What I'd Tell My 25-Year-Old Self

Host Adrian Kizy sits down with Randy Najjar, founder of Sapphire Luxury Homes, for a look back at the last ten years — and what Randy would tell his 25-year-old self if he could.

Randy was already building homes and running Sapphire by 25, going 100 miles an hour and taking on nine projects at once. In this episode he unpacks the cost of that pace: why "more" isn't always better, why scaling something before you've vetted it turns into nine mistakes instead of nine wins, and why the biggest change he'd make is simply slowing down.

He also tells the story of the most expensive lesson he ever learned — a $150,000 loss on a gated-community build where the client manipulated the situation for extras and then laughed in his face over the balance due. The lesson that came out of it: protect your reputation above all, but learn the power of no and stand your ground.

From there, Randy and Adrian get into why building a custom home is an art, not a science — why perfection is the wrong expectation when you're building something for the first and only time, how aligning a client's vision is half psychology, and why a space you don't like in isolation can come together beautifully once it's whole.

00:00 What would you tell your 25-year-old self?
02:35 Keep going, but slow down
03:04 Why 1 to 9 isn't the same as 1 to 3 to 6 to 9
05:02 Parallel paths: sales, standards & imposter syndrome
06:38 Selling nine houses before finishing the second
07:20 Reputation as the most valuable thing you own
08:16 The $150K lesson: the client who laughed at the loss
11:21 "I'm going to give you something more valuable"
13:27 The power of no
15:24 Building homes is half psychology
16:31 A beta version every time: aligning the vision
19:11 Selling a commodity vs. selling an experience
20:03 How do you value art?
21:27 Perfection vs. imperfect circumstances: the GM analogy
23:43 Doing right by the client when a mistake happens
26:14 Educating the client instead of telling them they're wrong
26:44 The 3000K vs. 4000K lighting story
28:22 Looking at a home in a silo vs. holistically
30:24 Why the space looks biggest once the furniture is in
31:12 Would you do it all again — and would you do it differently?
34:30 A great note to end on

Connect with Sapphire Luxury Homes: 

www.sapphireluxuryhomes.com 

www.instagram.com/sapphireluxuryhomes

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

All right, guys, welcome back to another episode of the Dream Builders Podcast. I'm back here again with Randy. Randy, I'm happy to be here. Hindsight is 2020. I say that all the time, right? Yeah. Because everyone's like, oh, I would do this differently, I would do that differently. But they're, you know, they're they're lessons learned. So looking back from your vantage point right now, what do you tell your 25-year-old self?

SPEAKER_00 0:33

Hmm. Interesting question. Um so I gotta think back. Where was I when I was 25 years old? So uh I had graduated college already. I was I was already building homes. I had Sapphire established. I was probably in the thick of it. Uh we talked about this last episode where a lot going on, and I was probably feeling burnt out from burning it, burning the candle at both ends. Uh so what would I tell myself? If if I could tell myself, hey, 10 years from now, this is where you're gonna be. This is what the company's gonna look like, this is what your life is gonna be like, uh the family you're gonna have, the types of homes that you're gonna build, I think that would have been an easy sell. Like you gotta bust ass for the next 10 years, um, but you get all of these things in the meantime, and and at the end, I think the biggest lesson is just keep your head down, keep going. Um trust in God. I would say that's a big one. You know, I've been one that always throughout my whole life, you know, I I put a lot on myself to try to do it all and try to be uh the best version of myself that I can be, whether that's when I was in school or uh with my family or friends or in business, you know, be the best person that I can be, and best version of Randy that I can be. So I I hold myself to a pretty high standard. Um, and sometimes with that, um you you question that, right? Like, sure. Am I setting the bar too high? Are are are my goals realistic? Is my vision realistic? Yeah. Um, you know, we we talked a little bit about that last last episode about imposter syndrome. Like who am I to think that I can have these things, right? I don't I don't I won't say that was been a big part of my thought process or philosophy, but it creeps in from time to time, especially during tough times or down times. Um but I would I would tell a 25-year-old me that like keep going. Do what you're doing. Um maybe the one change I would say is maybe slow down. Yeah. Uh I I I've always gone you know 100 miles an hour or more. Um always wanted to when I do something, I typically go two feet in the fire, you know, no looking back. Yeah, just dive right in, and that's not necessarily the best recipe for success. You know, we talked about I was doing nine projects at once right off rip. Yeah. Um more is not necessarily better, especially if more is more losses. Yeah, right. Right. Uh I I've had this challenge where I always feel like, you know, there there's a there's a natural high with with selling a project or selling a deal for me, right? Yeah. There's a feeling of there's a good feeling with with getting another job signed or another sale done. And and I've I've always enjoyed the sales process. Um there's joy in completing a project and and giving keys to a homeowner and seeing them happy and excited and um ready to move in with their family, of course, too. Yeah. Uh but that first part kind of has has fueled me a lot in my business. Um, chasing the next, the next project, the next big cool thing, the next million dollar home or whatever, yeah, whatever it was back then. Uh but try I don't want to say keep it within your means because it's good to push the envelope, and I and I believe that's helped me get to where I am. But you you know, you don't necessarily need to go from one to nine. Yeah. You can go from one to three to six to nine.

