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Building Wealth Beyond the NFL w/ Shawne Merriman! (Ep. 219)
We are joined by Shawne Merriman as he sits down with former NFL players, Jacobi Francis, Denzel Williams, Bubba Bolden, Stanford Samuels, and Shervon Barthelmy and member of his Family First Life insurance team, John Kabbani, for a conversation that’s as true as it gets! They dive deep into what life is really like after professional sports—sharing raw, unfiltered stories about the highs, the lows, and the unexpected opportunities that came with stepping off the field and into the world of life insurance sales.
This episode is packed with laughter, real talk, and game-changing insights from seven unique voices who know what it means to pivot and succeed in a whole new arena. If you’re an entrepreneur, athlete, or anyone considering a fresh start, listen to this discussion and learn how to work with these professional athletes.
What's up, fellas? What's going?
Speaker 2:on man. What's up, what's up what's up.
Speaker 1:So it's funny for me, because the only time we all get a chance to talk at the same time is over the group text. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, you know. So get everybody in one room and y'all Dizzee. You fluent from Phoenix, I'm not bad at all. Tennessee, from Atlanta, new York, new.
Speaker 5:From Vegas.
Speaker 1:From Vegas yeah. Dallas and we went to dinner in Dallas a few weeks ago for the convention, and I'm not even going to tell everybody what you said, because I'm going to keep that Different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, you're different man. So you know, I think, for all of us man, I think we all got our reasons for being in this business and you know the reason why we, you know, kind of formed this group and came together too, because we all got a common goal man is to do more. And then mainly really denzel man, because you brought all of us together. And then, if you want to just talk about your relationship with everybody in the background, your background, and then how you know most of the guys here, man, be cool yeah, I mean, first I met you just like just right person, right time, heard about what they were doing.
Speaker 6:And then I got into the space and I was like how much you making? And I got a zoom with you. You were like this, I'm like for real. You're like yeah. And then at the time I was in the usfl, I was in detroit, right, that's how I met stan. So I was like yo, I was so sold. I was after practice, like every day, studying for my exam, like every day. I'll be like now I'm doing this. And then, um, fast forward, I'm on what? Year two now with this. And then, um, I met kobe, uh, at our pro day training back in jersey and, mind you, like we were always on and off like yo, how you doing, but you doing. But it wasn't just like you know, everyday phone call, it was just like checking in. And then just recently he's on the Vikings this past preseason, right, and he was like yo, what are you doing? I keep seeing you post on your Instagram like numbers, like you're making that. I'm like, yeah, it's not just you know, I'm not making it up, I'm making it up, yeah.
Speaker 6:And he was like nah, hold up, I'm going to tap in. And then he got licensed and all that. So I'm chilling, I get a call. I'm like yo, what's good. He was like yeah, man, I got a call. I'm like okay, yeah, the Vikings assigned me. I was like all right, bro It'll, and then fast forward, like now we call him the IUL King.
Speaker 1:He knows more than me. He knows more than me.
Speaker 6:And then I met John just through, like one of the guys on our team. He's from New York as well. We hit it off. He's a solar guy. So then I met Bubba through him and Chevy I'm from New York, so he was my trainer back in New York. That's how I know Chevy, and now we all together Now. So he was my trainer back in New York. That's how I know Chevy, and now we all together.
Speaker 1:Now we all in the same place. You know what's crazy. When you first so you would go missing for a couple hours, y'all text you, and then you were like I'm at practice, so you would train. I said, you know, train for what?
Speaker 1:Because I thought you was already done and that's why you were doing writing business, I was like hold on, my whole mind kind of changed. And I always say this too, man, that's why I think athletes in general would do well in this business, for one, because just our mentality, man, I try to explain to a lot of people that we just think and go about different, our work ethic is different, and used to dealing with adversity, used to putting in time, and I always say that I believe that we're the most disciplined people on the planet Earth, for sure, because from the time, like 10, 11, 12 years old, like we're told what time to wake up, yeah, what time to be to a meeting, what time to watch film, what time to work out, and so you know, a lot of that transitioned into, which will translate into this business Right, and I think that is ultimately going to be, you know, the reason why we're able to excel and take this thing to the next level.
Speaker 6:No for sure, and I feel like for me I make me like I mean you were in solar but like most of us have no stellar experience at all I never had like our actual job besides playing football. Right, it was Baltimore, then I was in USFL and then I got lucky and just learned about this. I feel like our whole lives. I mean we have the conversation all the time. We make it our whole identity football sometimes.
Speaker 6:It's like dude, that's not going to last forever. What's your plan B? What are you going to do after? And so I think, for anybody even just watching this right now, you don't got to have any experience, and I think, even just from a standpoint of just having your license, write your family's policies, write your friends, like you know it's so valuable, like you can now make income wherever you are by just having your license, like it's not, it's not even a difficult thing to get. You just take a, what take your course, you do, you say exam, you get licensed and just write your family, your friends. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Like it's simple how was it man, what, what you know? Were you still doing the business when you were with the Vikings too, or did it happen after you kind of started making that transition out?
Speaker 4:No, so it was really for me, my time with the Vikings, and I went back into it I'm back home, let's get rolling. And he was like all right, bet. So I really, like he said, I got my license and came in from getting released and it was straight to work and I was putting in the time Like I'd be on early in the morning to like late as I could be and just studying and asking him questions and picking his brain because, like you say, at that point he had been like a year and a half in it. So I'm picking his brain, seeing what he knows, and then down the road, you know, I started learning and learning and then we're teaching each other back and forth. It's like ping pong, just going back and forth what you know about this, what you know about that. So it's become like a daily thing. It became more fun. It's not work to us, it's fun and it's like it's a new avenue for a lot of us, like transition that's the biggest word we kind of all use.
Speaker 6:Yep transition.
Speaker 4:A lot of them they hear me say it every day Like of athletes we make just doing one thing. That's our whole identity, forever.
Speaker 1:A lot of us been doing this since like four years old so when you're trying to find something new, it's kind of hard to transition out of that and become somebody new, yeah, and then, john, like you, you came from the solar, yeah, business and you know we went to dinner in dallas, you know, a couple days before the um, before their convention, and well, I'm gonna tell you what, john I gotta say it now because John wanted a thousand ages I said, hold on, like, first of all, we went to this cool place called the ranch and he did, he uh, recommended, and I was like, let us, let me eat first before you throw out numbers like that.
Speaker 1:Um, but how, how has you know? Because one of the things you, that you talked about is like the door knocking. Yeah, y'all were doing on the solar side and I always said that I believe a lot, if you could do door knocking, you can literally do anything in this world, because that is the toughest thing to do, man. So talk about, you know, kind of making that. You know we all use the word transition. I think we're gonna keep using that a lot, but that transition coming from the, the solar industry, and getting over here yeah, no, definitely.
Speaker 7:I mean I I knew I wanted to stay in sales, but the biggest thing for me was just finding an industry where I can actually scale. So I found that when I was in solar and door to door, like there was a lot of the sales process that was outside of my control. So as soon as you sign the deal, you're done, you know, you think you're done. There's the project management, there's the engineers, the stamps, the permits, all that stuff that could go wrong at any point and then, if it gets stuck, everyone else in the process isn't as incentivized to get the job done as well as you are, or at least as well as some people are. I was a top producer when I was in my company and that was because I saw the potential there.
Speaker 7:I don't know if you guys saw, like Alex Ramosi posted a video recently. Okay, you know a great entrepreneur there and he talked about like, if you want to make good money today in sales, door-to-door solar is like one of the best ways. You know People are making like $200,000, $300,000, $400,000 a year, but the problem is you kind of get capped. There is just because of the sales process that's outside of your control where things could go wrong and then it's hard to scale from there. So, going into insurance and I took my time to kind of really talk to a lot of different people get an idea of what the data they looked like, get an idea of how to scale, which is why I threw out crazy numbers like a thousand.
Speaker 4:What's up with the time?
Speaker 7:I mean you guys have all seen it happen, I think firsthand, Like you have this company. It's amazing what individuals can do just by finding, like you said, you find five guys that are like yourself, and I mean I'm already seeing that I've only been in this for a few months now and I'm seeing the rapid growth and it becomes exponential. When you do find five to ten guys that want the same thing that you want, you show them how you've been able to do what you're doing and then multiply, just multiply there as long as it's like a good foundation, which is what we have here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we were talking, so you play.
