now in line with the cost of natural gas and coal-fired power… The irony? Largely because it's the cheapest means of adding utility-scale power production there, solar is growing like wildfire in several states like Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas that picked Trump to be president during the recently ended election cycle. To the extent voters picked Trump for economic reasons, they'll certainly appreciate cheaper electricity and its positive impact on the economy. The 2022 passage of the Inflation Reduction Act is admittedly fueling much of this growth, by offering taxpayers a tax credit of up to 30% of the cost of a solar power system. The IRA also incentivizes utility-scale solar power projects as well as the manufacturing of solar panels themselves… But tariffs? While unspecific as well as far from being certain (Trump argues the mere threat of tariffs is enough), First Solar is mostly immune to their impact anyway. Although the company requires some imported materials that may be subject to such tariffs, it's an American manufacturer mostly serving the North American market, where the company believes over 90% of its immediate revenue opportunities await… Data source: StockAnalysis.com. Chart by author. Give at least partial credit for this brewing growth to First Solar's Cadmium Telluride (CdTe) photovoltaic panels. Although they make its design and production processes more complicated and more costly than that of more conventional silicon panels, this technology proves more durable while at the same time delivering more power. Utility-scale buyers are increasingly seeing these high-performance panels as an investment rather than an expense, as they further lower the effective per-kilowatt cost of solar power… The market's overestimating the risk, and underestimating First Solar Now all of a sudden First Solar's stumble since early November and its much bigger 37% pullback from June's peak looks like an entry opportunity. The analyst community agrees, anyway. Undeterred by political rhetoric and handwringing, most of them still consider First Solar stock a strong buy, sporting a consensus price target of $280.79. That's almost 50% above the stock's present price.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- Consider These Top ESG Stocks! (3) This next article, though from Australia, might interest many investors outside of that wonderful country. It's titled The Ethical Investor: These three ESG award-winning ASX companies show how it's done. It's by Eddy Sunarto found on ntnews.com.au. Here are some of what Mr. Sunarto says about his picks. “1. Orica (ASX:ORI) was named Australia's most sustainable company in the 2024 Australian Financial Review Sustainability Leaders awards, taking home top honours for its significant environmental impact. The company, a global leader in commercial explosives, was recognised for its groundbreaking emissions abatement project at its Kooragang Island plant near Newcastle, NSW. This project is the largest of its kind in the Australian chemicals sector, reducing emissions by 45% at the site and cutting national chemical industry emissions by 11%... The judges believe Orica's efforts have not only addressed environmental challenges but have also driven economic growth, injecting millions into the local economy while future-proofing critical manufacturing capabilities for industries such as mining, agriculture and healthcare. The company's commitment to sustainability is also reflected in its ambitious climate targets, aiming for net zero emissions by 2050. 2. Sims Metal Management (ASX:SGM) an Australian-based global recycling company with a 106-year history, was named the most sustainable corporation of 2024 by Corporate Knights, topping its Global 100 list. Known for its role in the circular economy, Sims has been integral in reducing carbon emissions by recycling metals like steel, copper, and aluminium – which are crucial in industries like electric vehicles, wind turbines and solar panels. In 2023 alone, the company's efforts saved 13 million tonnes of CO₂, equivalent to removing nearly three million cars from the road, according to its reports. Sims' approach to sustainability extends beyond recycling, with ambitious goals to transition to renewable energy in its operations by 2025 and achieve net-zero emissions by 2050… The company is investing in advanced technologies, like automated sorting systems and AI robots, to improve the efficiency of its recycling processes. Although these innovations may not always attract the same attention as large renewable energy projects, CEO Stephen Mikkelsen said that metal recycling plays a vital role in decarbonising industries and contributing to a sustainable future. 3. Australian Vintage (ASX:AVG) won the 2024 Global Drinks Intel ESG Award for Sustainable Wine Producer, which was announced in September. The award recognised the company's strong commitment to environmental, social, and governance (ESG) principles, despite current challenges within the Australian wine industry. The company had earlier achieved B Corp certification in February, making it one of only three Australian wine companies with this status. Australian Vintage's ESG strategy focuses on three key pillars: 'Thriving People', 'Nurture Nature', and 'Meaningful Growth'. The company said all these are supported by measurable, verifiable performance… The judges praised Australian Vintage for not just making ESG commitments, but for quantifying and achieving real, impactful results.” End quotes. ------------------------------------------------------------- Additional Articles of Interest 1. Title: The Top 10 Nuclear Energy Companies Shaping Clean Power on vaneck.com. By Coulter Regal. 2. Title: How to Get Fossil Fuels Out of Your Investment Portfolio on nytimes.com. By Tara Siegel Bernard. 3. Title: Raymond James Predicts Up to ~440% Rally for These 2 ‘Strong Buy' Stocks on finance.yahoo.com. By TipRanks. 4. Title: Top 10: Sustainable Brands on sustainabilitymag.com. By Jasmin Jessen. ------------------------------------------------------------- Ending Comment These are my top news stories with their stock and fund tips for this podcast “Consider These Top ESG Stocks!” Please click the like and subscribe buttons wherever you download or listen to this podcast. That helps bring these podcasts to others like you. And please click the share buttons to share this podcast with your friends and family. Let's promote ethical and sustainable investing as a force for hope and prosperity in these troubled times! Contact me if you have any questions. Thank you for listening. Now my next podcast will be December 13th. I'll talk to you then! Bye for now.   © 2024 Ron Robins, Investing for the Soul