SPEAKER_01 4:38

And there's an interesting uh, I guess, angle that you could, you know, look at that because when you're confident and comfortable in something, you you know the outcome is predictable, yeah, fine. You can you can scale that. But when you're learning and you go from one to nine, just just for example, right? Well, you're either gonna have nine successes or nine mistakes, you know what I'm saying? Because you haven't sometimes vetted the process or the outcome, and you've you've scaled it. Yeah. Um, but my story kind of runs in parallel with yours. So you've mentioned this before. We've been friends for a long time, since we were kids. We used to give me a lot of business advice. I think we're very different in the parts of the process we like. Like I hate sales, they intimidate me. Um, but we're very similar, I think, in that we always held ourselves to like a really, really high standard. Um, and for me, I think imposter syndrome was a lot more relevant because when you're holding yourself to this standard, and sometimes the standard that you can't meet for yourself, you start judging yourself. Like it almost like weaponizes against you. Yeah. You know, absolutely. Um, but you know, like you said, you know, when you finish a project, for me it was always like the reaction of the person, the deliverable, right? Yeah, that's what drove you. But it also builds confidence, right? You built my confidence a lot because you were seeing things in me that I didn't see in myself. But then once I did them, I started seeing it. It was like I kind of like baby step. Um, but I'm sure it was the same for you, right? Like every success, every win, every learning lesson, I'm sure boosted your confidence.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