Speaker 1:You played the shrine bowl yeah right, yeah, so, uh, my, my streaming serves. My network had the practices for the shrine bowl a few weeks ago and you know it's crazy, as I'm sitting there watching a lot of these guys, like everybody's not going to make it to the NFL, and so you know, my thing was the insurance space in general is perfect, because you always got this gap between whether you're going to. You still want to try, but when you try, you know you can talk about this a little bit more. Like you still have to train your ass off when you're waiting for a call and sometimes it's the most frustrating thing ever because you can't go out and get a 9-5. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1:Because you have to train, you got to be ready for that call and a lot of these guys they're playing in the Triangle, they're trying to get drafted, they're going to get brought in for the combine or whatever, but it's not guaranteed they're going to get drafted. So you know, when Denzel was talking about being in this business, I said man, this is the perfect space because you can carve out your time and when you want to work out, set time for your trainer, but you're not locked into a nine-to-five job. So talk about. You know kind of just that process.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I mean, it's been definitely tough. I was with Kobe out in Minnesota for Ricky minicamp last year and then we came back for another workout right before preseason happened, and they were telling me like yo, you know, go back home, you know you might get a call. So at that, at that time, I was just training, training, training, training, didn't really know what to do. I had a buddy in the space and he was telling me. He was like, yeah, man, just get your license, get your license. And in my head I was just so stuck on football, football, football 25-8. And then finally it got to a point where I'm like, all right, I got to find another way. I got to find another way to make money, I got to find another way to provide and do what I need to do. So I just said, all right, like, let me go do it, let me go take this insurance test. I went and did it and kind of got right into it and it still allows me now because I'm still pursuing football, right, so it still allows me now to go work out when I want, and I'll be telling these guys right like yo, like I'm about to go leave, I'm about to go train Right, go train right, um, maybe like bet to handle business, you know what I mean and come back and we get back to it
Speaker 5:so I think this, this space right here, is very beneficial for athletes um, people still pursuing their goals and what their dreams are, and you can come here and you can make a good living and you just build a lot of relationships. I think that goes a long way. And you know us and what we've done in our profession. Uh, we know a lot of people, a lot of high network people, that you know us and what we've done in our profession. We know a lot of people, a lot of high network people, that you know can give you opportunity to do something big, so you got to just take advantage of it, and I think that's what we're doing right now.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent, and so you got to keep it a buck. But you trained Denzel. Did he work? Was he working like that? Denzel's a very hard worker. I thought of her for a minute Very hard worker.
Speaker 2:But the best thing about Denz is like it wasn't just always about football, you know, like he always looked on the business side, like how do I like make more income Because, like you said at some point, it's only so much you can play football.
Speaker 6:Right.
Speaker 2:You know you get beat up all the time, banging heads all the time. At some point it's going to die out. So in the meanwhile, for me it was always about learning about the body, understanding how to make him better, how to make him faster and he actually was the one that switched my mentality. Learning about stocks, businesses.
Speaker 2:And I'm like yeah, yeah, yeah, but it's just training, training, training, training, training. And then at some point, same way like Kobe, started posting numbers and I'm like what are you doing? He's like I'm doing insurance. Are you still playing? He's like yeah, and for me I'm still training hard athletes and stuff, and I'm like okay, so like what are you doing? He's like I'm selling insurance. So that's how we got into it pretty much. And you know, yeah, because I think.
Speaker 1:I think the passion was always like we always want to still play the game, no matter what. You want to still train, you want to still do all those things you're you're very limited on being able to go on to get like a real full-time job and still live that life, to even make an attempt right, because you never know, you get that right call and you got to go on. So you're training a bunch of athletes and everybody is trying to figure out that next thing and I'll tell you, I never been. I got my ass cut by really the charges. So they waived me and then I ended up signing to Buffalo. But then after the second year I signed a two-year deal. They cut me like two weeks before the season Because my salary was a lot higher than the dude behind me that was willing to run down on special teams Because they asked me to do it. I'm like no, I'm good, I'm like no man.
Speaker 1:I wanted to pro ball a few times. I'm all pro, I ain't running. But I said, bro, I their rookie deal like $400, $500. I'm making almost $5 million that year. So they cut me to save that money. And then I ended up coming back. But during that process, when I was out, it was the first time I've experienced like what it felt like to be on the streets, where you sitting around calling your agent like you.
Speaker 2:Mad at your agent now because you think he ain't working right.
Speaker 1:You know, you make you think your agent like he's like hey, hey, man, nobody called what you mean, nobody called right you know, and so I that was the first time I really I said you know what? Now he's fired yes, you know. Yes, now you're looking at firing your agent and it's really becoming a frustration that that that open time, man. So just talk about. Talk about being able to have that security and you being able to still train guys. That security is important.
Speaker 2:It's very important because at the end of the day, when you think about it and between that period, when you were trying to figure out where you were going next, like I know, you were still looking for, like, okay, in the meantime, while I'm here, yes, I got to train, but like I need money, I got to pay for things. You know what I'm saying? Life, right. So it's like you start thinking and like you get into a point where now you start doing more research, you start looking for avenues to like build extra wealth and income. And then you say to yourself you know what, like football right now is not really working for me. So what can I invest my time in? To like substitute that, even if I'm training, what can bring me income? Right? And then you start to realize it's not only one way to do it, there's multiple ways to do it. Can you pivot? You know you pivot, you transition. Know you pivot, you transition. And then you get into that transition.
Speaker 2:Now, like you have, like Kobe too, you guys both have a different. You know what's that we're looking for. Clientele, right, you got friends in the NFL. You learned about insurance. How important it is now. Right, you know Players now. Players now are just playing At some point again. You can't play forever. You go through injuries. They're going to look for the next best guy. It's be a high. How do you have that security after you're done playing football? When it makes sense, it's like okay, I don't got to beat up myself all the time. Study, you learn and get into the whole business atmosphere.
Speaker 1:How did you two meet? Y'all met.
Speaker 2:Yeah, in the USFL, in the USFL, right, that's all.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm. So wait, yeah, so were you part of. So when they were in the XFL, then they made the merger, you were part of the merger too. No, I?
Speaker 3:wasn't part of the merger. So that was just like Kobe and Shev, I mean. It was just kind of like I couldn't deny it because I mean I was with Denzel a lot of the time when we would have free time and stuff and he was just showing me like all he had to do was show me his phone and show me the numbers and like that's the closest I've seen to athlete numbers Like you making real money in this business, and that kind of caught my attention and from there I just kept asking questions, asking questions, and I was one foot in, one foot out but I never like fully committed to it because I was still kind of playing. I was locked into the season, locked into it. But Denzel was already like fully locked into the ball, fully locked into the insurance business, so it's like he was already reaping the benefits from it early. But I mean just being able to see him kind of get like, get his feet up under him so fast, like, and just the work that he put in.
Speaker 3:Like because I mean it's plenty of guys on our team, I mean, who wanted to do things, like when we had free time wanted to go here, go there. Zell at the crib doing his studying. Zell at home getting ready for his exam. And then I look up and it's a month later and Zell already got his license and he making sales.
Speaker 3:So it's like it all happened fast and it just made it seem like it was obtainable for me because, like I said, I've never had a job other than playing football, so like it's foreign to me. It's like, do I really want to try it? Is it worth it? But when it's somebody close to me who's showing me the results, and when I got questions or whatever I have to ask, he's right there for me to ask and it's like man, it's undeniable.
Speaker 1:And then for the people out there that don't know, the USFL is a stepping stone so you can get your shot into the league and so you know the salaries are not crazy Like it's not a lot of money and I'm not going to take a shot at my boy DJ with the Rock and Danny because they're giving everybody an opportunity. But also, too, the upside if you do this insurance industry right, can surpass what you're making on the field For sure.
Speaker 6:Because how was your journey? Like football, like you were at Florida State first, right yeah, and you went to Packers, right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was at Florida State. Then I came out early, didn't get drafted, yeah, ended up signing to the Packers, was there for two years, yeah, and then I kind of I mean was trickling around for a little bit of time and then that next year is when I played in the USFL. But I mean during that time that I was at home, man, I had a lot of time to think, a lot of time to just I mean sit and just be with my thoughts, man, and it's not a good place to be sometimes because I mean you don't know where to turn to. I mean ball is all we've I mean pretty much all of us have known up to this point. So I mean it gets scary at times. So like I feel like that was kind of God's way of like showing me my other path and which other way I could take.