The monthly Men's Breakfast & Bible Study at OAG shared by Billy Rhoades. ** Edited to remove extended pauses ** Title: How to Kill a Giant for Dummies Summary: Billy Rhoades shares insights from the classic biblical story of David and Goliath, emphasizing the key actions David took to defeat the giant despite his youth and inexperience. He encourages listeners to recognize their own battles, remember past victories, and utilize the weapons of faith and prayer as they face their own giants in life. Outline: 00:00 - Introduction and David's Song 02:17 - David and Goliath: The Scene 04:46 - David's Courage and Cause 11:18 - Remembering Past Victories 13:29 - David's Choice of Weapons 16:00 - Facing Giants with Faith 19:56 - Victory in God's Power 22:42 - God's Continuous Work 23:28 - Encouragement and Prayer

Title: How to Effectively Train Neurosurgery Residents: Balance of High Expectations, Feedback, and Support Guest faculty: Kojo Hamilton and Nader Dahdaleh Host: Lara Massie and Scott Zuckerman This episode will discuss effective strategies on how to train neurosurgery residents. Rather than focusing on ways to teach surgery, this podcast will delve into the interpersonal strategies on how to achieve optimal communication with residents and support them in a way that maximizes their potential.

Title: How to be Unstoppable (ft. Alex Weber | International Keynote Speaker)Bio:An international keynote speaker, award-winning host for NBC, acclaimed author, and competitor on American Ninja Warrior, Alex helps leaders, individuals, and organizations to be relentless, to gain their competitive edge, and to unlock new levels of achievement. His contagious positive energy immediately impacts audiences to be unstoppable!Opening Quote:"And what if your people at the end of a keynote, what if everyone in the audience was lit up to be fully committed to themselves, to the people who need us, to the work we're doing and not these micro commits where we're hiding a little bit and we're holding back because that's what happens."Summary:A fantastic guest joins Scott today in this episode of No More Bad Event—it's Alex Weber. Alex is an International Keynote Speaker, Author, NBC host, and badass Ninja Warrior participant.No doubt about it.  Alex is one of the most enthusiastic people you'll ever meet. He's got a real passion for helping audiences and event professionals make the most out of every experience.In Alex's chat with Scott, they get into some really eye-opening stuff. They talked about his journey and how his all-in mindset really shapes everything he does. Alex has got some incredible insights on leadership and motivation, thanks to his background and experiences.What's really cool about Alex is his unique ability to blend humor with wisdom. He dropped some fantastic tips on how to keep your audience engaged and create a safe, positive environment, even when things go a bit off-script. If you're an event professional, you're going to find these insights super useful.Alex also touched on the importance of self-belief, chasing your dreams, and the power of positive energy. His approach is filled with practical advice and inspiration.HIRE THEM TO SPEAK:Follow Alex Weber: Hire Alex to speakFollow Scott Bloom: eSpeakers BioFollow eSpeakers: eSpeakers MarketplaceABOUT NO MORE BAD EVENTS:Brought to you by eSpeakers and hosted by professional emcee, host, and keynote speaker Scott Bloom, No More Bad Events is where you'll hear from some of the top names in the event and speaking industry about what goes on behind the scenes at the world's most perfectly executed conferences, meetings, and more. Get ready to learn the secrets and strategies to help anyone in the event industry reach their goal of putting on nothing less than world-class events. Learn more at: nomorebadevents.comABOUT THE HOST:A veteran comedian and television personality who has built a reputation as the go-to choice for business humor, Scott has hosted hundreds of events over two decades for big and small organizations alike. Scott has also hosted his own weekly VH1 series and recently co-hosted a national simulcast of the Grammy Awards from the Palace Theater.As the son of a successful salesman, he was exposed to the principles of building a business at an early age. As a comedian, Scott cut his teeth at renowned improv and comedy clubs. And as a self-taught student of psychology, he's explored what makes people tick and has written a book (albeit a farce) on how to get through life. He's uniquely positioned to deliver significant notes on connecting people and making business seriously funny. And who doesn't like to laugh? Learn more about Scott: scottbloomconnects.comPRODUCED BY eSpeakers:When the perfect speaker is in front of the right audience, a kind of magic happens where organizations and individuals improve in substantial, long-term ways. eSpeakers exists to make this happen more often. eSpeakers is where the speaking industry does business on the web. Speakers, speaker managers, associations, and bureaus use our tools to organize, promote and grow successful businesses. Event organizers think of eSpeakers first when they want to hire speakers for their meetings or events.The eSpeakers Marketplace technology lets us and our partner directories help meeting professionals worldwide connect directly with speakers for great engagements. Thousands of successful speakers, trainers, and coaches use eSpeakers to build their businesses and manage their calendars. Thousands of event organizers use our directories every day to find and hire speakers. Our tools are built for speakers, by speakers, to do things that only purpose-built systems can.Learn more at: eSpeakers.comSHOW CREDITS:Scott Bloom: Host | scottbloomconnects.comJoe Heaps: eSpeakers | jheaps@eSpeakers.com

