From $350,000 Debt to Serial Entrepreneur w/ Edward Collins

What happens when you're buried under $352,000 in debt, but have the will and resilience to climb out? You hustle, you learn, and you mentor others to do the same. That's the story of Edward Collins, a serial entrepreneur who transformed his life and business strategy to attain financial freedom. Edward's journey is a testament to the power of mindset shifts and strategic partnerships. He reveals the art of leveraging labor, transitioning from hourly charges to value-based pricing, and how it catapulted his business to heights of success. If you're navigating the swamps of debt or looking to scale your business, this episode could be your guiding light.

Edward's tale, however, isn't just about financial turnaround; it's about the power of intrapreneurship, the necessity of self-reflection, and the significance of taking action. From an entrepreneur in debt to an entrepreneur in a flourishing business, Edward's unwavering discipline and strategic decisions were paramount in his transformative journey. We discuss the law of prerequisites, the two pains in life - discipline and regret - and how conversations with oneself can unlock the doors to success. Are you ready to take the leap into the world of entrepreneurship? Listen in, as Edward’s insights might just be that nudge you need.

Financing options, deal terms, and multiple business ventures; Edward has truly done it all. His success didn't come on a silver platter, but through a mastery of unconventional methods. He shares his wisdom, regrets, and lessons learned on shifting business models, finding mentors, and leaving one's ego at the door. Edward's story is a testament to the power of perseverance, strategic thinking, and continual learning. So buckle up, as we navigate the world of entrepreneurship, finance, and personal growth with Edward Collins, a living exemplar of resilience and relentless pursuit of success.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

You want predictability in business. You want to be able to say if I do, this is the result that happens, and that happens through the adoption of processes and procedures. There are only four qualities of leverage that exist in business. You have leverage of labor, which is other people's hands and feet in your business. You have leverage of code, which is technology. You have leverage of capital I love that one because it's other people's money. Then you have leverage of community, which essentially transforms an audience into your marketing team, but that's it. There's no other form of leverage that exists.

Speaker 2: 0:30

Welcome to the Financial Freedom Fast Podcast, the show that teaches you how to buy back your time and live life on your terms. Learn how to confidently leave your nine to five from guests who've done it themselves. Whether you want to lay on a beach, travel the world or focus on your passions, this show will give you the tools to do what you want when you want. Now here's your host, matt Emile.

Speaker 3: 1:04

What is up? Financial Freedom Fast Fam. So excited for you to dive in today with Edward Collins. He was in $352,000 of debt and was able to work himself out by building a business, but learning some very important tips and strategies that you can use if you are trying to build a business for yourself. How can you take a step back and learn to look at a business and build that business instead of working inside of it? How can we leverage the power of the who not? How can we find the right people to help our business thrive? And if you are not building a business yet, or you think you will in the future, this is going to apply to you either way.

Speaker 3: 1:57

Some amazing lessons that we dive into in this episode. So excited for you to hear it, my people. What I want you to know, though, before we go into this? We do talk about how important partnerships and the people that we use to build our business are in this episode, and if you are wondering how you can use partnerships to scale your business, I want you to go to the show notes and I want you to click on the free PDF guide that I have built out for you 25 pages of how to find partners and how to use those partners to scale. You need to understand your value and bring the right people in. Where do you find the right people? I will teach you how in that guide. So click on the show notes right now. Download that free guide and let's retire together, baby, but without further ado, let's jump into the pod, edward Collins. Welcome to the Financial Freedom Best podcast. My man, what is going on?

Speaker 1: 3:09

brother man, I appreciate you having me on here. I just want to first start off by saying this I think what you are doing for your community is amazing. You should definitely get significant praise because you're creating an opportunity for people to learn by courtesy, through others, and I just want to say thank you for having me on.

Speaker 3: 3:25

Hey man, I am here to do the same for you, to give you some praise and let you share some knowledge, because you're doing basically the same exact thing around wealth creation, generation, protection with the businesses that you have set up, and it all wasn't smooth from the beginning, which I think is awesome, and we are going to dive into today's. Something cool, though, for the listeners out there, this is mine and Edward's first time talking. Yes, as we first had this conversation, edward was saying just had this crazy rainstorm that passed me by, and it ends up that Ed and I are 25 minutes away from each other right now Small world, crazy things and maybe we'll have to grab lunch or something like that tomorrow. But yeah, man, so let's dive in here, edward, for the listeners that don't know who you are, what you do and where you've come from, but does your current situation look like right now? Just as a brief synopsis of your businesses and what you're doing, and then let's jump it back to how that all began.

Speaker 1: 4:34

Sure, the best way to categorize myself would be I'm a serial entrepreneur. I've, over the course of the past two and a half decades, I've built and scaled nine businesses up to and through six and seven figures each. We still own them. I have not built anything for sale. I've built it for accumulation. That doesn't include all of our real estate. We have both residential and commercial real estate.

Speaker 1: 4:54

Now, most of my businesses tend to be in the area of finance. I own a private management firm. I own an accounting firm for actual CFO company coaching business for entrepreneurs at all different stages, if you will, of their entrepreneurial journey, and then a few other businesses thrown in here and there, from both a complementary and diversification purpose standpoint. I'd say that the best way to pigeonhole me, though, is I'm someone who tries to advocate for financial literacy in the ecosystem, so I spend a lot of my time now because I'm essentially retired Like I've been retired for about seven years, so where I'm active now in the businesses that I own are things I actually love doing that get joy from, so I spend a lot of time creating content or social media to just elevate financial literacy there, and then I spend a significant amount of my time mentoring other business owners, helping them know what it takes to get their business up to and through the next levels of whatever their respective journey is.

Speaker 3: 5:53

So yeah, I'm a serial entrepreneur that just has a passion for doing this and I've heard you say before on past podcasts and what you do on TikTok and on social media. I've heard you take guys that are doing guys or girls who are doing six figures in their business and you help them get to seven figures. And then you take guys that are doing seven figures and you help them figure out where are the roadblocks that are keeping them from getting to eight figures. And then you could just keep them moving along. And I'm sure there's some commonalities that you see from business to business that help to build those out. And we will jump into that in the future in this podcast to find out where those common mistakes are that business owners are making and how we can get around them.