Yeah. I mean, there were the the good things boost your confidence, and and the negative things like quite you make make you question yourself, right? Uh but there was, you know, I don't know if I necessarily agree with you that I was nine for nine or oh for nine. I think I was kind of right in between. I was like, I had like five or maybe five good ones and four bads, right? You know, maybe by dumb luck or maybe by strategy, or maybe from the man above uh looking out for you're pivoting right in the moment, so you're learning things while it's happening. You know, making an example that so the channels for me is like I made money on that first house, right? It's like if I can make money on the first one and I learned from that, I'm gonna make I should do better on the next one and the next one and the next one. Right. So I sold all nine of the next houses before I finished the second house. Yeah. Right. And then I'm like, uh oh. Yeah. And the financials and everything's react reactionary. Sure. Um one thing I think I did right, you know, talking back to my 25-year-old self is even when the projects were upside down, um, I never really let that the client know. You had asked me, I asked you. Uh did the client suffer? I I have always treated my reputation as the most valuable thing. You know, money is important, it comes and goes. You have good projects, you have bad projects. Sure. Um, quality is important, um, design is important, all things are important. But reputation is one of those things. If it's a good, if you have a good reputation, it could really transform and transcend and uh do multiples for you. If you have a bad reputation, or or you start getting one or or you create a bad reputation for you, it is a very, very difficult hole to climb out of. You always people will always see that like residue. If you're right, yeah. So going back to what I was saying, it was very important for me to make sure I finished the job, I did it right, made sure the client still felt good about it. Um did we ever talk about that job that the client was laughing at me at the office when I showed him my PL and that I was losing money on it? No, I don't think so. It's a good time to talk about it. Yeah, so this was I was probably 25 when this happened, give or take. And I think it was the third or fourth job that I had signed. And it was one it was it was the job I've lost the most money on. Okay. Um I was $150,000 on that job. $150,000 that I did not have. Sure. And the client really took advantage of me. Um and I let him, let them take advantage of me. You know, they were very nice, and they trusted me to build their home, and it was in a gated community that I wanted to be building in, and they manipulated the situation oftentimes, where they would said, Oh, you this has to be included. I'm spending this much money. You need to include this, you need to include this. And I was always like, I want to make sure I I make my clients happy, kind of make sense what they're saying. Okay, I'll do this, yeah, I'll do this, I'll do this. Next thing you know, I'm doing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of extras that they're not getting billed for. Right. So not only am I not making money, now I'm losing money. And at the end, I finish the job and there's a balance due, and he wants to negotiate with me on what he owes. And it's it's not it's not like a discrepancy in what he thinks was black and white, sure, this were the things you signed off on. Here's what you pay, here's the balance. He wanted to negotiate for the sake of negotiating. Like, you know, you know, I owe you 60,000, I'm gonna pay you 40 of it. Like, why? I I didn't my job, I finished the home. Yeah. I are you not happy with the home? Oh no, we're very happy with the home. Did I do something wrong? No. But, you know, it could, you know, we could have done some things differently or whatever. I'm like, I was like, listen, I didn't want to tell you this, but I'm upside down on your project. Oh no, there's no way you charged me a lot of money, you made a lot of money. I was like, I charge you a lot of money to you, but things cost money, and I gave you a lot of things. Right. I literally pulled out my file and I pulled out my QuickBooks report that I had just reviewed, and it's literally negative $100 and something thousand dollars at the time. I was like, I can't give you a discount, I can't give you anything else. You want my shirt? Because that's that's all I got left. And he sits back in his chair and he starts laughing. And I'm heated right now. I'm like, what is going on? Why is this guy laughing? I just showed him I lost hundred something thousand dollars and he's laughing. Is this guy serious? I was getting angry. I yeah, I can imagine. And I'm just like, what? What's so fun? It's like I'm gonna pay you. I was like, well, yeah, thanks. You should. But I'm gonna I'm gonna give you something more valuable. I'm like, what? What is this guy talking about? Okay, he goes, in my uh ethnicity, in my in my family, we believe that it's my job to do everything I can for my family. And I'm gonna use every tactic that I can to get you to do extra for me. Yeah. If if I have to make you feel bad, if I have to manipulate the situation, if I have to do whatever I have to do. But at the end of the day, if you say yes, then I can sleep peacefully at night. You can say no. You don't have to do it. Sure. My job is to convince you to say yes, and if I get you to say yes, it's a win for me. He's like, you should know that moving forward. Hold your ground. Well, I was like, I was taken aback because I don't operate like that. You're right. Most people I know don't operate like that. Um but but it made me realize not everybody is necessarily coming from an authentic or genuine place. Sure. Um, especially when money is involved. Yeah. And you know, there there are times when a negotiation is is required, but if I don't believe truly that I owe something to somebody, or that I need to stand my ground to better myself and to better my company. It's not just making the client happy. That's important. Right. But within a reason, uh I have to protect myself and my business as well. I can't just let people take advantage of me. Agreed. Uh, so I would say that's the most expensive. You didn't ask what's the most expensive lesson I learned, but I'll tell you that's the most expensive lesson I learned. Uh so I guess circling back again, go back to 25-year-old Randy. What would you tell them? Yeah. Be confident in what you're doing, you're doing the right thing. Um, stand your ground though when it when necessary. Don't let people take advantage of you.