Speaker 1:When I talk to people all the time and I say it is a scary place sometimes where you don't know. And that next step and even when I retired, I went over to, I signed a deal with NFL Network, you know, doing a broadcast and stuff. But I would get upset some days and I was like man, this is it. You know what I mean. I was making good money but it just wasn't the same because that's what you identify with for so long. And now you got to figure out okay, now you, this person I actually remember it was one of my boys and it was a cover three and I was talking breaking the play down and he blew it. He left somebody behind him and then, you know, over the cover three, and so I'm sitting there because you know you want to keep everything in front of you. So I'm sitting there and I don't feel comfortable calling him out because in the locker room you'll snitch. You get what I mean.
Speaker 1:So it took me a while to even adjust being a broadcaster and so just finding and I think for me mentally, after like my second year, I was ready to let it go. I was like you know what, I'm not going to play again. You're sitting there seeing what some of these dudes are making. You're like man, I'm on the couch, I could do that, you know, like dudes getting beat deep, can't tackle, can't do all this stuff, so you don't want to come across as hated. But also you're like he on the field and I'm not, you know, nobody's calling me. So I think that it took me a couple years.
Speaker 1:When did y'all like Denzel? When did you hit that time, man? Because, like I said, I was just impressed when you were still able to do both. Yeah, like when is that time when you felt like you were comfortable enough to kind of move more into the insurance stuff, do more stuff in the insurance? Yeah, and you felt secure enough, whether it's amount of money, whether it's like you felt that this was going to be something you could do for a long time.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I mean I want to be transparent because not everybody is going to have the same experience. I did Like I'm a different kind of dude, like when I do something I get obsessed. So like I'm not going to tell you to like do what I did, but like I was every day. But, similar to you, like I'm just studying every day. You know I'm dialing every day, right, I'm doing everything I can to make football money outside of football. And so I would say, honestly, in my second month, like I show him, I'm like, look, you going to do it now, right, or what? Like, because I'm not a person, I'm not going to sit here.
Speaker 6:And Because, like where we come from and you know people we play with all the time, you know we got to see it. Like I can't just hear you talk about it, I got to see it for myself. So I was like yo, look, I face time home, this is my bank account. Like this is what it is. You want to do it or not? If not, it's all good. But and then, from there, like I mean don't get me wrong Like every day I think about football all the time, I love it. I mean like I'm not going to sit here and be like, I'm just like so over it, but I'm not going to sit there and make it my whole identity, right. I'm not going to sit there and not move on. I'm going to be present Right now. This is where I'm at and right now.
Speaker 1:It's one of those things, man, where I think this business kind of gives you a like. You can make better decisions because you're not scrapping for bread, scrapping for money. And, too, you might get a situation where you don't want to go to a certain team because they could bring you in just practice squad wise and cut you the following week because that's, they just need somebody as a as a scout team guy for that week. But if you're sitting around you're making money. It's like no, I'm good.
Speaker 6:Yeah, you know, I'm straight, you know, yeah and what I would say, too, is like this is honestly more than football bread, because I'm not getting taxed, like you know what I'm saying like, and there's no cap of how much I can make. Yep, and and I'm doing that to comfort my home, I mean shoot. I was in Columbia just last summer sitting down my laptop doing work.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like, come on, you know what I'm saying. You actually was getting work done at Columbia, so when.
Speaker 2:I went out there, I missed everything.
Speaker 1:No, go ahead, I missed everything yeah.
Speaker 6:So it's like you have so much autonomy over your business and also you don't have someone to like. You have a boss, right, you're your own boss. And so I love how you have full autonomy over your time and what you do and there's no one telling you to get up now and clock in. So, yeah, man, I really can't complain. I mean, I love where I'm at now and I feel like that that ball might don't last forever. Yep, you know you retire, you know you have a four or five year career. What you gonna do after? Hey, what's your next? What's your next plan, right? So it's like with this I found something besides football that I know I'm done playing for good. I got this right here.
Speaker 1:I'm chilling, you know what was, what was the hardest? Because'm going to ask all y'all what was the hardest thing starting out in a business? Was it like for me? When I first started? I got really into really building a team, but when I first started out it was a rejection. It was like that rejection of rudeness, because you're going to come across that sometime People being rude, I don't even care they're the to feel something out.
Speaker 2:You're like, hey, I'm looking at this right, I see that you felt this out.
Speaker 1:So obviously you're looking for insurance. All right, why are you mad at me? Yeah, you know, and so like what I want to, you know, kind of get that from all you guys. What was the hardest part?
Speaker 6:I'm a person I don't like hearing no, like what you mean. No, you don't get this in short now, but uh but no, it was, it was humbling.
Speaker 6:But I also learned, like being on the phone and talking to someone that like filled a card out and I don't know them, my talking skills, the way I talk, my networking skills improved tremendously because I'm doing it many different attitudes, personalities you know I'm talking to Sally in Georgia and then Daniel in Idaho, right, so, like different people. So I just learned to develop my skills, you know, in terms of talking on the phone. But that was the hard part, I would say, because, like I'm about, you know 30 leads and honestly, 15 might say no or 20 might say no, but that 10 will say yes and that's all I care about. Right, because that makes it so worth it. Because I just now bought a 30-pack of leads. I sold, let's say, five or 10. I only probably paid 30 leads, 200 bucks. I just made over 15 racks over just a little investment like that, right? So, but I will say, anything you do, there's always, you know, like highs and highs and lows.
Speaker 6:I'm not going to say this is such an easy job. It does take consistency. It takes getting on, getting know, improving your skills. This is a constant. You've got to constantly improve your skill with this. You can't just for the next year or two years, use the same script or same words. You've got to constantly be improving. I'm used to that now. I'm resilient now when it comes to it. And then we constantly all of us find different ways to get a different lead source. Or hey, now it's going to the IUL space, or let's get into our warm market our old teammates or your current teammates. But yeah, I think overall, anything you do, I don't care what job it is, it's always a trade-off. I, I don't care what job it is, it's always a trade-off. I said this trade-off with this job is just like getting rejected, hearing a no, even though they signed it and they wanted it at one point. Just hearing a no, yeah.
Speaker 4:What about for you? Me personally, I've always been like a laid-back dude. So, like talking, I'll tell you, when we was training I didn't really say too much. I come in there. What's up and With this? It really just helped me with my networking, communication skills, being more outward towards people and learning how to read people over the phone and in person. Also, like the biggest thing for me was hearing that note, because when I first came into it, it was me just trying to fill a void of like not playing ball, just jumping into something. And then I probably say like once every week when we talk to new guys that come on with us, I'm like you got to know the products, know what you're selling so you can get comfortable. So when you're selling something, you're talking to these clients. You have a response off of any rejection they give you. So at the end of the day, that was my biggest thing is really just honing in on my craft. It's like I work with football.
Speaker 4:I know we keep referring back to football, but I mean, that's what we know best, like the back of our hands, and at the end of the day I just put the work at it and I woke up every single day trying to find a new way to make a deal versus this thing. I would probably ask Denzel the same question five times and he'd be like bro and then once he said it one time. He's like a coach. Don't ask it again.
Speaker 5:You should know it.
Speaker 4:So I took that into consideration of being taught the craft and trying to build on top of that. And then, once I kind of got over those no's, I was looking forward to the next type of response I would get. So if I heard the same thing 10 times, I was starting to find some notes that I hadn't heard before so I can go research what I need to know or try to go find another backdoor into the company to figure out a better product for the client.
Speaker 3:Yeah, what about you, kind of like Kobe just said. I mean, like with football, you really just want to jump into it because it's the next thing that we're doing. But I mean, when you jump into it without having enough knowledge on what it is that you're selling, like he said, without knowing the products and stuff, you're going to hear way more no's than you think you're going to hear, and that alone kills your confidence when you're trying to do something new. So I mean you kind of just got to be like Zell said, you got to be resilient through that process and just know that. I mean, if you're getting more no's than you think you should be getting, then you're not doing something right.
Speaker 3:So, whether that's you need to study the products more, or whether that means you need to get better with your tone, you need to get a better script or no matter what it is, but you just got to hone into your craft, just like you would with football, because we we all put in a million hours of extra work with football, but then we come into another space and expect for it just to jump and just work, just because we start doing it like it's not, just like.