Speaker 3: 6:38

But before we do that, I want to jump it back to the beginning of your story, because it wasn't always retired Edward. There was a boy where Edward put himself into a pretty significantly heavy amount of debt and was working some business for a while. That didn't really bring much of a return for you. So I would love to jump back to that period where that struggle was, where that debt buildup was, and let's just go through that journey with you. What were you thinking? What happened? How did you build that debt up and then how did we tackle that?

Speaker 1: 7:14

I think it's important to recognize my roots. I did not come from money. I'm five to six kids from a very poor family. Just to put it in perspective. We had to work really hard just to get up to the poverty. I did not have any financial literacy growing up. I never really learned anything about money, anything at least positive. I always had this scarcity mentality, didn't really understand how money works and I actually started my journey in adult life working to the government which is awesome, like that's an interview that doesn't understand what money is and how money operates. But I learned pretty quickly that I really just detested it. I worked for the United States Department of Justice, which was ironically it was like my dream to be in that environment my entire adolescent life. I wanted to be like an FBI agent.

Speaker 1: 8:08

When I went to work for DOJ. It was like the realization of my dream. I just learned pretty quickly that I'm not built for government work. I praised the people who are, because obviously there are some really good people there. Unfortunately, the people are managing a lot of stuff in government, aren't really all that great for new series and leave a lot to be desired. But there are definitely some good people there too. It's just I wasn't built for it and I saw a lot of stuff happening in government that just did not resonate with me. There's a lot of just bureaucracy and financial eruption that exists internally, just within the system. I'm not trying to say that there's evil actors all the time. It's just the way the system is built is problematic.

Speaker 3: 8:45

And it's probably not the best area, the best system and job to be in if you're an entrepreneur type as well, with your own type of self governing, regulations and new ideas and creativities.

Speaker 1: 8:58

And that was actually the thing that led to me making decision to resign. I got hit with basically a cease and desist from my boss's boss with regard to being creative and problem solving and in all intents and purposes, that was essentially what it was. I remember the last thing that this individual said to me. She said Edward, the next time you have a bright idea, keep it to yourself, because I was solving problems and actually by doing so I actually created problems. Per and again, there's a lot of bureaucracy that happens in government and most people understand that government senior people of government operate based on power, and power is created by budget. So the larger the budget you have, the more power you have. But if you do something within government that actually creates efficiency and lowers the spending, which means if you don't spend your budget allocation automatically next year you get less, which means your power goes down, which again is like the exact opposite of the way my brain thinks. Like I want to save, I want to create an opportunity to do things more efficiently. Back to where I ended up hitting in my resignation without a plan B. So I left that job and I started doing workshops Again.

Speaker 1: 10:03

I was born and raised in New Jersey. I lived in North Jersey at that time and I started doing these workshops at local libraries, teaching people how to budget Because, again, I had an interest in money. I had an interest in finance, I had learned some things through university that made sense to me and I started teaching people. But I was doing these at libraries and I was charging like $5 for attendance. I was spending like $4 and 50 cents on the coffee and like donuts and stuff per person that was attending. It was like I wasn't making any money. And someone came up to me at one of the workshops and asked if he could buy me lunch. Absolutely couldn't afford lunch. So, yes, you want to buy lunch, I'm all in. And so at lunch I it was literally the next day and he asked me if I had ever given any thought financial services and honestly, I had not. I had not given that any thought whatsoever. But I did a little bit of due diligence and I decided to open my very first financial planning practice back in 1998 and I Knew nothing about this like nothing at all.

Speaker 1: 11:04

I made a decision that I was gonna learn everything I possibly could about financial investments and how portfolios work. I became a true student of that and and so that I could feel comfortable on topics. I was still very young and I'd be going into rooms where people were making lots of money to me. Thank you. This about somebody that I could ever I'd never dream possible that I do and because of my age I did not have confidence. But I had learned that with confidence comes confidence. So I figured I'd study, right, I'd learn everything I possibly could about investments now portfolios work so that I could Navigate a discussion with a lot of skill and I that actually happened who started doing? But I, unfortunately, I didn't realize I needed to learn how to run a business and pretty much made every mistake that there is possible to make in business. I think if there's a book that exists on someone's shelf that says what not to do in business, I Literally did everything I should. They actually wrote the book based on you. I think they did. It's like it is.

Speaker 1: 12:08

It is crazy what happened the first four years I was in that financial planning business. Not joking at all, I literally made no money like zero. So you may think, women, how do you stay in business? For four years I became very good at leveraging credit cards and Because, again, I understood generally how money worked, how credit work, and I got to a point where at my lowest point I had 17 credit cards, I had seven personal loans, I had some like loads for family and friends and Everything I own but owed. At that end point this is about. Again, this is about four years into it at my low point I was like over three hundred thousand dollars in debt and Every single credit relationship I had at my low point was more than 60 days past it and and it was why it was a Tuesday morning I can remember it as if it was yesterday.

Speaker 1: 13:04

I woke up, I had just about 6 am and, like at 6 0 7 in the morning, there was a knock on my apartment door. I can remember opening the door and there was two guys standing in front of my door. One of them was holding a clipboard and they were there to take my car. So I didn't paid the car bill in months, not just to, like Mars, before five months they're repoed or repo and I Remember I had to hand them my car key. Remember I had to sign the clipboard. I can remember them putting my car on the flatbed and driving off. I had to go to work that way. Like I remember closing this, my apartment door, I can remember Walking past, like through my kitchenette.

Speaker 1: 13:49

I call it a kitchen out of purpose because you could not call the kitchen. It's like ridiculously small. I had this small little round table that could barely sit one person, definitely could not fit two people to eat. It was just for me. And on top of it were piles of Unopened envelopes and they were unopened because I knew what was in them. They were past due notes, right, it was just like covered with bills.

Speaker 1: 14:12

And I walked past my kitchenette into my bathroom. Again, to call it bathroom was being generous, but I walked into it and I went right up to the mirror and that was my look. I looked at myself in the mirror and I said, edward, what are you doing? Because, no matter what it was, it's not work and that's that was my rock bottom. I don't try to ever compare it to anyone else's rock bottom. Everyone has their own, but for me that was my rock bottom.