Work with us: Corporate2Coach Program Hey Team, Welcome to Episode 207 of The Fit CEO Podcast with your host, Chad Molyneux! In this episode, we're diving into the essentials of a successful sales call. Title: "How to Connect and Qualify Leads in Your Sales Calls" I'm breaking down the key strategies to build rapport and qualify your leads effectively. Whether you're new to sales or looking to sharpen your skills, this episode is packed with actionable tips to help you connect with prospects and close more deals. Tune in, take notes, and let's elevate your sales game together! Best, Chad ➡️ Visit our website for more information on NLCA: https://www.thenextlevelcoachingacademy.com ➡️ Follow me on IG for quick business tips: https://www.instagram.com/the_fitceoigsh=MWY3dm02dnZ0cmFtMw== ➡️ Subscribe on YouTube to follow my entrepreneurial journey: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcuJAZpe3kBMoxmKbHfRmlw ➡️ Join our Skool Group to access our resource library & mini courses: https://www.skool.com/corporate2coach-academy-1996/about

Title: How is your Sacred flame burning?Speaker: Pastor John Van De GiessenDate: 28th April 2024Location: Adelaide, Australia Listen to the entire Podcast Revival library by visiting https://podcastrevival.com The Revival Fellowship is a Bible-directed, Spirit-filled Church and we welcome visitors to our meetings at any of our locations worldwide. To find your nearest venue visit https://therevivalfellowship.com © 2024 The Revival Fellowship. All Rights Reserved.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Is having a big crowd the only way to have a great event? Not really. You can have a great event even with a small number of people. What matters more is the quality of the people attending. A small group of engaged and motivated people can create a great event, while a large crowd of disinterested people may not. It's important to focus on the people who will be most invested in the event and get the most out of it. Have you ever wondered how to make things work when they don't go as planned? What if the key is in how you handle tough situations? In this episode, I talk to Lynne Fiscelli who uses the Referral Mastery System really well. She shares how she turned a rainy event into a big success, getting 28 referrals and making some money, too. “Keep holding events and don't worry about the results. The results work themselves out.” -Lynne Fiscelli   Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode     -Making the Most of a Bad Situation Don't let a low turnout ruin your event. Why shouldn't it matter that not many people showed up? -Organizing an Event that Makes Money Use smart strategies to not only cover costs but also make extra money. In what other ways can you make your event profitable? -Getting New Business and Friends from Every Event What can you do to make sure every event you hold helps you meet new people and grow your business? Guest Bio Lynne Fiscelli is a dedicated real estate agent known for her expertise in building successful businesses in new markets. A master implementer of the Referral Mastery System, Lynne has transformed her approach to networking and events, consistently generating significant referrals and creating meaningful community connections. Her commitment to generosity and continuous improvement has made her a standout leader in the real estate industry. Now based in South Carolina, Lynne continues to inspire others with her innovative strategies and positive outlook. Episode: 344 Title: How this Transplanted Agent Got 28 Referrals in One Day w/ Lynne Fiscelli  Host: Michael J. Maher  