SPEAKER_01 13:43

I'm really glad you said that because it kind of puts something in my head. So the power of no, essentially. Yeah, right? Yeah. Um, and for me, especially early on, you know, it's a smaller scale than what you're talking about. But I was a yes man, right? I want to give the client everything they want. I want them to be happy. Now, incidentally, they weren't happy because you know, you overpromise, underdeliver. But I remember one time there was a client who's a mutual friend of ours. I remember this conversation between you and me. And I got this crazy request, this email. Can I get can I get this, that, and the other by this afternoon? And I was getting heated and frustrated, and I told you, and you're like, he just asked a question, just say no. So I emailed back, I'm sorry, I can't do it. And he responds back, oh no problem. When can you get it done? And like, I got myself like all worked up. If I would have agreed, I would have disappointed him. But like I projected that this is the most important thing in the world that this person wants, and it really was just it was just a request. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:48

It doesn't hurt to ask, right?

SPEAKER_01 14:49

Right, yeah. But it's interesting with what you said because like when when you clarified kind of when he told you that, right? You know, you question like, is intent malicious? On one side, I'm gonna do everything I can, you know, for my family. Yeah, but depending on where you are on that spectrum, you have a different, a different viewpoint, a different, different vantage point.

SPEAKER_00 15:12

So yeah, I mean, I would say that that was the most extreme situation I've had in that particular case. Um, but I've had numerous clients, you know, try similar things, and sometimes they make sense and they were like, Yeah, I expected this because X, Y, and Z. It's like, okay, I I can see that. That makes sense to me. We'll meet in the middle, or you know what, you're right, let me let me take care of this for you. And that's fine. But when it's you know, when it's a repetitive scenario, then you gotta like think twice, maybe.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

But I think that's the other part of business too, and like I experienced a lot. I think it's part of the reason like why I'm good at what I'm gonna do. Like, I don't want to use the word like therapist, but there's a lot of psychology involved, especially on the sales side of things, understanding people, understanding personalities, making them feel comfortable. It's like there's a huge chunk of this that has nothing to do with building homes.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

You know what I mean? A massive chunk. If I was just building homes and then selling them, this whole large aspect of what we do wouldn't exist. Right. You know, I'm dealing with most often a husband and wife, and they're not always on the same page. He wants modern, she wants traditional, he wants black, she wants white, right? Whatever the case may be. And and you're in the middle trying to get them to compromise. And even if they are on the same page, we're building something that's never been built before. It's it's a beta version every time. Yes. Uh, so we're looking at something on paper via a rendering, a drawing, specifications on a piece on a document, and trying to make sure that what they're understanding or saying, what I'm understanding and saying are actually the same thing. Right. We can be saying the same thing, but imagining or thinking of different things, right? Exactly. Like what level, you know, what what's luxury, right? Right. Depends who you ask. Yeah. Somebody coming from the royal palace is gonna view luxury very differently than somebody coming from an apartment in Detroit. Of course, right? Little things can be a lot more luxurious. So aligning visions is a challenging part of what we do. Yeah. If I'm building a home and you can walk through it and you see it, and this is what I'm buying, that that goes away. Right. That's very easy. You're buying a product, it's there, it's available. Yeah. When we're designing and building, it's it's not uncommon for people to think one thing and say another or not articulate it right the way that I can understand it. Or sometimes it's me. I'm I'm talking technical jargon. I don't I try I try really hard not to be technical. Yeah. But I'm in it so much in the day-to-day. I say something simple to me that they don't understand, and they don't want to question it because they don't want to whatever feel a certain way. I was like that in school. Yeah. I mean, it's a real thing. And I think I'm saying something that they're understanding, and they're not understanding it, so it creates a a challenge.