Speaker 1: 14:38

I had no understanding of how I could get out of what I was currently at, because Everything I was doing in business was wrong. I had a huge ego at that point and you'd maybe say wait a minute, how could you have ego ever? I did exceptionally well in school without ever trying. I barely tried. I was very good academically, so that gave me this ego and I just thought I could do anything and sadly I could.

Speaker 1: 15:03

I did not know how to run the business and I can remember looking at myself in the mirror and in that moment and something clicked in my head. The switch was flipped. And when I turn, I know this is sounding strange, but I can remember Turning away from the mirror to exit my bathroom. It was as if I left my ego on the floor there Because I no longer had it like it. It was not because I, up until that moment I was so headstrong, so arrogant and so like, just not willing to listen to anyone else's counsel at all. And in the as I exited the bathroom, I was literally a different person. I know it can sound strange how I'm describing it, but that's the best way I can describe it.

Speaker 3: 15:50

I don't think it sounds strange at all. I think it sounds like you went into the bathroom Because you just had a pretty crazy life changing event where somebody just took away your car. That might have been part of your ego in itself, but if you had this nice car and, like you, see all your bills piled up, you walk in the bathroom, you look at yourself and you're actually honestly looking at yourself, which is something that a lot of people can find hard to do To actually look at themselves in the mirror, be real with themselves and say, dude, what the hell are you doing? And jump into this present moment, where it's what I'm doing right now is not doing business right, and I've got about three hundred thousand dollars of debt that I've just been trying to push off on different credit lines and push into the future, man. So I don't think it sounds crazy. I think it sounds like you actually came into the present moment. You were like damn it, I gotta do something different now because that old me just isn't it. It's not working.

Speaker 1: 16:47

So what happened like I. I started to again in that moment. I had to figure out what happened, what to do that day. I had to go to work. I had meetings, like now, I didn't have a car, and like I had, there's no story I could make up. I did not have a car. There's no way I was going to get one, because no one would. I had no money. I had no capital. Yeah, I had to figure out how to get to work. So I'd have a friend drive me to work and another friend which barely was a friend at that point driving me home, because I had owed that friend money too. It was like a ridiculous scenario, but Again, I had.

Speaker 1: 17:21

I didn't have an ego at that point, so I was able to finally ask for help. So I started making outreaches to people who I believed to be Hitting or at milestones of success that I wanted to be at right and because I had no ego. This is this is something that everyone should Really wrap their head around. If you could do this, you should do it. If I had, since I had no ego of my own, I literally could just do exactly what they told me, no matter what it was, and I figured, if they were here and I was like way down here, if I just did exactly what they said, what's the worst that could happen? It couldn't be any worse than what I'm doing right now. So I, without thinking, without pondering, and like stradded, I just did exactly what I was told. And it was crazy within a year I broke even for the first time. Like I didn't make any I'm not trying to whoa uh, but I broke even. I did not lose more money. By the end of the second year I paid off all my debt and had extra. Wow, so it. It was a two-year turnaround and what I had done is I simply started reaching out to mentors who were at positions in their respective businesses and careers that I wanted to be at, and I literally just modeled everything that they were doing and the turnaround was Lightening fast. Two-year sales sounds like a long time, but in in reality it's not long at all and that that transition lasted for a significant period of time. But I had plateaued Because I started getting an ego Right, got to a point where I just I couldn't get out of that mid six figure range.

Speaker 1: 19:11

I couldn't hit seven figures and I was like man, that's so frustrating. I'm like, wait a minute, I'm doing everything that got me to six figures, but I'm not doing the things that will get me to seven seven. So then I had to start reaching out to different mentors, different people who were at a higher level than where I was, because I was still listening to the people who are now. I was at their level, right, I was still listening to what they're doing. Like, wait a minute, no, if I want to transition, I have to do something different. I have to be willing to sacrifice the life that I have so that the life that I want doesn't become the sacrifice. So I get be willing to sacrifice where I was to and do something different.

Speaker 3: 19:45

To get something, you have to sacrifice the person that you are to become the person that you want to become, because they have person that you want to become becomes the sacrifice, becomes the sacrifice right, because we are.

Speaker 3: 20:00

If we are Want to be somewhere else, that is going to require us to make Movement and to have growth, and that growth creates an entire new person. So what is, what are the things that we need to do that create that growth? So where I want to actually jump back a little bit in this story, though, so Left the ego on the floor and we decided let's find a mentor, let's find somebody who's actually in a position that I want to be in, because they've already done it, they know how they've gotten there and maybe they can tell me something that will get me to where I'm at. And the ego leaving you is important, because if not, I could listen to you and say, no, this, yeah, I know how to do this, I know how.

Speaker 3: 20:45

If I had an ego thinking that I knew how to get that done, then I'm not going to listen, I'm not going to be open to the suggestions of other people. But if you can leave that at the door and realize that you don't know what you don't know and bring somebody else and that's at where you want to be and then learn from them, you're going to be able to get to the bottom of that and learn from them, you're going to be able to get to where they're at or get closer to where they're at. So what were some of those things that you did differently from year One to two, right where we broke even and then we paid off 300,000 dollars of debt? What was it that you were doing differently within that time frame? Was it sitting back and like managing the business differently? Tell me a little bit about that journey that you took there.

Speaker 1: 21:31

I think it was two different phases of things. Phase one was just mindset. So I had to basically rebuild my brain so that I could understand what I should be doing versus what I was doing. So that that mindset journey, that was a significant portion of that year one. That and I call that year one because that's really when I started to really do things, to do first four years.

Speaker 1: 21:58

And it wasn't anything in ways, but with that way, learning experience, that's for sure. But it was definitely mindset, because I think One of the things you have to recognize Is that your brain, your mind, as you will, that's the loudest voice in your head. No matter who you are around, you are always louder and if you can't figure out how to talk to yourself in the right way about the right things, you could make lots of mistakes. So that first year was me just listening to all the mindset stuff that people who were at places where I wanted to be, what they were doing, what books are they reading? What places are they going to? Who are they hanging out with? Why are they doing that? Right, I would simply just ask questions, and it's really interesting.