Title: How to Deal With Complications – Both at Work and at Home Guest faculty: Christopher Shaffrey, MD Host: Lara Massie, MD and Scott Zuckerman, MD, MPH Every surgeon will experience complications. We are often protected in residency from feeling the true weight of the responsibility or dealing with the patient long-term. Dr. Christopher Shaffrey will discuss how to manage complications medically/ethically, the shame that accompanies them, and how to both protect yourself and the patient from the challenging feelings that are difficult to navigate.

Title: How to Choose a Better LifeConnect with Nichole Banks Life Coach: Thrive in MidlifeFree Gift: 5 Steps to Clarity in Life & Careerhttps://www.nicholebanks.com/5EasystepstogainclarityNichole Banks Life Coach for Women: https://www.nicholebanks.com/CoachingFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/NicholeBanks23Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/thesecondactformulaInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/msnicholebanks/30 Day Guided Journal: https://tinyurl.com/tzyyha8x30 Day Guided Journal: https://tinyurl.com/49ntheuj Introduction:You're listening to episode 70 of The Nichole Banks Podcast, where we explore how to choose a better life.Hosted by Nichole Banks, author of the Second Act Formula, life coach, and expert in helping women grow into their best selves.This podcast covers a variety of women's topics for personal growth and development, releasing fresh ideas every Monday.Opening Remarks:Nichole reflects on recent personal experiences, including health challenges and the passing of her mother-in-law, Shirley Thompson, dedicating the episode to her memory.The episode will explore the theme of choosing a better life, inspired by Shirley's legacy of love, family, and simplicity.Despite life's challenges, Nichole emphasizes the power of choice in shaping our destinies and finding fulfillment.Exploring the Theme - Choosing a Better Life:Nichole discusses the concept of choosing one's "hard," highlighting the importance of aligning choices with personal values and aspirations.Using personal examples, Nichole illustrates the transformative power of embracing discomfort and stepping outside one's comfort zone.She encourages listeners to envision the life they desire, emphasizing that change is possible through intentional choices and personal growth.Three Simple Tips for Choosing a Better Life:Reflect on Your Values: Nichole advises listeners to identify their core values and align choices accordingly, even in the face of challenges.Embrace Discomfort as Growth: Shifting mindset to view challenges as opportunities for personal development and expansion.Seek Support and Accountability: Surrounding oneself with a supportive community can provide encouragement and motivation to pursue chosen paths.Poem Dedication - "The Dash" by Linda Ellis:Nichole shares the poignant poem "The Dash" in honor of Shirley Thompson, highlighting the significance of the time spent between birth and death as a measure of one's life.The poem serves as a reminder to live with intention, love deeply, and make choices that reflect our true values.Closing Remarks:Nichole expresses gratitude to listeners and encourages them to continue their journey towards a better life.She invites feedback, engagement, and connection through her website and coaching program.Signing off with a message of empowerment and encouragement for listeners to pursue their dreams and unlock their full potential.Stay tuned for next week's episode for more empowering insights!Outro:Thank you for joining today's episode of The Nichole Banks Podcast. Remember, success is within your reach, and together, we can unlock your full potential.Visit www.nicholebanks.com (spelled with an H) to learn more about Nichole's coaching program and connect with her.Stay fabulous, keep shining bright, and until next time, take care!

In today's connection-starved world, the cold, fist-to-the-face marketing strategies that once worked are falling flat. Relationships are the key to building a thriving, blooming real estate business.   While many people don't believe a referral-based business can rival (and even surpass) a marketing-based one, the numbers don't lie. Agents who focus on deep connections do better consistently, and make more with less stress.   What are the simple, yet effective methods for connecting with people? How do we lead with being of service and of value?   In this episode, I'm joined by the Queen of Relational Real Estate, Jacki Semerau Tait. She shares how she went from paycheck player to building a consistent six-figure business through referrals and relationships.   Help people understand that you are there to help them. -Jacki Semerau Tait   Things You'll Learn In This Episode     -The power of personalized cards  How can we make sure our communication feels unique, customized and deeply thoughtful?   -Find referral cues in any conversation How can we identify an opportunity to solve a problem for someone?   -Set boundaries around your business In this business, it's so easy to fall into the trap of being available all the time. How do we avoid burnout and still achieve a thriving real estate career?   -Don't get lost in the likes Social media platforms only seem to foster a false sense of connection. How can we build genuine relationships?   Guest Bio Jacki Semerau Tait is a speaker, author, Real Estate Agent, Coach and the Queen of Relational Real Estate. Her coaching style focuses on helping real estate agents create a steady income in their real estate business through the power of relationships and success habits. Jacki also believes in a healthy work-life balance and helps other agents create that through building the right systems and habits in their business, and setting boundaries that helps protect their time off. For Jacki's free sphere of influence guide, head to http://byrelationship.com/.   Episode: 329 Title: How to Get Referrals with the Queen of Relational Real Estate and the King of Referrals w/Jacki Semerau Tait Host: Michael J. Maher