SPEAKER_01 18:10

So that's that's interesting, I think, that you know, you you presented that because we're both in the in the arts, right? Like when you're when you're selling like a spec home, let's say, for example, or like a production home, right? You're selling a commodity. But when you start getting into luxury and this and that and the other, you're selling an experience, right? I had this conversation with a dental client. Like, if you're selling veneers, you're selling a commodity. If you're selling the confidence that comes with those, right, now the way that's valued is different, and you find the people that value. It's not your place to convince everybody in this world that a sapphire luxury home is for them. It's your place to say that if you're looking for this caliber of luxury, I'm the guy, I'm the guy to do it, right? And we we saw that with um the latest model, like the Cameron, right? It's a beautiful model. Everybody had an opinion on what that home was worth. Right. And, you know, me working with you closely, I had an idea of what you had into it. So some of these people were just like completely way off. But I used to always tell people, because people, some people that knew that you were close to me, they used to ask me, what do you think it's worth? And I would just tell them, it's worth what it's sold for. You know what I mean? Like once that number gets there, somebody decided whether it was emotional or not, that this is worth a freak. That's what it's worth. It doesn't matter what you think it's worth, it doesn't matter what you think you could build it for. Right. Um, and you know, with with what you do, there's there's not necessarily a right and a wrong way.

SPEAKER_00 19:54

I mean, you let's circle back to what you just said. You know, what we're doing is an art. Yeah. How do you value art? Like an actual artwork, a painting, a sculpture. Yes. The value is in the eye of the beholder. Yeah. Right? Something that could be worth one dollar to somebody could be worth a million, millions of dollars. That exactly and then that was taped to the wall that that was art. Doesn't do it for me, but you know, somebody thought it was valuable. Yeah. I I tell this to the my clients a lot. What we do is an art, it's not a science. There are some sciences behind it. Right. Uh, but I use this analogy all the time. You know, clients expect uh a custom luxury home to be perfect, like perfection. We strive for perfection. We we really do. We try hard, and but we're dealing with imperfect circumstances. Yeah, the wood that we use is not perfectly straight. The contractors that we use are normal people, they're imperfect people. Yeah, the conditions that we build in are imperfect. There's rain, there's snow, there's wind, there's whatever it may be. And this home is being built for the first and only time. This design on this property with these conditions, it'll never happen again, right? And I use the analogy of you know, we're in Detroit, the automotive industry. So GM spends billions of dollars designing whatever car it is. Yeah. And they have top-notch engineers uh working on this and they do prototypes and they test it in every single condition, and then they build it thousands and thousands of times in a controlled environment on an assembly line with a very specific system, and they still have recalls. Right. Right? If they can't do that perfectly, and they've been doing this for a hundred years, yeah. Right. Why are you expecting the home to be exactly perfect? Right. It's you know if you take a microscope or a magnifying glass and a Flashlight to every wall, you're gonna find imperfections. That's not a realistic expectation. Um, but we just going back to it, it's definitely an art. You're you're you're working a lot of different components, whether it's people or materials and right designs and trying to integrate them. And sometimes things designed on paper don't actually work in the field, or you overlook something, you know, you're seeing it spatially, or there's a pipe in the way that you weren't expecting to be there, or whatever it may be. And you're you're adjusting and you're tweaking and making good decisions and judgments based on information at hand.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

And I can speak directly to what you said because I come from I come from an automotive background, and most of those imperfections that you're talking about in that kind of industry, they don't like change. You know what I mean? But technology moves forward, and it's usually the integration of a new technology. Now you imagine on a custom project, right, where everything is new, you know, I I learned really, really quickly that it's not about never making a mistake, it's about doing right by your client in the situation that you make a mistake. If something happens, because like you said, some of it is just out of your control, right? The elements, weird lot circumstances, but you make it right, yeah, that's great. But there's there's there's a certain I because in my work, if I'm doing a logo or a video or something, I tell people, listen, if you're gonna tell me to do something that's absolutely wrong, I will tell you and I'll make sure it doesn't happen. But there's gonna be 50% of it, they they almost want me to say, like, yeah, this is it. Do this. I'm gonna say there's 50% of it that can be done in a million different ways. Right. And I'm just gonna make it so that when you wake up in the morning, you like it. So I need you, you need to there, there is a right way, right? Of usually what's under the hood, but then you're gonna speak to their emotion. And you want to make sure that not only is it right, but when they wake up in that home, in that room, whatever, yeah, that they're happy, of course, you know.