Speaker 1: 22:52

The quality of the questions you ask impact the quality of the answers you get. And if you could start asking people who are at levels you want to, as a tane, start trying to figure out how can I ask them really good questions? Because when you ask a really good question you get a really good answer. It's when you ask the cursory stuff oh, why did you choose XYZ business? Is that really a good question or what led you to making the worst decision you made in business and what led you to making the best one. That's a different quality of the question. So I spent a lot of time just diving deep into all of the myths that I believed to be true. I went and dove back deep into a lot of stoic philosophy too. I was exposed to that in university. I really liked it, but I can't say I truly adopted it until again after I've made the transition, if you will. And there's this one stoic philosopher called Epithetism.

Speaker 3: 23:51

He basically says that it's nearly impossible to teach a man something he believes he already knows, and that's extremely true and that in itself, if you listen to that, if you listen to that quote, in itself that actually releases a good bit of ego in itself, if you can fully hear that quote and that will resonate with you. That is ego leaving you. If you realize that, man, that is true and I see myself in that position sometimes, but the fact that I can see it is the knowing that I can release it as well and I can learn from those positions of that. Continue on. Sorry to cut you off there.

Speaker 1: 24:33

So that's what I would say made the most difference in the decisions then that I was making. So I had said, okay, I know nothing. The only thing I know is I know nothing. Therefore, I'm going to learn from those who seem to know because of the results that they're getting. I'm watching what's happening in their particular respective businesses and that is something that I want. So what are they doing? And I would literally just watch it and then I would ask questions like why did you choose to do that this way? What was your decision making? Because I wanted to learn how they thought. I didn't want to just learn what the decision was. I wanted to learn how they came about making decisions, what factors they think about.

Speaker 1: 25:13

Then I was able to start to adopt those mindset principles into the decision I needed to make in my own business hiring decisions, who was going to be turned the lights on? Figuring out operating procedures, having operating procedures, how do you do something? That's a fundamental thing if you think about it. If you own a business and you're the one doing everything in your business which most people that's the case, In fact, if that's your case, you are not really a business owner. You own a job. A job, yeah, or you own many jobs, but a business owner. A mindset shift that you're making is I want to know what are the processes and procedures that create outcome within my enterprise, whatever it may be? Whether you're talking about opening a power washing company or you're going to open a McDonald's franchise, both need processes and procedures. Now, definitely there are different processes and procedures. You're not going to necessarily cook a burger on the sidewalk, Only different processes and procedures, but they still have processes and procedures.

Speaker 1: 26:15

If you want to say you have a capability of predicting outcome, because if you don't have a process and procedure, you can't predict outcome. You guess, and maybe sometimes you guess right, but it's not predictable. You want predictability in business. You want to be able to say if I do this, is the result that happens. That happens through the adoption of processes and procedures. That was a mentality shift that I had, because I didn't have those in the first four years. I had none. There are definitely times I didn't even know how the trash was being cleaned. I'd say a bill. I don't remember paying a bill. Where is the trash, by the way? Who put it out? There's things that happen in a business that when you have processes and procedures. It relieves you of that particular stress, and now you can predict an outcome the lights will be on at 8 am or 9 am, whatever it is. Lights will be turned off at 6 pm, Like these types of things that can be put in place. Now, obviously, that's brick and mortar.

Speaker 1: 27:12

If you're talking about something that's a digital environment, maybe a coaching business or a dropshipping company, you still have to have processes and procedures. How do you go about engaging with your customer? What is that nurture sequence that you're going to engage in in order to cultivate that relationship with someone who was already bought for you? Because, at the end of the day, it's nine times easier to sell to someone who's already bought to you than to find a new customer. How do you nurture that? All of those things are incumbent upon a business owner to tackle.

Speaker 1: 27:45

The other thing that I really learned, though, by year two, was the seven magic words that every entrepreneur needs to look Again. This is going to be so simple that most people are going to ignore it, but it's 100% true. Find the who to implement a how See as a business owner. Most of us fall into that realm where we believe we have to do everything or we're the only ones that are best suited to do the thing. But that's not business ownership, that's job ownership. To be a business owner, you have to recognize that there are better utilizations of your time, so you should be paying someone else to do that, whether that's an outsourced someone or an insourced someone.

Speaker 1: 28:35

You leverage something within business. Now, there are only four qualities of leverage that existed in business. You have leverage of labor, which is other people's hands and feet in your business. You have leverage of code, which is technology. You have leverage of capital I love that one because it's other people's money. So you have leverage of community, which essentially transforms an audience into your market, but that's it. There's no other form of leverage that exists, and most business owners.

Speaker 1: 29:01

My counsel is that you start with the leverage of labor, and the reason for that is because you then have other humans with different perspective that can test and stress test your processes and procedures, and you can empower them to create them, and you, as the business owner, can refine so much easier to rewrite than it is to write. So you employ someone to do that, and once you've now perfected a process and procedure, then you can leverage technology because that just makes the process of procedure more efficient and effective. But if you try to throw technology at something without having rest tested processes and procedures, you end up with a mess. So there's a logical order by which you engage leverage you start with labor so that you can stress test those processes and procedures. Then you leverage technology to make that labor more efficient and effective. And we're living in an age right now where everyone's so bent out of shape.

Speaker 1: 30:04

Advocates for AI right, AI is like the new talking head. Believe me, we're all. Ai is here to stay. What is literally changed? But AI will not necessarily replace you. Businesses who leverage AI will outsell you and then you out of business. But AI itself is not gonna put you out of business. You, as a business owner, need to learn how to leverage it right, how to leverage code, but again get leverage it without the right processes and procedures in place. Best way to do that is with humans right, Stress test, Figure out how, what is the most effective and efficient utilization of time in your business, and then start leveraging technology or code to make the return on that time per person exponentially.

Speaker 3: 30:56

Even greater.

Speaker 1: 30:57

Yeah, that was. The biggest issue in year two is I started leveraging other people to the right person.

Speaker 3: 31:06

I think you saw the repeated patterns of actions that you were doing on a pretty daily basis that could be repeated by someone else and not you, and you could be focusing on these higher strategy, higher ticket items in your business that are going to bring more value.