Title: How to Network to Grow Your Sports Career Guests: Ali Speck, Cory Bernstine, Jackson New-Smith Podcast Perks:  Thanks to Screen Skinz, the #1 branded screen protector, for their support of the podcast! Screen Skinz allows you to personalize your screen protector with custom or officially licensed designs that disappear, get yours today by visiting ⁠screenskinz.com⁠ and use the code “LIFO24” at checkout for 20% off AND don't forget you can get 15% off Suja Organic today with the code "LIFO" at the link: sujaorganic.pxf.io/1rM9Da --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lifeinthefrontoffice/message

Title: How to Network to Grow Your Sports Career Guests: Ali Speck, Cory Bernstine, Jackson New-Smith Podcast Perks:  Thanks to Screen Skinz, the #1 branded screen protector, for their support of the podcast! Screen Skinz allows you to personalize your screen protector with custom or officially licensed designs that disappear, get yours today by visiting ⁠⁠screenskinz.com⁠⁠ and use the code “LIFO24” at checkout for 20% off AND don't forget you can get 15% off Suja Organic today with the code "LIFO" at the link: sujaorganic.pxf.io/1rM9Da --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lifeinthefrontoffice/message

Title: How to Network to Grow Your Sports Career Guests: Ali Speck, Cory Bernstine, Jackson New-Smith Podcast Perks:  Thanks to Screen Skinz, the #1 branded screen protector, for their support of the podcast! Screen Skinz allows you to personalize your screen protector with custom or officially licensed designs that disappear, get yours today by visiting ⁠⁠screenskinz.com⁠⁠ and use the code “LIFO24” at checkout for 20% off AND don't forget you can get 15% off Suja Organic today with the code "LIFO" at the link: sujaorganic.pxf.io/1rM9Da --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lifeinthefrontoffice/message

Title: How to Sell, and Sell Yourself Guests: Ron Li, Rachel Krasnow, & Allison Filmore) Podcast Perks:  Thanks to Screen Skinz, the #1 branded screen protector, for their support of the podcast! Screen Skinz allows you to personalize your screen protector with custom or officially licensed designs that disappear, get yours today by visiting ⁠⁠screenskinz.com⁠⁠ and use the code “LIFO24” at checkout for 20% off AND don't forget you can get 15% off Suja Organic today with the code "LIFO" at the link: sujaorganic.pxf.io/1rM9Da --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lifeinthefrontoffice/message

Title: How to Sell, and Sell Yourself Guests: Ron Li, Rachel Krasnow, & Allison Filmore) Podcast Perks:  Thanks to Screen Skinz, the #1 branded screen protector, for their support of the podcast! Screen Skinz allows you to personalize your screen protector with custom or officially licensed designs that disappear, get yours today by visiting ⁠⁠screenskinz.com⁠⁠ and use the code “LIFO24” at checkout for 20% off AND don't forget you can get 15% off Suja Organic today with the code "LIFO" at the link: sujaorganic.pxf.io/1rM9Da --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lifeinthefrontoffice/message

Title: How to Sell, and Sell Yourself Guests: Ron Li, Rachel Krasnow, & Allison Filmore) Podcast Perks:  Thanks to Screen Skinz, the #1 branded screen protector, for their support of the podcast! Screen Skinz allows you to personalize your screen protector with custom or officially licensed designs that disappear, get yours today by visiting ⁠⁠screenskinz.com⁠⁠ and use the code “LIFO24” at checkout for 20% off AND don't forget you can get 15% off Suja Organic today with the code "LIFO" at the link: sujaorganic.pxf.io/1rM9Da --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lifeinthefrontoffice/message