Speaker 3:You actually have to make it work like you actually have to. You have to study, you have to like it's thing, because it's not a space that we come from. This is not something that we've been doing since we were young. So, like football, I feel like me personally, like I never looked at football, like I was doing work, because I love playing football. But you come to a different space and it's like you have to sometimes force yourself to to to sit down and to sit down and, kind of, you know, do the extra work that you may not want to do sometime, but when you do that extra work, that's when the success comes and that's when you do get those yeses instead of getting those no's so the hardest part for me man was really dealing with the rejection like what was the hardest part about this business getting into it?
Speaker 3:for you, uh, I mean kind of like kobe said. Uh, I mean, like he said, just jumping into it. I mean, when you come, get started with something new, I mean you kind of just want to jump into it because you're trying to get something else going other than your main thing. But I mean you can't jump into. This is not one of those businesses where you can just jump in and not have no knowledge on anything at all.
Speaker 3:Like you have to learn the products, you have to learn the tonality of the whole, of the whole conversation. You have to learn how to hold a conversation. You have to learn the rebuttals. Like it's so many different steps to the process. Like for it to be, for it to work, and you're gonna get knows, like I've learned that from everybody who I've talked to in the business. Like you're gonna get no, this impossible not to get knows. But you're just working to the point where you're gonna get a yes eventually and you're gonna get more knows than yeses. But the money, like the money that you make when you make, when you get a yes, it'll make it all make sense. But but you have to put in the work in order to get to that point.
Speaker 1:Yep, no honey for you. What was it?
Speaker 2:So for me, I would say like transitioning, like going back to sales 2017, transitioning into, like, remote sales. You go from door to door, right, I mean, you knock, you talk to people, but it depends, right. And then I got switched to retail. So I heard a lot of no's every day. So after a while, like that became comfortable for me. The body language is different because I'm talking to you right there, um, so I can kind of mimic. You know the stand, so like how you feel. And then you get into remote sales and for me it was like calling people, actually getting on the phone and dialing, like you get that nervous feeling. I also can't see them, so I don't know how to like approach it. And I would say the most difficult thing for me was like knowing what to say, what not to say. So that would be like my biggest thing, like knowing what to say, getting over the nerves of calling people, kind of like figuring out the tonality, you know. So that was my struggle.
Speaker 5:Yeah, telling people kind of like figuring out the tonality. So that was my struggle. Rob Markman, yeah, no, I definitely feel that, because I'm the same way and I've been in this for about two months now. I'm still kind of new to it. So hearing no's don't really bother me. It's more so about, like, people sticking to their word. You know what I mean, because it's coming from what we do is yes sir, no sir, you better be where you at on time, and that's that. So I schedule a lot of meetings. People don't show up to the meetings.
Speaker 4:That's my note.
Speaker 5:I'm like extremely mad I'm like you're not showing up to something.
Speaker 1:You said and they ask for it, right right, couldn't have said no.
Speaker 5:So that's the part that I just got to get over. Right now I'm still in it. So, um, rejection, isn't? It don't really hurt my heart, it don't hurt my ego. I can't see, you can't see me. So, yeah, I, I don't, I don't find no hate in that, but you know, it's all a process. So we still learning, we still going. So at the end of the day, we gonna, we gonna get it done.
Speaker 1:I tell everybody, man, you got to play them numbers yeah, you gotta play the numbers, because it doesn't matter if you get eight no, uh, seven no's out of the ten. If those three say, yes, it's, it pays for your money, right, it all makes sense, you know. So you got to play about the numbers. What about for you?
Speaker 7:yeah, so for me, coming from door to door into this, I mean the aspect of sales, the all the risk and the nose, I mean that's. That's exactly what I was doing, like the day before this, you know. I mean, um, so my challenge, or my the most difficult part for my transition was a bit, I guess, a bit like I don't know how applicable it is but I had a team of like 15 20 guys that you know. We went to the gym together every day. I mean it's the same thing, like you know, you're on a team, but we went to the gym together every day.
Speaker 7:I mean it's the same thing, like you know, as if you're on a team, but we went to the gym together every day, we ate together every day, we knocked doors together every day.
Speaker 7:So going from that and then, you know, working remote, that's my biggest challenge. It's like now I have to wake up on time and do all this stuff, and I'm grateful that we have the Zoom where, where we're able to have those intermittence of actually meeting the guys in person and, like you know, creating that culture. Um, so that was probably the most difficult thing for me is like, just not being able to see, like is one of my guys struggling, like he's not on the zoom, but is he struggling or is he just busy today? You know, I mean that's kind of tough to see, um, but for me that just sets a goal, right, like for me, I see that I'm like all right. So now I realize I do, I like working remote, I like the flexibility of where I, where I get to work, which is nice, and I feel like if I had a family, I'd be probably full remote, but I don't, and so my goal now is to have an in-person office and that's just, you know, it's just another step in new york.
Speaker 1:So when I, when I, when I uh, it's funny, when I first started out and you know, I got this thing with me that I never tell anybody to do something I wouldn't do myself right. So when I first got into the business, it wasn't remote. It wasn't remote first. And so when I first started to do it, I went into like what a few of my agents, we went in home and so, you know, I played football, people know who I was and whatever. So some didn't. But when I got in there and I walked to the door, people were like Sean Murray, what are you doing here? And I was like, look, I'm coming here because I don't want to ever tell anybody to do something that I'm not going to do myself.
Speaker 1:You know, and I think that you know, when this whole thing went remote, what it did was and you talk about people not showing up, when they don't show up on the phone, it's easy. When they don't show up at the house, man, you're really pissed, you know you're really pissed about that. And so the goal here now is to maximize, like, your cause and opportunities, because when you play the numbers right, you're dialing in the morning a certain set of leads and you're dialing in the afternoon, the evening when they get off work, and some of them will be at work and say, hey, call me at 5 o'clock, I'm home. Well, call me at 6. I'm home and I think for all of us, man the opportunity really and we talked about it earlier there's no ceiling If you're buying quality, you got quality leads in your hand, you're working the script and you get really comfortable at working the script.
Speaker 1:I've seen people like life's. That's what's mind-blowing. We've all made good money, especially if you play in the league at some point and we got those bigger checks. So we're not we're accustomed to seeing checks. We're not accustomed to seeing checks without tackling somebody. We're not accustomed to seeing checks without catching the ball or putting your finger back in place or waking up in the morning you got to take a hot shower in order to walk straight around the house because you're in training camp. So when I started to see people in this business making those kind of numbers and they tackled nobody, I said that was it, that was it for me.
Speaker 1:You know. So I made that. I don't know if that was a selling point. I know you like to, you know, and I do the same thing, showing people what I made that week, what I made that month, because you can't lie from the sales. But for me I say, coming from where we came from and we're accustomed to seeing money, yeah, now somebody you know is making a tremendous amount of money from home and didn't have to go through the stuff that we went through?
Speaker 6:No for sure. I feel like for me, the dopest thing you can do is make money without playing a sport or being an entertainer, or like being an entertainer that's, to me, is impressive. Yeah, like I feel like at some point, when you're done playing football, like you know people that you want to look up to without you know the people in the finance space, right, because at the end of the day, like you made that money but you're going to them for advice, right? So it's like for me, like I had my friend the other day. He was like yo, denzel, I'm not gonna even lie to you, to you and kobe like what y'all doing is dope because y'all are making money without playing football. That's so cool. Like you know what I'm saying, because we're just taught that like this is it, this is it or nothing. So again to your point, like I agree, like when I figured out I could like make this while sitting at home and laying down and just yo, this is denzel, that that was it, you know I got to do.
Speaker 1:I got the funniest story about that with people making money without playing sports. So I had two pit bulls. My pit bulls when I was playing in San Diego used to get out the yard and so one of my pit bulls got out the yard and ran through the neighbor's house and ran through the screen door, broke the screen door and they didn't bite anybody it wasn't aggressive, but pit bull running at you, everybody's shook right, because it's a pit bull.
Speaker 1:And so we went through the house, broke the screen door and I went over and I apologized to the guy. I said, man, I'll get you a, I'll buy whatever, get you a new screen door. Did he tear up any front of the chair? I'll get cleaning service over here. Just being super nice I felt bad about. And then he was super nice about it. He was like man, look, don't worry about it, I got dogs and this and this and that. I said man, I'm a big fan. I said man, what do you do? And he said well, I own a rubber band company. I said hold on.