Speaker 3: 31:27

So why not bring in the person that can get those done? So what were some of those first initial tasks that you were bringing people into and how did you tackle the mindset behind that as well? Because even myself I can get. I just hired somebody full time on my end outside of my property management company. I hired somebody full time for administrative work doing all that type of stuff, and it was harder for me to make that higher for these menial tasks, because it's always no, this is really easy. I could do this myself. So much easier. But it's like if you have 40 hours of somebody else's time to put into the business and they can create these own processes themselves, the dollars will start to come in even more on the back end when you start focusing your time towards your top 20% more valuable tasks that you're doing. So did you have any hesitations around hiring somebody and putting the money into using someone else, and how did you get around that?

Speaker 1: 32:33

So I think, again, some of those hesitations existed, and that was first four years. First four years where I didn't know who to hire, I made really bad hiring decisions. I hired based on what I saw other people doing but other people at my level, not at the level I went, and I was just modeling that behavior. I was like, oh yeah, I'll hire an assistant to do all my schedule. How are this person to do all this? And so I end up spending a ridiculous money and I wasn't making money. First, again, the first four years, I didn't make any money at all. It was definitely mindset stagnation those first four years. Once I started to make the transition, I recognized that if I could invest my time at a more strategic level, I could have someone else at lower cost, do all the stuff that took me away from the strategy, if I have the capability. Again, this was so.

Speaker 1: 33:32

My first business was a financial planning firm, so I was selling quote, unquote selling financial plans. Usually they came in at around like $1,500 to $2,000 each. So that was what I was selling concept of financial planning. Now, do it me wrong the value that the clients were receiving for that was exponentially larger when I was doing financial planning and again, I still do that in one of my business now, but I go all in. I really over deliver that philosophy. But I was the one building those financial plans and, at the time, dating myself. This predates Google, predates YouTube.

Speaker 1: 34:13

The technology that exists today didn't exist then, so it was all manual stuff. I was using Excel spreadsheets in order to create all this stuff together. I know Excel inside now. I know all the four things. I had to build those things right and I was customizing these things for each individual client to do cash flows and analysis. And then I was learning how to do like Monte Carlo simulations. I was doing all this stuff myself and it was taking me and I would say, on a scale of one to 10, by the end of that fourth year I was probably like an 11 on the technology side. I knew how to use the limited amount of software that existed. In my error, let's say I was really good at it.

Speaker 1: 34:53

But even with my skill sets it still took me a long time to be able to do anything, which meant I could only deliver a certain number of plans per month because it took me a long time to build them. So it could take me a couple of days to build out one plan. So maybe every month I could sell seven plans, maybe eight at max, because it took me a long time to build them. But then when I said, okay, I just hire someone else to build a plan and I just work on the strategy as to what's happening, I could triple or quadruple the number of plans out, because I wasn't doing, I was no longer the bottler, I could have someone else or someone else's like multiple people, multiple who's to do the thing and they cost me this much and I was charging this much per plan. Therefore I was making the spread. And then it's not magic, it's just math. You could run the number how many of these people could I afford and how much value would that bring back to me?

Speaker 1: 36:03

And once I was freed of doing this, the strategy I was able to get involved in was able to exponentially grow. So then I could start charging more per plan. I was adding more value. So instead of 2000, then my prices went up to 4,000. They went up to 5,000.

Speaker 1: 36:18

Because the more free time I had, that I wasn't doing, the stuff I could spend on creating the opportunity for more exponential value for the client. Therefore, I could charge based on that value. I wasn't charging by the hour, I was charging based on the value creation. So that was another shift that I made in my mindset. I stopped building like most people build in my industry at the time. I wasn't charging by the hour anymore. I was charging based on the value created by the plan. So if I was able to save people from an estate planning standpoint, was able to save people and give them a glide path towards retirement, I was helping them to figure out how to fund their child's college education. Whatever it was I was doing, I was just doing it at a higher level. Therefore, I could charge more for it and because I was charging more for it, I wasn't necessarily paying this person who was doing the doing more for that. Told them you're on that annual increases and bonuses and things of that nature, because I believe in rewarding people based on meritocracy. But at the end of the day, my margins grew and with that margin growth came with the capability of me utilizing that capital for better purposes.

Speaker 1: 37:25

This better acquisition, hiring even higher class A players, individuals who were still doing the doing, but they were doing it at such a higher level that I maybe as an example, because this is something that actually happened I was paying one individual which was referred to internally as a power planner. It was the individual who's doing all the building out of the spreadsheets. I was paying him at the time. I think it was about $27,000 per year to do this, plus bonuses and things of that, but in the grand scheme of things the base was 27,. Maybe they got up to 30, 31,000 based on bonuses at that time.

Speaker 1: 38:04

The hire that I made year two in the business was for an individual who was at a level at a level who would I apologize for that at a level who was at now I paid $52,000 for, so essentially almost double the cost. But the output that person was having was three to four fold. They were able to produce way more plans. One because they were exceptionally skilled at it. They knew this stuff way better than I ever could because they were all in on it. So I paid more but I got more than if I would just have doubled the person. And then this person became the mentor for this person and elevated that person's skill sets. So it all became something that was interrelated and able to actually truly add significant value to the bottom line of what I was doing. So again, it's not magic, it's just.

Speaker 3: 39:02

And you brought better who's into the equation and for those of you listening, I know I've mentioned this book before on this podcast. But who, not how guys. Incredible book, incredible mindset shifting to be able to bring the right people into your business. So, edward, this was a pretty big change for you and allowed you to level up your businesses. But then you said there was a shift to another mentor that needed you needed to make to go from six figure Edward to seven figures Correct. What were the learnings that you had with that mentor? What did you do there to increase your revenues so much at that point?

Speaker 1: 39:46

I think the biggest thing I learned from that mentor is that the outcomes I desire are just on the other side of the question. Right, I had to be willing to take more risks calculated risks oh, you're wrong, I'm not talking about just going to Las Vegas and putting everything on 14. So it's calculated risk, but you have to be willing to take more risks because outcomes that you desire are on the other side of caution. So I started doing it. I started taking more risks. I said, okay, I'm making X, I'm gonna choose to reduce my personal lifestyle so that I had half more capital that I can deploy towards asset acquisition, which is what I started to do. I started to say, okay, I'm doing this thing.