Title: How to start the new year year with a simplified meal plan Description: Are you ready to step into a new year filled with health, happiness, and abundance? If so, let's talk meal planning! As we embark on this exciting journey together, I invite you to join me in creating a simplified meal plan that will nourish your body, uplift your spirit, and set the stage for a year of success. So put on your apron, grab a notepad, and get ready to transform your life one delicious bite at a time! Based on Your Needs When it comes to meal planning, the most important factor is customization. Each one of us has unique dietary needs, preferences, and goals. So, the key is to design a meal plan that aligns perfectly with your individual needs First, take some time to reflect on your goals for the new year. Once you have a clear vision of your goals, it's time to assess your existing eating habits.  The Benefits of Simplifying Your Meal Plan Save Time and Energy Support Your Health Goals: Save Money Expand Your Culinary Repertoire Here are some Tips for Simplifying Your Meal Plan Start with a Clean Slate Establish a Routine: Keep It Simple Batch Cook and Meal Prep Embrace Versatility Celebrate Balance Mindful Eating and Finding Balance Slow down and savor, Listen to your body, Practice self-care rituals You hold the power in your hands to start the new year off right, and it all begins with a simplified meal plan. Embrace the opportunity to nourish your body, mind, and soul, and make every meal a celebration of your commitment to living your best life. Remember, simplicity is the key to lasting change. So let's fill our plates with love, gratitude, and wholesome goodness as we embrace this incredible journey together.   And lastly Food for thought: Don't wait for the perfect moment, take the moment and make it perfect.   To help you get started and to support you, I am offering a free 1:1 15 Minute no strings attached meal planning coffee chat to set you up for success!  You can book it here.   Thanks again for being here! Stay tuned for my next episode dropping on Sunday where I'll be waiting for you! stay blessed and beautiful my friends! Cheers!   Here's what to do next:   Step #1: Follow me on facebook for more dinner and meal planning tips and hacks  @ busymamamealplanning   Step #2:  Be sure to get your free 5 Meal Method Planner to help you facilitate your meal planning journey. It's free and you can get it at:  https://bit.ly/5mealmethod   Step #3:  Book your FREE No strings attached Meal Planning Coffee Chat to help accelerate your meal planning journey!    Happy to help! Have questions, send me a DM @blagagoertzen.   Again, thanks again for being here! I'm so grateful for you! And I'll be waiting for you in my next episode!   Xx Blaga Your Busy Mom Meal Planning  

Here is part 2 of our Top 10 Episodes of 2023!  This episode focuses on the top 5.  Which episode will be the number on epiosde of 2023????  Listen on and find out!   Everybody loves summer…expect your business. When the temperatures warm up, your schedule starts competing with all the summer stuff going on. This is where a morning ritual comes in. No more mayhem in the AM, now you have infinite control over the morning, the whole day and the whole summer. You even have the discipline to hold an event. #296: The 2 Critical Things you Must do for Yourself and Business this Summer   Most people think a robust database means more people, but that couldn't be further from the truth. Whittling down the many to the essential, energy multiplying few - that's how we truly get those solid connections.  Find out how going from almost 15,000 to 414 people can supercharge your database and ultimately your relationships and referrals.  Peek into a coaching session between Michael and Tania MacLeod. #300: Building a Robust Referral Database - Episode 300 Celebration!   The first rule of throwing relationship-building, superfan-creating, referral-driving real estate events? Don't talk about real estate…don't call them client appreciation events. Rule #2: create a calendar of flagship events at the beginning of the year. Rule #3: don't underestimate the power of an accidental small event.  Learn how Lindsay Rice generated a barrage of referrals and relationships by accident. #309:  How to Grow Your Real Estate Business Without Talking About Real Estate with Lindsay Rice   Multiplying one happy client into a horde of happy clients, or SUPER fans, that's the goal. Imagine having people who had such an amazing experience, they don't just come back, they tell everyone about you. One simple system can boost your reputation and get people beating down doors to work with you.  Learn how to build your Build an Army of Ambassadors here. #277:  Creating Super Fans:  How to Build an Army of Ambassadors with Brittany Hodak     At this very moment, there are profitable partnerships and referral-rich relationships sitting in your database, but how do you unlock them? We have just the strategy to start elevating those connections. In our 4-part Triangle of Trust series, we talk about Connecting with Connectors, the new ABC of Sales, and the powerful Spokes-to-Hubs strategy. #295: The Triangle of Trust (part 4) - How to Get Referrals Today in This Market   Episode: 323 Title: How to Go From Under the Radar to Highly Referable Host: Michael J. Maher