Speaker 3:I know why I'm in this neighborhood. You get what I'm saying, I know why I'm here.
Speaker 2:I've tackled right. I know why I'm here.
Speaker 1:And my neighbor was, you know, had a rubber band company. It wasn't even the biggest rubber band company in the country, they're like 15th, 15th rubber band company in the country. And that's where it really started to spark my to your point of what you said. Like I thought same way. I think the biggest flex really for all of us is making the money and not having to go and do what we did because it is roughing your body and we love it. We love the sport, we always want to have the opportunity to play, but for me, man, that was it when I saw that this house was a little up the hill, like he had the cul-de-sac.
Speaker 1:He had the biggest house in the neighborhood and he on the road of being successful out here. No, for real. I want to ask you a question, kobe. So like, how do you go about? Like, because for you you're more. At one point you were doing, you know leads and you were doing really well, but you kind of opened my eyes.
Speaker 6:You were like listen, there's a whole market, denzel, you know a lot of people. Why do you just keep doing just that? And for me, I got to hit me once or twice and then I'll do it. Let me see you do it, though first you did it. So what's your approach when you're hitting up old teammates, family, friends? How is that for you? Is that uncomfortable? Do they hear you out? How is that for you?
Speaker 4:I mean just to start off, it was kind of uncomfortable for me.
Speaker 1:We talked about it.
Speaker 4:Because I was coming to them, just coming out of that locker room with them, I'm jumping in a space that I've never talked to them about, never done myself. And you know, like a lot of us in the league, we all work with the same pool of agencies, financial advisors, the whole nine. So it's like why would you listen to an old team if they can't tell you what to do with your money?
Speaker 5:or what you can do with your future and your family and you've got a team of people doing that for you.
Speaker 4:But then at the end of the day, I was like I did my research, I started studying. I'm like I'm in a new space. This is where I'm supposed to be. Take full advances of it. So in place, because you know, and most of us know, the NFL life insurance is only $50,000. Max is about $80,000. The average person is walking around with life insurance than a professional football player. That's great.
Speaker 1:Or athlete.
Speaker 4:We should say so for me to be able to grasp that to them and say, look, you have this football money. But what if I put you in a policy that gains you money that you can access and you can go venture out and do other investments in your life outside of football? You can go start a real estate company, you can go start a business whatever interests you and you don't have to go through a bank, you don't have to get a loan, you don't have to do any of that stuff. You can basically do it on your own and basically get your money back in your pocket, get it barred from your policy. Exactly so you explain to them like that and you know, sometimes it's kind of like let me talk to my advisor, let me talk to this and that, and I don't budge from it, you know, because we all I said we all been that space. So you have to be smart with your money and they like I understand you want to.
Speaker 4:I'm coming to you as an old teammate or somebody you know. We have a good relationship and I'm talking about what to do with your money right, so I understand.
Speaker 4:I respect it, but how I want you to see is from have a mindset of what can I do for my family outside of somebody else. Right, let me make a decision for me and my family that I can further us along. Yeah, so that's why my mindset is with it and how I kind of help people out with it. Yeah, and you know, like now I'm more comfortable. I'm like yo, this is what it is. I keep it real simple. I'm like yo, this is what it is. You. Yeah, let's make it make sense, right, right, and if you still feel like you need to talk to your financial advisor, let's all get on the call, right, right, I have no problem explaining to them because this is the space I'm in. Right, a lot of financial advisors don't have insurance licenses.
Speaker 4:They cannot sell this stuff Right, so they don't really know about it. They can't sit there and say this is right or wrong right but I know what I'm selling and when.
Speaker 6:When they say what I'm going to put in place for your family, right, and you're going to thank me in the end yeah, because the reality is too like you need this, like I don't gotta sit there and like sell it to you, like if you know way I break it down, iul, right, there's like three things. Death benefit yeah, you know I'm saying god forbid you pass away my kids, kids. Kids are taken care of. Exactly that's important to me, exactly. Point to y'all, pretty sure.
Speaker 6:Second thing I can become my own bank. Right, so to your point, right, you can borrow from your policy, buy real estate. Do that, do that, okay, so I can borrow from myself out of the bank I'm in. Third thing is like it protects you. Now, a lot of times when you hear about life insurance, it only pays out if you pass away, but it turns out to you while you're alive too. Like if you have like a disability, illness you're not able to work, these plans pay out to you. So I feel like people just kind of get a bad rep when they hear the insurance word because they never heard about a properly structured plan Right and that's why I say like, even like most insurance agents, they don't know how to properly structure an IUL.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 4:So it's complex but it's not. At the same time, If you know what you're doing, you have actual relationship and you can thoroughly walk the client through what they're getting and show them what they're going to get. It makes it a lot easier than just saying, hey, you're going to get this Right and this is what it's going to do right now is like on the screen.
Speaker 6:I'm going to show you kind of like how we do our IULs and how we structure it. And this would be good, you know, for us.
Speaker 4:Like you know, your friends, family, they see this, they now know how a real IUL indexed universal life plan should look like. Let's see here. So here's the company National Life Group we'll just put the client.
Speaker 6:You don't go over the basic, Okay cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and LG's been good. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, when they get around it's like 1864, 1868, something like that.
Speaker 1:That's one of the things I try to tell people too. It's like when you start seeing the carriers that's been around for 100 plus years the three when you start seeing the carriers that's been around for 100 plus years the three, mass, mutual, all these guys that's been around for 100 plus years it really in a sense give everybody. You know they feel comfortable because they all got A plus ratings and they've been around for so long.
Speaker 6:I'll break this one down, alright, cool. So let me break this one down for you and then Kobe different examples and there's many different ways to do a IUL, so the way I do it is this is probably the most like normal approach. I use, probably the most all-around approach right, it's going to cover you for a death benefit, but also have that banking aspect. Right, we can borrow from it. So this is, you know, let's say, sarah, right, so Sarah is paying a1,000 a month. All right, what she's going to get is a death benefit of about $1 million, right, and then what you have here.
Speaker 6:So usually for people, what I do is I give them the option. It's like, hey, you can pay on it for five years, 10 years, 15 years, depending on your budget. I'll, like you know, play around with that, but just for the example, I did the 15-year buildup, right. So basically what that means is, for the next 15 years, right, sarah will pay $1,000 per month. Right, that's in her budget. Right, year 15, the policy is paid for. What that means is that she no longer, ever again, has to pay towards a policy and the policy will still protect her, and the policy will still protect her and the money will still grow on it right. So, as you see, year 15, right, she has over $200,000, right Now, whenever she wants to, she can borrow from that right.
Speaker 6:You know, getting to real estate, whatever the case may be, that's all tax-free right. At the same time, there's over a million dollars, million dollars right, protecting her if she's out of work tomorrow for disability or illness or she passes away. Her kids are getting that right now. As you see, it continues to grow right with the front of value. Right, this is what the value can take out. Right, continues to grow, grow, grow, grow. Let's just stop at, let's say, I don't know, is that age?
Speaker 4:I'm about age 65.
Speaker 6:65. Retirement age Retirement age right, she has over $1 million in her savings and her policy to take out and do whatever she wants to do with it, right? And then at the same time, now at 65, her death benefit is increasing. Now, right, but now, right, I mean hopefully great longevity in her life, right in her family. Right, she continues to grow. It continues to grow and grow and grow. Hey, age 80, looking at three million dollars in the death benefit and over three million dollars in the cash value, this is just your own private insurance. This is like now, your own bank. This is your money. The irs nobody can touch. That, that's your money. This is probably the most like my go-to approach. I'll say it's probably the most balanced approach. But then kobe opened my eyes about the different ways to do it as well. So I'm gonna hand over to kobe. He'll give you kind of a different angle of different approaches to how to build an iul yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4:I know Denzel said this is his approach and it's no right way, no wrong way. You just always want to make sure that the client has what they need. So we'll pretty much use the same person Sarah, age 26, female. We'll keep it at a minimum death benefit, max cash value Because she's so young. A lot of times what I do with some clients who are young, I give them an increase in death benefit because you want that to grow over time a little bit more. It depends on what the client wants. So let's just say this is a conversation. He says I want to get more money in my death benefit over time. So of course we're going to have an increasing death benefit. We're going to still keep our premium at the $1,000 a month, but Sarah says she wants to pay on it until it matures. The policy matures. We're going to keep it going all the way up until it matures and with that also, if she says she wants to start receiving a benefit distribution in her policy at retirement age, we'll go into and we'll set it as a lifetime income.