Speaker 1: 40:35

Now over here, I'm running into roadblocks because there are outside service professionals that are doing a poor job to the clients that I'm servicing, specifically in the area of tax, and I can't find a solution that really adds value. Because I went out to the marketplace and I tried to search for accounting firms that I could potentially align with right Strategic partnerships and I just couldn't find someone that matched who I was, what I was doing and how I was doing it. They didn't speak my language, if you will. So I took the risk of building my own right. I made a decision that my clientele needed something. I could not find a solution outside, so I took my own money and built my own thing. And that was very scary, because now I'm talking like I was talking about building a brand new business. At the same time I'm trying to still grow my existing business and, looking back on it, I probably would not have done it at that stage, because now what I counsel people to do is you don't do a new thing until you build your first thing to seven favors.

Speaker 1: 41:40

But at the time I was so frustrated that I took the leap earlier than probably I should have, and that caused a bit of a congestion period for me. It was about a year and a half before that started to really be humming, and I could have dedicated more time to it if I had already built this thing to the seven figure, Because I would have been able to essentially fire myself more. That should be the goal of every business, or how can you fire yourself the fastest of the things that you're doing inside your business? And at seven figures I was able to fire myself from pretty much everything. Then I had true choice. I could just do the things I wanted to do. So I probably did it a little bit too early over here, but about a year and a half in I started making this humming and I started building this up and then, yeah, there I was like wow seven figures Right, and they all compound with each other.

Speaker 3: 42:32

They're working vertically to help build each business up and I'm sure that leads to more. You're like. That worked pretty well. What else can we add in here?

Speaker 1: 42:42

Exactly, and that's essentially been my career path I have significant bias. So my bias is that true financial success comes from the business ownership. I believe that to be true and the reason for that and again, a lot of people say, well, I don't know about real estate. Real estate done right is business. If you're not doing it right, it's not a business. But if you look at the statistic right now, in 2020, at the end of 2022, 96% of all individuals who earns $5 million a year or more, 96% of them own at least one business. The other 4% it's a misnomer to say they're not business owners, because those other 4% are senior executives or heads of other companies, like presidents of companies, whose main form of compensation is stock. So they own a business right. So, in reality, real wealth and again, if you're earning like $5 million is nice, don't get me wrong. It's like a great class of people to be in right. So if you're aspiring to get to that level, knowing that the path to get there almost 100% of them are business owners, you want to navigate the business ownership path.

Speaker 1: 43:58

Now, don't get me wrong, it's not always easy. I respect that. People don't start off at $5 million, right, you have to work your way there. Your journey to that, though, can be shortcut to some degree. You have to still experience life, and you still have to go through the business processes, but your journey can be shortcut through mentorship. You find the right mentors to teach you, whether that's in person or vicarious. What's a vicarious mentor? Reading a book, listening to a podcast? Social media? Yeah, social media you can learn through us.

Speaker 1: 44:26

Now you have to be careful, though, on social media, because we live in an Instagram world, which means like it's the perfectly curated picture or video, right. There's a lot of filters there, whether they're real life or filters through the way the content is being shared. Business ownership is not always pretty. It's not always fun. That's why not everyone is cut out to do it. But for those who are willing to go through the stress of being a business owner because there is absolutely stress involved in business, no matter what level you get at, it's just your heart is a different type of heart. There's just more zeros at the end of your heart. At the end of the day, that path business ownership path that leads to financial freedom Right, and financial freedom is it's the best freedom to fight for, because it leads to every other freedom.

Speaker 3: 45:13

Yeah, leads to freedom of education, leads to freedom of health, leads to freedom of social aspects, leads to freedom of mobility spirituality, like everything, when I was able to get out of my job that opened up my world to see so many different things and, like we were talking about earlier in this podcast, edward, I really wasn't able to know who I truly was until I was financially free and out on my own. Every day, I have the decision to do what I want to do. I had to figure out who I actually was and what I actually wanted for me to be able to do that, and that's the amazing gift and problem that financial freedom gives you and brings you, because that is a very difficult question to answer to yourself if you don't exactly know what you're doing, and I think one of the things that you said here that is a little bit different than the topic I was just hitting on, though, is that you could be really good at sales or spreadsheets or creating all these things, but that doesn't mean that you're going to be a good business owner. Those are the tactical things to create a business around, but to be a business owner and to sit back and see the systems of the business actually working and being able to build them out and create a business that's going to run and operate on its own. That is what being a business owner is about being able to put the right people in the right places to make that business happen.

Speaker 3: 46:50

So, edward, what does your full scope of business lines look like today? I know you said you have right around nine businesses. How do they all work together? What are those businesses and what do you do with those?

Speaker 1: 47:02

Yeah. So I think one of the things that people need to recognize because I want to touch on a point here that you just made it is important. Not everyone is designed to be an entrepreneur. That's perfectly fine. Some people have entrepreneurial tendencies but are not really cut out to be an entrepreneur. I refer to them as intrapreneur. They are perfectly positioned to be like the number two in a business. They're perfectly positioned to be the one who comes in and facilitates the operations of the business at a very high level. It still has some entrepreneurial tendencies and has the ability, under a really good entrepreneur, to be able to explore those tendencies.

Speaker 1: 47:39

So you have to really be honest with yourself. Like we were saying at the very beginning of this discussion, look in the mirror, because the only person who cannot truly lie to you is you. Quite literally, look at yourself in the mirror and really evaluate who you are and who you want to be, and then take the necessary steps. What that means boils down to the concept of discipline. Discipline is doing the things that are necessary, regardless of how you feel, no matter what, do it so if your goal is to get fit. So it's important for me to share this too.

Speaker 1: 48:20

I have this philosophy called. I call it the law of prerequisites. It means because most people believe that they will get the outcome and then they will start doing. For instance, if your goal is to be fit, they'll often say at least the people I've been around a lot, unfortunately, in my past was they said okay, once I get healthy, I'll start doing the things that make people healthy, like I'll start eating right. Once I get healthy, I'll get fit, I'll start eating. No, there's a prerequisite that's required to get the thing. The prerequisite is the thing that gets the thing. If your goal is to be healthy, you have to do what healthy people do before you become healthy, because that will lead you to becoming healthy.