Title: How to Spend An Hour With God. Series: The Essentials of the Christian Life Wednesdays In The Word Description: Ten biblical steps to guide you in spending an hour with God. Speaker: Pastor Bruce Burkett Lighthouse Baptist Church Cortez CO 12/21/23

Title:  How to Embrace the Holiday Season with Ease and Grace, Rediscover Your Supermom Powers, and Find Time to Relax and Savor the Magic Season's greetings, my dearest Mamas! As we approach the most wonderful time of the year, it's important to remember that you have within you the power to navigate the holiday season with effortless grace. Yes, my friends, YOU can be the supermom who effortlessly manages all the jingle and joy while also creating moments of relaxation and pure magic. So, grab a cup of warm cocoa, settle into your coziest chair, and let's dive into some empowering tips on how to manage the holidays like the superstar you truly are. Start by creating a holiday planner to organize all your tasks and events. Prioritize your time by identifying the most important activities and responsibilities. Make self-care a priority by scheduling time for relaxation and rejuvenation. Create a gift shopping plan by setting a budget, making a list, and utilizing online shopping resources. Streamline your holiday decorations by focusing on a few key areas and incorporating minimalist design principles. Delegate tasks and involve family members to create a sense of togetherness and shared responsibility. The holidays are a time of joy, wonder, and unlimited possibilities. By embracing the magic, you can create an atmosphere of love and happiness that will permeate every aspect of your life. Now, my dear Mama, as you embark upon this marvelous holiday season, remember that you possess the ability to feel like a supermom, manage the festive chaos with ease and grace, and still find moments to relax and bask in the enchantment that this time of year brings. Trust in your inner strength, embrace the magic of the holidays, and always remember to take care of yourself. You, my friend, are capable of creating a holiday season filled with joy, love, and the priceless gift of precious memories.   Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! Sending love and blessings ❤ P.S. Book your free no strings attached meal planning coffee chat to set yourself up for success in the New Year. https://bit.ly/busymamamealplanning   Here's what to do next: Step #1: Follow me on Facebook for more dinner and meal planning tips and hacks  @busymamamealplanning   Step #2:  Be sure to get your free 5 Meal Method Planner to help you facilitate your meal planning journey. It's free and you can get it at:  https://bit.ly/5mealmethod   Step #3:  Come and see how we can work together!  I have something for everyone and every budget, from free guides, meal plans starting at $4.99 and personalized 1:1 meal planning sessions for $47 go to:  https://bit.ly/busymamamealplanning   Happy to help! Have questions, send me a DM @blagagoertzen. Again, thanks again for being here! I'm so grateful for you! And I'll be waiting for you in my next episode!   Xx Blaga

Low inventory, high interest, commission lawsuits and affordability (or lack thereof). Real estate is getting more challenging by the day, leaving consumers and agents alike wondering: what the heck is going on with the market?   There's a ton of uncertainty and fear right now, and if left unchecked, it leads to panic and ultimately, paralysis. Agents who combat the fear with communication, market knowledge and expert advice will win in this market. If we're able to confidently guide people forward at a time of great uncertainty, we'll have a client for life, and plenty of referrals too.   What vital information do we need to be sharing with consumers right now? How do we help them navigate this challenging market?   In this episode, I'm joined by the CEO of Keeping Current Matters, David Childers. He shares how we can be the lighthouse in the storm of the market we're in right now, and how to use information to combat uncertainty. If you're able to confidently guide someone forward at a time where they're not sure what to do, that's a client for life. -David Childers    Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode     -Data or distraction  Agents can't stop talking about the commission lawsuit, but is it a topic consumers really care about?    -Factually correct but tremendously misleading  In a market like today's, a headline can be more damaging than what's actually happening. How do we separate panic-mongering news from insightful information?   -Fear = Forget Everything And Run or Face Everything and Rise  How do we bridge the gap between paralysis and action?   Guest Bio   David Childers is a featured thought leader in the real estate industry widely recognized for his expertise, leadership, and unwavering commitment to keeping agents well informed about the ever-changing dynamics of the real estate market. He is well known for his ability to captivate audiences by combining his profound market knowledge with engaged storytelling. His unmatched ability to simplify complex market concepts and distill them into actionable strategies equips agents with the knowledge and clarity they need to maximize their business and be the go-to resource in their local market.   As the CEO of Keeping Current Matters, David has revolutionized the way real estate professionals stay ahead. He has kept his finger on the pulse of the real estate industry for more than 20 years. Notably, he and KCM delivered over 200 presentations at the peak of the COVID pandemic – bringing calm and confidence to a nervous industry. His deep understanding of market dynamics, economic indicators, and consumer behavior continues to prove instrumental in helping agents navigate challenging times and capitalize on emerging opportunities. He continues to contribute in this capacity today. You can sample his content on KCM's podcast, YouTube Channel and our regular webinars, and more. David's passion is rooted in his unwavering commitment to equipping agents to be the standout expert in their market so that every family can feel confident when buying and selling a home.   For more information, head to https://www.keepingcurrentmatters.com/.    Episode: 317 Title: How to Combat Confusion and Eliminate Fear in a Challenging Market w/David Childers Host: Michael J. Maher