SPEAKER_00 23:57

Um go ahead, sorry. Yeah, I I I was gonna say, like, you're right, right and wrong is hard in design. Yeah, in construction techniques, there's oftentimes right and wrong. Right. Even there, there's different ways to go about accomplishing the same goal. Uh, but in design specifically, it's very much art. Yeah. And how you how you put two materials together or you know, the the edging of a certain material versus, you know, round and versus square and things like that. Right. The color schemes, etc. People have opinions. Sure. Right. That you can find two of the best designers in the world. If they both, if they disagree on which one is more beautiful than the other, which one is it? Yeah. Beauty is an eye of the beholder, we said that right. So that's a challenging part. You know, sometimes we show a client a very real thing, photorealistic rendering. This is what this space is gonna be like. Then they walk into the space, and it's still under construction, so you don't, it's not really truly the best circumstance. But then they're like, Oh, I didn't think it was gonna look like this. And I'm just like, how can you not think it was gonna look like this? This is exactly what it's supposed to look like. But yeah, I can't tell them that they're wrong. You know, it's their home, they want to feel even if it does look like that. Well, what do you want it to look like? Or what do you want it? What do you think it should look like? Yeah, you know, let's let's work together to try to figure that out.

SPEAKER_01 25:27

It's usually an opportunity to educate, right? And tell them, like, this and this is fine. Yeah. And then you can show them just so you know, right? And they might say, Yeah, that's fine. Or they may say, you know, I didn't think of that. I didn't want it as bad as I thought I did.

SPEAKER_00 25:39

Perfect example. This literally just happened in the last two days. I had a client that um we just were finishing up the home right now. We're putting the lighting in, and he's like, the lighting is too it's too dark in my house. I I had said I wanted to be bright. You guys use 3,000 K temperature lighting. Should we want it brighter? Well, 3,000 K is our norm. Every home that you've ever walked, almost every home that you've ever walked into that's a sapphire room has had 3,000 K lighting. It wasn't specified, or it was specified to be 3,000 K. We never discussed changing it to anything, but now they want it to be 4,000 K. Yeah. So it's a whiter light, uh uh cooler a little bit in color. Cooler, yeah. And but that's what they want. So, you know, it how do you you can't say that they're wrong, that's what they want, right? That's not what we normally do, but it's their home. If that's what they're it's gonna make them feel better at night or during the day, or whatever it is. Like it's a simple, relatively simple situation. We can make it work, and right. Um, I'm not saying I'm right and they're wrong, but I educated them and saying that 3,000 is our norm. We do it in the Cameron home and every in my own home, every home you've ever walked into of ours has had that. He's like, it didn't feel like this, this is what we want. So we're making that happen.

SPEAKER_01 27:06

I experienced that when I was building my own home. Um different, right? It's not a set for home, it's like a production home, but the process, you're looking at things with like with a fine-tooth comb and a magnifying glass, and I was like, Oh, why does this look like this? Why does this look like that? I ended up changing all my home to 4000k, and then I switched it back. Oh, really? Yeah, I didn't even know that. Because it was just like, you know, you you like you make assumptions, right? And I was probably more in tune as a photographer, like with color temperature, but then it's just like you almost trick yourself. Well, no, every home I've ever been in is 4,000. Then you go to your parents' house, they're like, wait, it's not, and wait, it's not, it's just like it's just you never paid attention to it. Sure.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Um and that's one of the funny things about building a home, is you're making decisions about every aspect of the home that you typically, if you're buying a home or remodeling a home or parts of a home, you're not picking up every intricate detail. Right. So when you're looking at a countertop or a cabinet or a hardwood or tile or whatever it is, you're somewhat looking at it in an isolated perspective. Yeah. But truthfully, it's how it all comes together. Yeah. And even then, once the furniture and accessories and and you're actually, you know, it's looking like it's lived in, it completely changes for sure. The the feeling and how how all these materials work together and come together. So you're almost looking at it in a silo, yeah, and you're like, this doesn't feel good on its own, right? Right. I don't like the color of this countertop. Like take a step back. How does it work with everybody, everything else? Yeah. And then it's like, I think to myself, okay, if this home was 100% complete, there was furniture, artwork, et cetera, and you walked in, that same person, yeah, would they say, I don't like the countertop? No. Probably not. They would probably say, This is a beautiful space. Exactly. You're looking at it holistically rather than specifically.