Speaker 1: 48:57

The law of creating wealth means you can't wait to become wealthy and then start doing the things that wealthy people do. You actually have to start doing the things that wealthy people do now so that you can become wealthy. It's a law of prerequisites. It requires you to do the thing before you get the thing, and in business, you have to recognize that there are things you have to do in order to grow. There are things you have to do.

Speaker 1: 49:21

You have to do the things that people who are at that position are already doing in order to get to that position, and when you're trying to figure out where you fit in that cog, just have that honest discussion with yourself. Where are you now? Are you willing to engage in the discipline that's required to get you to the thing that you really want? Because if not, then you have to question is that something you really want? And you should be honest with yourself because if it's not, perfectly fine, it's good to have no's, it's good to have yeses, but it's also good to have no's because a no forecloses a path, which is great.

Speaker 1: 49:56

You've cut out a thing from the buffet. Your choices are now limited, which is good, because now you have fewer things to think about. So foreclose paths that you should not be going down because you really don't want to. But if you make a decision, looking yourself in the mirror and say I really want this, you explore all the reasons why and as long as they're really true reasons you're not lying and you're the only one that can truly not lie to yourself. Have that honest conversation, then start doing the things that are necessary. Have the discipline to do the things, whatever it may be.

Speaker 3: 50:30

That is so strong there. This is one thing that I didn't even realize until financial freedom either, because I'm staring at myself in the mirror and, being fully truthful, I realized that I'm the only one that's going to be my truth. I have to tell my truth, be my truth, and no one else is going to pull out of me. Matt, this is what you really want to do. No, I have to realize that myself and be honest with myself, with what I want. And something Tony Robbins says is there's two pains in life. So, once you figure out what you want, there's the pain of discipline, and then there's the pain of regret. Which one do you want to take? Do you want to take in the future when you didn't do the thing that you wanted to do and you're going to go through the pain of regret, or are you going to go through the pain of discipline, which requires you to take the actions on a daily basis that are going to get you to the thing that you actually want?

Speaker 1: 51:24

Time is a non-renewable resource. The calendar is going to move forward, with or without you, and regret is an unfortunate event that way too many people have, because the reality is you're very rarely going to get to the end point and regret the things that you did. Regret is usually about the things you didn't do. To regret Not talking about. Oh, I wish I didn't go out drinking last night. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about true, real regret and the only way to.

Speaker 1: 51:56

I did this thing. This was nearly 20 years ago, maybe a little bit more. I went and I volunteered in this nursing home that was affiliated with the university I attended as undergrad. I was exposed to a lot of people at the end of life, so I had a lot of conversations with people and a lot of them had significant regrets and I'm being truly genuine. I cannot remember someone telling me a regret about something that they did. They did, yeah, I can't remember a single instance of that.

Speaker 1: 52:31

Now, maybe it's like selective memory, I don't know, because I want to be transparent. I just cannot recall a single instance of the regret that was shared that were based on something that was done. Everyone I can remember was based on something they wished they did. And if you were at a point in your journey where you're staring at an option that could lead to an outcome that you desire, take the leap. Take the leap, take out there, do the thing, because the reality is this no matter how much planning you do, planning doesn't lead to outcome. The only thing that leads to outcome is action. So do the thing, because you at least learn from that. You can't learn from planning, you can only learn from outcome.

Speaker 3: 53:24

It's almost like the analysis, paralysis by analysis that a lot of people talk about in real estate. So many people in the beginning of their investing careers or at least they want to start investing. They'll read all the books, they'll see all the equations, they'll listen to all the podcasts. They know so much about real estate. They know everything that you could know about real estate, but they don't have the balls to get out there and just take action, take one step towards actually making this stuff happen. Once you take the action, you look back. You're a little further than you were. You see that progress. You keep going, you keep doing stuff. You make mistakes, you take failures and you learn from them and get going. Edward, we're getting towards the end of our podcast here. I'm going to shoot into our final questions, but before I do that, I do want to just get a brief overview of the current business structure that you've got now, with the nine businesses that you have.

Speaker 1: 54:16

Yeah, so we own a lot of financial companies. So financial services businesses, private wealth management firm, accounting firm, fractional CFO company, we own a coaching business for entrepreneurs, we also own property management company, we own salons, we own vending companies, we own product companies that go into that, and then we own real estate as well. So residential real estate and commercial real estate, but I don't even each individual, one of those I count as a business, but not in my nine, if you will, that's supplementary to everything else we're doing. Our residential and commercial portfolios are definitely something that everyone should get involved in, because the passive income there, potential passive income there, plus all of the tax benefits that are associated with real estate, it truly makes it a no brainer what you really understand how this operates and understanding also that it's not as capital intensive as most people believe to get started. You could jump into real estate literally with no money, as long as you have sweat.

Speaker 1: 55:18

I talk with my mentees a lot about the concept of a deal and in a deal there's two qualities you have, you have price and you have terms and, realistically speaking, you get all you being in control of one and if that's the case, you want to be in control of terms. Never want to be in control. You don't care about price, because with the right terms, prices are relevant. I want to sell you, or you want to sell me, a building and you want I don't care where the building is let's say it's a single family house and you want the price to be a hundred million dollars. Perfectly fine with that, as long as you give me a hundred percent of the terms. You know I get. I control it, meaning I'll pay you your a hundred million dollars, then I'll pay you a dollar a year until it's paid off. Yeah, yeah, that's being now. That's hyperbolic, that's ridiculous, but that's what I mean.

Speaker 1: 56:00

Your control of terms doesn't matter with the prices and in a, in an environment where you come to the table and you don't necessarily have a lot of purchasing power, you can get involved with real estate based on the concept of understanding how terms work. You do all the leverage and labor. You can bring someone else in that has capital and you could do a joint back sharing real estate, right. You can access people who are affected by one of the four D's right, like divorce, disability, disillusionment or death Right, no scenarios. Now you have the leverage to create a deal Right, because now you can get into maybe seller financing type of situations where you're not coming out of pot. You can go to hard money lenders in order to come out with down payment.