Speaker 4:And when does a policy mature? Usually what year? It just depends. A lot of times most policies mature Like NLG shows the policy maturity all the way up until age 120. Okay, policy mature usually what year? Um, it just depends a lot of time. Most policies mature like nlg shows the policy maturity all the way up until age 120.
Speaker 1:Okay, now you know, a lot of times nobody lives to 120 yeah but that just pretty much lets you know that nowadays you never know, you never know, but you know we just kind of keep it realistic in the client.
Speaker 4:Yeah, when I show them these type of illustrations, right, and I asked them like this, they'll say what's the longevity in your family? If you tell me the longest person lives about 98, I said, look, you're gonna. You see this amount of money at age 95, 96, 98 and I'll probably advise you at some point. You want to pull out and probably invest in something else along the line in your policy.
Speaker 6:But every client is different. You want to kind of hear them out, listen to them for sure. Yeah, the client. If you want to build some sort of rapport with client.
Speaker 4:You don't want to just try to give everybody the same type of script, same type of illustration, because everybody's retirement plans, everybody's life goals are much different. You may be talking to Sarah and she may not have a family down the road, it might just be her and she may have other avenues. And then I may talk to John and John may have three kids, so he may want his policy structure differently and all his disbursements to go in three different ways. So you just have to talk to them, understand what's best for the client and not just what you know best. Okay For sure.
Speaker 4:So, like I said, we have her sitting here at a lifetime income and so we'll just go here at a quick view. Okay, okay. So we see here that, also, like, we don't have Sarah in a lapse year, so her policy will never lapse, and her policy doesn't have a MEC. So a MEC is a modified endowment contract. So as long as she's not overfunding her policy within the guidelines from the IRS, she's always in good standing. Okay, and along the lines. So we see here that she is put in until age 59. Okay, and at age 60, you see that she's putting in nothing else, right, so we'll scroll down a little bit Right there. So from age 60 and on so forth in her life, she'll be getting $85,000 yearly.
Speaker 4:Right and from that she still has the 1.3 that's accumulating her value over time that she can withdraw from that she can still. Well, she's getting this in a monthly income and an annual salary. So from this salary is going to be broken down out of that accumulated value and that surrender value. But, as you can still see, because within the policy you're still basically still have some growth in it. So the policy that came much about is still gonna grow, yeah, but we, as we can see over here to the right, the surrender value is gonna drop each year because that money is also being taken out to go into her annual salary, right, and then, as we can see as far, right as well, then her death benefit is dropping. Okay, that's why I say you have to go talk to the client and let them understand like, look, you have this death benefit, but we have you at a lifetime income, so we're basically replacing your income and you're not paying on this policy anymore and so forth. Your death benefit is going to decrease with that money to come into your pocket to do whatever you want to do with it. So this is just one way that I can show a client you know, look, this is the best way you want to do it based off your goals and your retirement age. And if we go back and we never put Sarah at a lifetime income benefit, it'll just be kind of the same way that Denzel showed it.
Speaker 4:And she still has no mech year and she still has no laps year. Now from that it's still the same. She's paying out until age 59. And then from there she just still has to have $1.4 million to access from at age 60 and so forth. But the death benefit over here is starting to increase every year. Still it's increasing. Nothing's coming out. So the surrender value and accumulated values are still going to increase over time and she can still have more access to the funds and do whatever she wants to do and also, upon her passing away whatever that she did take out from the policy at the time, then of course they will just subtract that from the death benefit. So I mean this is pretty much a standard issue.
Speaker 4:IUL that you can kind of keep it simple for a client. You know it's kind of it goes into more about what the client really wants. You can always set them to base off their goals, whether it's a level benefit or the increasing death benefit. And a lot of times I'll talk to clients. You know they tell me that they want to get an index policy in this universal policy and they want the cash value. Always set them at a minimum death benefit, max cash value, because with that then that gives them the cash growth into it to maybe access the funds. It's not going to give them a low death benefit but it's going to give them a good amount of benefit that they still have enough cash value into it. So why do you think?
Speaker 6:like it's a rep insurance. Why do you think that is? Why do you think people say, oh, I don't know, it's because of the wrong plan? What is it?
Speaker 4:Well, I think it's many things. I think the first one is they're not properly informed. Indexed universal life policies they're new in the insurance world but they're not brand new. They came around in the late 80s, early 90s, and so when indexed universal life policy came around, like the 80s, mid late 80s, early 90s, okay and so in this universal life policy came around, a lot of people knew about term and I knew about whole life. So insurance I said it's only been around 100, almost 200 years now.
Speaker 4:Yeah, but in this universal life policies around from years onward, so look at it in that aspect and you like, okay, cool, I don't know about it.
Speaker 6:Yeah.
Speaker 4:My parents don't really know about it. So what really is this?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And so when you present something new to people, they have to kind of, like you said, hear about it, learn more about it. Right, and going from that, I think the other thing is some and I lost my money, but you have to know somebody who's going to structure it the right way.
Speaker 6:And John a question for you, because you answered this pretty well. What do you do when someone says to you oh, I have a 401k or I have work coverage. What's your response to that?
Speaker 7:Yeah, I mean my main response is it kind of just depends on their financial situation, right? So, like, depending on what's in their 401K and how they have it structured, if they're still contributing to it, and if it's transferable. I mean, I'll ask which I think I forget who exactly gave me the information, but I learned it, like over a week ago at the convention.
Speaker 7:It was just like has anyone taken the time to show you how your 401K is structured Like how is it going to work for when you do retire? How your 401k is structured Like how is it going to work for when you do retire? You know what are the vehicles that you're investing into and what's the returns that you're getting like year after year. So just seeing if there's like a lack of you know, if there's a missing bridge there between like having the 401k and actually knowing how to use it. I think it's the same thing why people don't, you know, might have like like a bad taste in their mouth from insurance. It's like you know insurance sounds like a necessary thing, just like a 401k, but if you don't know how to utilize it to your advantage or your specific needs, then you know it's almost useless to you, I agree, and it's locked away for a little bit.
Speaker 6:You know what I mean With IUL. You can tap and tap whenever you want to. People forget want to, you would forget to. A 401k is in the market. Yeah, there was a bad year.
Speaker 6:I bought to your money yeah, you didn't hit I you well. Only mirrors the markers, so you're never gonna have to deal with that. You know losing your money, right, it only mirrors the markets upside. So to your point, like you know, it's just more so about like doing your homework, cuz no one actually like even to your point to with the financial advisors, right. Like no one's like even to your point too with the financial advisors right, Like no one's actually looking into it for themselves. I get you're playing, you're busy, but it's like when I started to really tap in and like listen to some podcasts, I'm like yo, like these advisors really don't do nothing, Like I could have did this myself, and then I'm in the wrong plan, Like I didn't have an IUL.
Speaker 4:So I agree with have a IUL. So I give both of y'all yeah, definitely. And just to you know, sam, go back to the 401ks. A lot of people forget that. You have the earlier withdrawal fee, which is 10%. Right, but even when you have that access age to get it, you still have a 30 33 percent tax on it. So let's say you have 500,000 in the 401k, you're only going to get about 275 350 of that 500k. So like they're only going to get about $275,000, $350,000 of that $500,000. All right, so they're still going to get their tax. Whether you have $500,000 IUL policy, you're going to get that full $500,000.
Speaker 4:So that's a good thing to remember. You have tax-free money and you don't necessarily always have to pay it back. You don't have to just say, oh, that's the most basic question I get Do I have to pay it back? No, it would be smart to put money back into it, but at the end of the day, they're just going to subtract whatever you didn't pay back into the death benefit.
Speaker 6:Anyone can answer this. Why do you think people don't know about this? What's y'all opinion on that? Why no one knows about an IUL For me? I'm in a space now.
Speaker 3:I'm like, yeah, it's're not taught about like financial literacy, right. Like I mean, I know my parents are just kind of learning about it now with me, so it's like you know you don't have anybody to teach you it. And then, like you said, when you're learning something new, it takes more than just for you to hear it from somebody, like a random person. Like when it's somebody closer to you or connected to you, then you're more inclined to listen to them and actually hear them out. So I mean I guess I think that I know that plays a big role in it.