SPEAKER_01 29:08

And we experienced that directly with our media when we started staging the homes, right? They felt completely different in the photos when they were staged with furniture. It's not even close. Versus empty spaces, you know.

SPEAKER_00 29:18

Um people have a hard people in general, myself include, it's hard to comprehend the size of these rooms, right? Right. You're looking at dimensions 20 by 20. Okay, how big is that relatively? Right. What does it look like when there's furniture place in this room, this family room, this bedroom? Anytime you walk into, I tell all my clients, I said, the the the closer you are to finishing the home, the larger each space is gonna look. Yeah. And it's counterintuitive. You think when it's an open hole, it should look the biggest. Right. When the home is framed but no drywall, it should look and feel bigger because there's no walls, right? There's no barricades. That's not the case. No. And really you don't understand the scale until furniture is there, and then you you can really understand spatially how does the space feel.

SPEAKER_01 30:12

Exactly. I agree with that 100%. Um I want to kind of go back to like how we started this. You know, we went off on major tangents, but it's okay. You know, I'm I'm I'm I'm happy with where it went. Um, and you kind of already touched on this, you know. You said if if you knew what you were gonna receive, you you would do this again. But would you do it differently? If you could go back, would you do it differently, or do you feel that these are just the lessons that made you who you are?

SPEAKER_00 30:44

You know, if you if I had all the information that I have today and go back to 25-year-old me, but I I had all the knowledge that I have now, of course I would do it differently. Sure. Right? I wouldn't, you know, learn all these lessons and experience all this pain. But all of that has led to this, right? Um, you know, I we've talked about it in in past episodes. You know, have I questioned my decision of getting, you know, creating my own home building company, I have. Yeah. Uh, but to go back 10 years and say, you know, this is imagine trying to tell 25-year-old me in in six years there's gonna be a global pandemic. Right. It's hard to even comprehend those things. So trying to tell myself, like, these are the struggles you're gonna go through, and these are the learning experiences and all those things. Yeah, I don't know if 25-year-old me would be like, I can make it through all of that. That's a lot of stuff to go through. Uh, but if you have the end goal or the end result and say, you gotta deal with all these things, but here's where you're gonna be in 10 years. This is where the company is gonna be. You're gonna have 30 employees, you're gonna have a landscaping department, you're gonna have model homes and numerous properties and numerous awards that you've won, and you've created a brand that's had a great reputation. Is it all worth it? Absolutely. I was I would definitely go back and do it again. Um I I would love to say I would do things differently. I would say the biggest thing is just maybe not going so fast. Sure. Trying to do things more methodically. Um enjoy the journey. Yeah, there was times many, many times that the journey was not being enjoyed. Uh, but yeah, I think that would have helped. Um, I've had a lot of great people along the way. I've had a few that weren't so great. Um, you know, they say hire slow and fire fast. I've kind of done the opposite, fire hire fast and fire slow. But now we have a great team. And um that would be one of the things I would do differently too, maybe being more selective on who I bring on to the team. And as you're growing your business, the business is in different levels or stages, and there's different people to get you from stage one to two. Maybe you need somebody else from two to three, and somebody else from three to four, right? Right, and we and I've experienced that. Um so all in all, in hindsight, looking back, it's been a great journey. Um, I'm very happy with where we're at. I'm happy with the lessons that I've learned. And we're still learning lessons, we're not perfect, and you know we're still we still have goals and we still have a vision, and that's for another episode.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

I think that's a great note to end this episode.