Speaker 1: 56:43

There's so many ways to get involved in real estate and the tax benefits. There again, I'm a lawyer that specializes in tax, estate and business law, telling you the tax benefits that are exist within real estate are second to none. They are literally the best tax benefits that exist. I agree, you have to leverage it. You can definitely transform your life.

Speaker 3: 57:03

Yeah, and the whole idea of getting into real estate with no money down. It's completely, 100% doable. Everybody's doing it and there's different ways to do it. You could have the seller be the one that allows you to get into a deal no money down because you're controlling terms and maybe it's a seller finance or a sub two or a sub tail or some type of creative financing that you get in. But there's also the option to partner with somebody that has capital for them to come in. You are the sweat equity.

Speaker 3: 57:34

So what I say is there's four things that you need in a real estate deal you need time, capital, knowledge and a deal. If you could be time, knowledge and a deal. All you have to find is the capital, and hopefully they have a little bit of knowledge too and you're able to get those deals done and bring in these people with experience and money and get all these things done. And it's amazing that you started where you started from. And then all of these learnings, these business learnings, have been able to translate into you being able to buy so many different businesses, because you have learned how businesses operate and how to operate and create opportunities and businesses and notice opportunities. So just from getting into your first business, learning how to build that and getting that done, you have learned how to leverage yourself into other opportunities. I love it, edward, final questions I've got for you on the podcast today what is one actionable step our listeners should take today to start on their path towards financial freedom?

Speaker 1: 58:40

An actionable step would be to learn what an accountable plan is, how to put one in place for you, because, at the end of the day, the real secret to getting to the next level is to figure out how to keep more of every single dollar you make and send less to the IRS so that you could deploy it for your own benefit.

Speaker 1: 58:59

Because I don't know about you, but I have never seen someone write a check to the IRS and get a return for that check, meaning you don't get any money back. If you will, that really adds to true cash. If you get money back from the IRS, it's because they gave you your own money back. They're not giving you an extra. Look, brad's giving a thing. So learn how to keep more of every dollar you make in business, and one surefire way is to start off with an accountable plan. You can go into Google, you can go in, you can jump into some of the content that I do for free online and learn about what that stuff is. It's a surefire way to kickstart your journey to keeping more of every dollar you make so that you could deploy it towards your own benefit man.

Speaker 3: 59:42

I love that. That is such an actionable step for you guys to go look that up. That's an accountable plan. Go check that out. And the final question that I've got for you here today, Edward, is what is one question that you wish I would have asked or a topic that you wish I would have covered, and how would you have answered that question or how would you have expanded on that topic?

Speaker 1: 1:00:03

So I have a podcast where I sit down and I talk with business owners about their journey as well, and I have this method where we get towards the end of the discussion I usually ask them to go through a thought exercise with me, where they have this special power that they can go back in time and visit a younger version of themselves and share a bit of wisdom. What age do you go back to and what wisdom do you share? And I would say if I were asked that question, I would probably go back to my like 21 year old self and I tell myself you're about to get started in business, you're exiting. You're gonna be exiting something you thought you were gonna be passionate about.

Speaker 1: 1:00:48

Don't get too hung up on that and know that you are not the most intelligent man in the room, yet you can learn so much from those who have been where you want to be. Do that sooner. Learn from others sooner, because the journey of success is a journey and you're constantly putting one foot in front of the other in order to achieve fulfillment. At least, I adopt exactly what Tony Robbins talks about. The whole concept of fulfillment is progress. It's not the destination, it's the journey, and as long as you're putting one foot in front of the other, you can get into that state of fulfillment. But the reality is this you can still shortcut that journey. You can hit milestones sooner by learning from others and I would try to implore to my younger self to do that. But I recognize the reality is I would not Because, no matter, even if it was myself and I can prove it with myself tell me back in time to tell me I was so obstinate, I would not have been able to hear that golden wisdom, I wouldn't have been in here.

Speaker 3: 1:01:59

It took you losing that ego, yes To actually be able to sit back and say you know what other people do know more than me. And maybe I need to actually listen to what people are saying. And I just have to say bringing in mentors has been such a crucial part of my development and my acceleration to be able to buy more assets and leave that ego at the door and realize that I don't know everything. And even me. Starting this podcast is an availability to people like yourself to be able to have the conversations and explore new ideas and learn new things that I might not even have a clue about and I want to learn about and grow myself. So amazing wisdom, amazing information.

Speaker 3: 1:02:51

Anyone out there? Look for a mentor, look for someone that could tell you the next step. Go out there, take the next step, create a problem, go back to the mentor and say, hey, I took your next step. This is what I ran into. How can I tackle this issue now? And now you're solving problems, now you have momentum and now you're on the roll. Edward really appreciate having you on today. Man. So much wisdom, so much information, so much fun. Man, where can my listeners and watchers find you online?

Speaker 1: 1:03:21

Definitely check me out on Instagram and TikTok. The handle is the same. It's at edwardcollins, underscore, upleveled. Again at edwardcollins, underscore, upleveled ED at the end upleveled. Yeah, just check me out there. I give a ton of content we post every single day across those platforms. My goal was to give away as much financial literacy counsel as I possibly can as that dove head for my content. So, yeah, I'd love to be able to hopefully help other people out there, take their life and their business to the next level.

Speaker 3: 1:03:55

Yeah, definitely I second that. Guys, make sure you check out Edward's content, especially on IG. I love it. It is amazing. We will put a link to that in the show notes. But from the Financial Freedom Fast Podcast, I'm your host, matt Ammabiel. Today we had on Edward Collins and we are signing off. Thank you, matt.

Speaker 2: 1:04:21

Thanks for listening to the Financial Freedom Fast Podcast, the show that teaches you to buy back your time and live life on your terms. Be sure to subscribe to this podcast wherever you're listening, and follow us online at Matt Ammabiel. That's Matt AMA B-I-L-E. Be sure to tune in Monday, wednesday and Friday for our weekly podcast drops. Thanks for listening. Let's retire together, okay.