Speaker 2:I agree with Sam too. We're not taught these things at all and we seek for different things, entertainment, things that don't really matter, you know. So, like the information is there, it's not hidden, it's in plain sight. So if you take the time to actually go look and study, it's there. So there's really no, no excuse. So I just think people are just not financially literate and also I don't think people really want to learn until it starts to make sense. And, like you said, kobe, if you structure it and explain to somebody why it starts to make sense, and like you said, kobe, if you structure it and explain to somebody why it's important right, you showed them better than you tell them it makes sense then they're more inclined to you know, dive into it more being yeah, I was about to say being around them, hearing, because I know you're just kind of getting going with everything.
Speaker 1:What, what have you kind of picked up? Even with this information you got now? What have you picked up so far?
Speaker 5:just kind of getting into the business, I mean I picked up a lot, I think, starting off when I talked to Kobe and Denzel they were doing more so mortgage protection. And when I was with a different company before I switched over and we were doing IULs, I told Kobe I was like y'all don't do IULs over there. He was like nah I. I told Kobe I was like y'all don't do IULs over there. He was like nah. I was like you need to look into that. And since then he's kind of took off. I mean I still know a lot but obviously I'm open to everything that's going on and listening on the outside view of other people looking in on it.
Speaker 5:I just don't think people really care yeah, right and as I've been learning about a lot of people yeah, it's necessary to have life insurance, but not everybody really needs it. You don't necessarily need it. More people look at health insurance. I need health insurance for sure. I don't want to pay for the doctor. People don't really care about death benefit. People don't look at it like that and they look at it like, oh, it's too expensive and in reality it's not all that expensive and it's just like you guys find out too late.
Speaker 5:You guys are putting on the little yeah, 50 years old and you smoke Well, I'm sorry.
Speaker 4:It's going to cost a little extra, right? I think that's why.
Speaker 5:If people just kind of tap in, and I hope that we can open people's minds with this and you know athletes and other people and show some influence.
Speaker 1:I think it's education you know you really got to just put people on game and I think, at least where I come from, you know it wasn't taught because for one nobody had money you know growing up but two, you know you start talking about death and all this other stuff that gets you.
Speaker 2:you don't want to talk about it. I'm young, I'm healthy.
Speaker 1:We're making sure that the next and the next and the next is taken care of, and by you actually and I pitched this too I just lost my grandmother a couple months ago. If we talk to them about this now and put this on the table for them because my family is from the South, from South Carolina this is not nothing that they even was around to even find out the information for. But what you want to do is start setting up, because if you really care for somebody, you're going to make sure this is in place so it don't be a burden for them. That's one thing I just learned too, because nobody wants to talk about death, especially the older people. That's kind of stuck in their ways. I'm not talking about death. I'm not dying any time. No, we're not talking about that. We're making sure that if something happens because something's going to happen to all of us that the next people are taken care of. And while you're alive too though.
Speaker 1:That's a big thing about how you live when you're living if you have a heart attack, something that goes on, you receive a portion of that death benefit, which is big.
Speaker 5:You don't see that in other policies. I got a buddy that works at New York Life and it's certain companies that have living benefits. You probably got to pay a little extra money for it, but this comes in the whole policy. So I think that that's the biggest key and your money is growing.
Speaker 6:I feel like people they probably watching this now. They're probably like oh, they got mad excuses, oh it's too much money or I'm probably not healthy. Nah, like there's a policy out there for you yeah, like budget.
Speaker 6:Not a problem, we can figure it out. You know what I'm saying. Health we can work around it. So, like, I feel like we live in a day and age where everyone just tries to find every excuse not to do something. It's like, no, I'm looking at you, right now, you can get a policy. You know what I'm saying. Like, don't sit there and procrastinate, you can get a policy, trust me. So, and I feel like I'm tired of seeing GoFundMes. It's like how about you get life insurance? You know what I mean.
Speaker 5:Look at Walt Disney. Walt Disney created Disney really from life insurance yeah okay, he took a loan out and that's how he paid his employees and that's how everything got going.
Speaker 4:What do you read in Rockefeller? Yeah, I was reading the book called what would the Rockefellers do? Yeah, and in that book specifically it talks about Walt Disney and the Rockefeller family and just how they were able to keep their family name alive right just through an IUL policy yes, it is.
Speaker 6:If they're doing it, why would I do it?
Speaker 4:Yeah, and you know, just going back to like, when Bubba mentioned like the day that he had a phone call with you and I, it was crazy because he was on a. It was like a three-way Zoom call or whatever a phone call FaceTime.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 4:And we were all sitting and talking sick and he was like no, we writing this right right and then since then I was like we probably talked once every couple weeks and I'll be like how everything going and I'm researching more, more and more how to get into the iul space and, like he said, like being able to just take off for me and I'm ready to see him flourishing because he knows a lot.
Speaker 1:I'm a little bubble, fool y'all like. He know a lot within it.
Speaker 4:So like he's just. You know, I'm saying he's just. He's been in it two and a half, going on three months now, and it's like when he goes off because we kind of all work our warm market, because we all know healthy people right now. But I don't think people grasp that idea right now and I think people are scared to kind of tap into that warm market. But I think it just helps with your networking and it helps with helping other people. I think if you actually like to help people, you will show them this is what you should get especially while you're young, because it's not expensive.
Speaker 4:Like to give someone, a 20-year-old, a million dollars that they have access to when they're in their 40s and 50s, but probably only paying a certain amount of money. Like who wouldn't take that? And like Bubba just said, try to get it when you're 40, 50 years old. You don't know what health problems you might have at that time. So like take advantage of it now, while it's basically free in my eyes and like to piggyback off that too.
Speaker 2:Like I've heard the term I'm worth more when I'm dead Than when I'm alive. It doesn't have to be like that. You know, you talked about. People don't have money Right, like how many times do you go to 7-Eleven and you buy like Snickers or like a candy?
Speaker 2:Once you look at your bank statements. At the end of the day it adds up. A dollar turns into two, three, four, so that's extra money you could just put aside. You know what I mean to put into a policy. You know we spend $100 on nothing, sometimes Nothing.
Speaker 5:Like you know, I look at it like to the homies in the league.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 5:Man, we used to go to the club all the time. Man, let's dive in that, yo, let's dive into that, let's dive into that.
Speaker 1:Let's dive into that. Let's really dive into that. Go ahead, bro, let's dive into it. I've done, seen it, I've done, did it in college.
Speaker 4:Yeah, we've all done it. I was living.
Speaker 5:I mean, I think, my senior year. My mom told me she was like yeah, but I think you made about 100,000 your senior year of college. Yeah, I blew it all when the club Right. Yep Car this, that whatever I was doing, but like looking at it now, people in the league, y'all got all this money and this money is spread out over 36 weeks. You guys are getting these checks weekly or bi-weekly. Y'all could put a little money away into our policy and just let it sit.
Speaker 5:Y'all blowing $50,000 in a year at the club.
Speaker 4:Maybe even more, more than that.
Speaker 6:I've seen some people do some crazy stuff, but you could put $24,000 away, bro, In a lump sum, one annual payment.
Speaker 5:Boom and put that away and make it structured properly for you while you're in the league, right, right, a certain amount of time, yeah, so after you're out the league, you're not feeling that burden of paying that money? Yeah, and now you're sitting on, I don't know. However, much. You're chilling.
Speaker 6:And when you turn 60, you got all this money sitting there right. Let's be honest when you retire to NFL, the little checks, the little time checks what they gonna do for you. What they gonna do for you. Like, you have a Rolls Royce now three mansions, what are you gonna do?
Speaker 5:and at that point you don't got life insurance yeah, right that life insurance. I just got my little life insurance thing from the NFL talking about oh, do you want to renew it? Nope, Nope, yeah. Like you know what I'm saying, I just go back to like what we were saying.
Speaker 4:A lot of guys just don't know about it.
Speaker 1:They don't, so when?
Speaker 4:we're coming to them from this space and saying yo y'all should get into this. What's the first response? Financial advisors. All right, let me think about oh, what is this? I think I think I already got it either you have it, you know, that's my biggest thing, you have any place you know you have. Yeah, well, you don't, you know. I've talked a couple guys that I play with in men across the league yeah, a lot of them are just like oh yeah, I think I got this already.