Title: How a Deaf Woman HearsSpeaker: Diane ComerLink to Diane's BookLink to Intentional Parenting Podcast

Throwing events and creating memorable experiences is a guaranteed way to get leads for our real estate businesses. But the key to a successful event is not to make it about real estate at all.   The last thing we want to do is make people uncomfortable by talking shop - or worse asking for a referral. The amazing thing is, even if the event isn't about real estate, people will refer us if we make it memorable.   How do we create a calendar of flagship events? How do we learn from past events to make the next one better?   In this episode, Owner and Managing Partner at Rice Properties Group, Lindsay Rice shares her success and lessons from her client events - from the Summer Sip and Swirl to the 5k BBQ Fun Run.   It's now obvious that we don't have to get up at the event to have a speech about real estate. -Lindsay Rice   Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode     -Improving the flow of your events  How do we limit guest confusion from the moment they arrive to the moment they leave?   -A mental health event  How did Lindsay turn making a difference into a successful event?   -An accidental dinner, a wonderful gathering  How did an unplanned event turn into a huge referral source?   Guest Bio Lindsay Rice is the Owner and Managing Partner at Rice Properties Group. She's an experienced Realtor with a demonstrated history of working in the real estate industry. Lindsay is skilled in Sales, Short Sales, Foreclosures, Buyer's Agent, and Working with Relocation Buyers. Connect with Lindsay on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/lindsaylmack/)   Episode: 309 Title: How to Grow Your Real Estate Business Without Talking About Real Estate w/Lindsay Rice Host: Michael J. Maher

Hosting regular, well-executed events doesn't just get people to talk about us, which benefits our businesses and referrals. At their core, these events make our towns or neighborhoods better places to live, they foster connection and give people something to look forward to several times a year.   It means we never have to worry about the source of our next piece of business and we can focus on making each experience better than before.   What steps can we take to make our events more memorable? How do we come up with themes that will make people really want to attend?   In this episode, Scott “The Mortgage Doc” Edwards, shares what he's learned through his events this year. If you've never done an event, it's great to be in a room with people that are doing events - it makes pulling that trigger easier. -Scott Edwards   Things You'll Learn In This Episode     -The greatest thing about events If our event is centered on a movie, how do we actually make it a connecting experience so people don't just watch and leave?   -Removing choke points and hold ups How do we use feedback from the last event to make the next one better?   -Make your town a happier place How do we make our annual event schedule predictable, but also sporadic enough that it builds in excitement and anticipation?   -Getting stakeholders on board If we have sponsors, how do we make sure we're actually adding value to them?   Guest Bio Scott “The Mortgage Doc” Edwards is a Mortgage Advisor with more than 10 years of experience. The time-tested lessons that come with multiple years in the industry have helped fashion Scott Edwards into a seasoned professional. There are simply too many things that you can't learn in a book—and that's why it helps to have a mortgage professional in your corner, advising you every step of the way. With years of learning, adapting, and building a strong reputation—not to mention plenty of happy clients, Scott Edwards is ready to share that experience with you. But it's more than bullet points in the resume that make Scott so special to work with. Clients enjoy the professionalism, the upbeat and friendly attitude, the willingness to go the extra mile. After all, this is essentially a people business. To succeed, you'll need someone who understands the mindset it requires to find the best possible solution for clients. Working with Scott Edwards, you'll discover that not only does their experience matter—but the experience you have when you work together is paramount. For more information, go to https://mortgagedoc.us/.   Episode: 308 Title: How to Grow Your Business by Creating 'Talk-About' Events in Your Town w/Scott Edwards Host: Michael J. Maher