Speaker 4:My biggest response to them is like okay, go look in your policy packet, if you have it, and tell me exactly what you have you don't know, let's like because I want to be able to help you at the end of the day, like it's getting to a point where I'm like there was a reason why we were able to get into this space. We didn't stay that long in the league. It's a reason we were brought to this space and at the end of the had and there wasn't a great policy and I figured out.
Speaker 1:The financial advisor that I had at that time was somebody they worked with because they were getting the kickback.
Speaker 1:It wasn't necessarily the best thing for me. But again, if you don't know and that's why I think it's important that we're talking so people understand now we're seeing it at a different angle. I'm seeing it because when you're playing, you don't want responsibility, you're paying your bills. I had some money to pay my bills and doing this, doing that, yeah, give me such and such amount of coverage, I'm good, whatever. Not knowing that that's not the best. You talked about it, it's not the best policy or the best situation for you, and you look back and like, man, why did he go with this carrier? That don't even make sense. You find out that they have a relationship with that carrier through all their athletes. The average person got more coverage than you, right, that's what I mean. So I think it's important, man, as I said before, it's more of an education thing getting out there, and I think that we have a bigger influence than a lot of these guys because we've actually been there. We have no reason to tell somebody we're already good and we've also been where they are and we're at where they're going to be at some point, so it's easier for us to talk about it. Good head start. So just real quick, man.
Speaker 1:Last thing for everybody man, if you were talking to somebody about just getting into this business, what, what would what would you say to him being out? And I'll kind of start off for me, I just the one of the biggest reasons why I got into this business was it was an effort base. You talked, we talked about all the time it. You don't have to be the smartest person, you don't have to have a degree from such-and-such place and all this other qualifications. I've seen people have success, extreme success, in this business, just because they dialed, they were buying leave, they were going over the script, they were just consistent, dialing every day and before you knew it, they were extremely successful in this business.
Speaker 1:And there's no cap right. And I'll just say this my last year at Buffalo, like you know, I'm playing in New York. You know it wasn't New York to use upstate New York cold, but I was still paying them New York taxes that after everything was cut. You know you're making. Like you know, my last year was in a rookie, rookie deal, whatever. I'm now that deal. So it's like seven, eight hundred thousand or whatever after taxes. So I'm like no matter what I did that you know, unless I had incentives for sack bonuses or playing time or whatever it was. Whatever they paid me was gonna be it right. And so now it's like, well, there's no cap, there's no ceiling on what any of us can do, and that is what interests me getting into this business yeah, no 100.
Speaker 6:I would say, whether you're, you know, used to play football, you still do um, whatever field you're in, not even just athletics, just any field, medical field, financial services, like, whatever the case may be. Like I think this industry is just recession proof. I know guys were making the most money ever during COVID. A lot of jobs are shutting down, you know, and I just feel like having this kind of job and anyone kind of getting into it, like again, you don't need any sales experience, you don't got to be the smartest person in the world. Just like myself and all you guys here, you learn on the fly, right? So like, if I can do it, he can do it, you can do it. You know what I'm saying, everybody can do it. So I would say, just like, even if you know you're a little nervous or you got a part-time gig, right, just just try it. You know what I'm saying, just try it, you'll see.
Speaker 6:Once you get that first deposit and it hits in 24 hours, I'm like, nah, let me, let me, let me lock in, right, right, yes, I would just get into it. And this is something that even just to have to my friend the other day I was like he's a CPA and I was like, why don't you just have this on the side, like you have so many clients Right, like you can write them an IEO or even annuity on the side. So I would say for anybody, I don't care what you do for work, have your insurance license right. You can even help your family out right. You can have a nine to five work at McDonald's and have your insurance license and help your family out by getting them a policy in place, because you know that the reason why they should have insurance.
Speaker 4:Yeah, reality. I think anybody should get in this and the advice I would give you just come in this with a clear conscience of what you want to gain and how you want to grow. Um, I think this business is going to test you in every aspect of life. Um, just persevering, just getting through all the phone calls, getting through all the rejections and just learning how to just network. I think that's the biggest thing I take now is networking and stepping outside of my own comfort zone, whether that's in person, whether that's over a phone, and you know, a lot of times it's a new industry for a lot of people. So I don't want to just be athletes that are going to have to come in this. You could be a regular college kid right now. If I was doing this in college, this would have been like playing college ball and doing this this would have been like wow, okay, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 4:So I think that's my biggest thing. I mean, both of you guys have already hit on it and said the biggest thing that you can possibly gain from doing this type of industry work, I think just being open to it.
Speaker 3:I mean whether that's the information or I mean just being open to the idea. I mean it's something different to each one of us for different reasons, but I mean just being open to learning something new that can help you and your family and everybody that's close around you. Because I mean this is a vehicle that I mean so many people have used to get a step up in life, and I mean there's so many people who don't know anything about it, let alone, I mean know someone who has a policy or who has benefited from a policy. So I mean it's just so much upside in this business. I mean so. I mean, like they said, as long as you put your head down and work, I mean do the grinding work by yourself as far as studying and actually getting the information down, but I mean other than that. I feel like the sky's the limit in this business.
Speaker 2:I think it's a good space because you know you could learn more financially wise. You know you can help out your family Again you could be successful in that business, even if you have your own thing going on. I mean for me, like I have a sister, you know I have family, Like I have younger generations coming up, you know like we weren't born with wealth.
Speaker 2:You know, we had one orange. We had to make it last for like four days. You know I'm saying so like to just be able to like learn more about it, get uncomfortable and kind of like teach that to the youth coming up, you know. So I mean that's the biggest, biggest thing for me. And again, like you could help your friends out, you could help your family out, you know, and like use that vehicle to get you into a different financial bracket.
Speaker 3:I feel like everybody, kind of everybody at some point, whether I mean whether you have money or not like everybody's chasing financial freedom, and I feel like this job allows you to obtain that and it's not just a dream, like it's something that you can actually reach up and grab Like it's actually.
Speaker 5:Now, yeah, piggyback on that. I think coming into this space space specifically my reason was to really help people. Um, being knowledgeable in this space, uh, I think can take you a long way and I think it take a lot of people like not even yourself, but the clients you're on the phone with. I think that goes a long way. And just building other people up, um, and everything gonna come to come back. The reward's going to come back. You know that money's going to come back to you. You're going to be like all right, like I just did somebody good and now you know I'm getting the returns for it, I'm getting the benefits for it. So I think that's the biggest thing that I would say.
Speaker 7:Yeah, I mean the reason why I've been in sales for this long, the reason why I transitioned, I feel like it all aligns with one thing, and it's the fact that I mean, I think, like five or six years ago, this guy Naval I don't know if you guys have ever heard of him Like a pretty well-known entrepreneur, angel investor, very, very successful guy, really wise guy, talked about on this one podcast that has just stuck with me about being a successful entrepreneur, which is what I want to. You know, what I'm pursuing is essentially owning my own business at some point, um, like a real, real business, whatever that may be. But he talked about the two parts of it is specializing in something. So having something that you're good at you know what I mean, whether it be like software engineering or just design or training or just something that you can, something that a product. You know what I mean. And then the other half of it is sales, and so at that time the reason why it stuck with me is like I don't know what I want to do, but I guess I'll learn the other half, and so I've just stuck with sales and in my journey and door to door, doing different products, even trying to start my own company a few times, in my journey in door-to-door doing different products, even trying to start my own company a few times.
Speaker 7:I think that this industry is probably the best for so many reasons. Just so many boxes are checked. You are helping people. You are giving people a product that they don't necessarily need but it will help them be more financially secure for themselves, their kids and so on and so forth. You're helping people get more financially literate. You're even getting yourself more financially literate with all these different products that you have out there. And then you have consistent checks. It's a higher ticket sale, you got residual income, you have overrides. There are so many different benefits to this job and it's just like, if I'm going to pursue sales, I can't see a different industry that I would want to, you know, be pursuing at this time.
Speaker 4:Johnny man.
Speaker 1:Well, I appreciate all y'all, man, and just you know, for me it's just inspiring in general, just when I see the hunger and everybody's just the the, the group texts just lighten up, you know, because everybody's just fired up, um, and, and really it's just the group text just lighten up, you know, because everybody's just fired up and really it's just we're making a new lane that I don't think any of us in this room, somebody made for us. You get what I mean and that is most important, man. So I appreciate y'all coming out and everybody New York and Tennessee, you know.
Speaker 1:Florida, texas. So yeah, we gotta do.