Own Your Claim Pt 2 - Own Your Service

Continuing into Part 2 of Own Your Claim, Daniel and Bob talk about service, from Military to our businesses - and what our tasks and daily choices mean for our lives.

Transcript

When we're in a position where and I think this is where you and I connect a lot, when you're in a position to positively impact people, you go out of your way to do that because that pays you back tenfold.

Kind of, one thing that I want to do here, is I want to kind of talk about, like how you got into this business.

You know, you're a veteran. Thank you for your service. Like, how was how was that? How was your service time kind of molded you into who you are today, and, you know, how did you get into, you know, the PA side? I mean, I think you spoke briefly on earlier, working, you know, you were already in contracting and everything.

So I, I got medical out in 2012. And that's a whole story for another day. So I was in the Army from 2001 to 2012. So I was in the middle of basic training on September 11th in 2001. So everything changed when I joined, like nothing was going on. Right? I was like, I'm going to go get some college money and we get a guaranteed paycheck at 18, like, life's going to be good.

And then three weeks into basic training, September 11th happened and everything crap after that, where were you at basic training, Fort Knox. Okay. And then we got fast track through my individual training at Fort Lee. And then I went to Fort Campbell. I was in 101st for ten years, and I did all four deployments with them. And I got moved out to Fort Carson, Colorado and got medical out from there, with some back issues for about two years.

I just kind of floated around and couldn't really figure out what was the path for me. I tried a little bit of everything. I worked for ADT, installing security systems. I drove truck for Fedex for a little while. I drove car parts around in Texas and then landed at a roofing company in 2011. 2014? Yeah. And I went out to try and be a door to door roof salesman and figure out very quickly that's not my, my jam.

I'm very good at the operations and logistics of things. And so I ended up moving into the operations manager of that company, and they went from, being like a negative million dollars in the hole when we started there to inc magazines like fastest growing construction companies in the country. And then the owners got in trouble, and I think one of them went to jail for money laundering or something.

And, Hurricane Harvey hit and I was started working for a disaster mitigation company. Same situation where I fell more into the operations side. But I was because of that. I was always argue with insurance companies and then you could do it. Like then there wasn't that line didn't exist. If you could call and be like, no, their policy says this and you guys need to pay for this and then about 20 late 2018, early 2019, they started passing all these laws that said, there's a line that contractors and go up to you because technically, insurance policies are a legal, binding contractual document.

So who can interpret legal documents? Well, they either need to be a policy expert or they need to be a lawyer. So that's how the UPA stuff came into play. And I was working a $37 million church in Greenville, Texas, and they were pushing back and pushing back and pushing back and that church ended up, I think it ended up settling at like 24 million, which is still a massive number.

Right? But when you take off the difference, it makes a huge impact on the contractor. And so once leaving there we went. I did one more hurricane after that and I was like, screw this, I'm tired of getting shafted by the carriers. I'm going to go open a PR firm, get my PA license, because every PA that I had run across was garbage.

And so I was like, I'm going to go do this and do it better. And the the thing that worked well for me was that I had already had this experience in commercial claims, but I had already been in the contractor space. So we had done a little bit of everything. I had been in roofing, I had been in large commercial roofing, I had been in water mitigation and fire mitigation and I had done all these things.

So being a PA, I already knew the angle for a lot of these arguments. And then that massive Dallas freeze happened and we just skyrocketed from there because we just we were one of the few CPAs that actually understood how to do water claims. And so we just kind of kept motoring along there then. And we've been doing that ever since.

And I found that I'm a lot better at organizing the chaos and actually dealing with a lot of the claims. So we I very rarely run a claim. We have really good PPAs to do that for us. And so now I do the fractional consulting stuff, and I step in and have these conversations on the PA behalf because I know that space, I just don't I feel like there's better people to handle a claim than me.

Right? Does that make sense? Oh, yeah. Like I can own a roofing company. I'm not nailing shingles on your roof. Right? Kind of thing. That's what I try. I tell people you don't want they put in shingles. Yeah. So yeah. That's it. Yeah. There's certain claims that I'm probably the better suited to do, but like, you know, Betty Sue's house down the street.

I'm not the one. Not the one for that. We've got guys who are really, really good at that and we'll handle it really quickly. I just, I, I have too much empathy. I think a lot of times I want to I get too involved with these people. And that's why commercial claims always worked well for me, because I'm dealing with some guy in California who might show up to his property once every five years, right?

Yeah. I don't have to deal with them. There's no emotion behind it. You're eliminating a lot of that, back and forth for no reason. So. So, did, how so were you in some combat? I mean, you were in some combat in, while you served. It was you. So I did, Iraq in oh three, Iraq in oh five, Afghanistan in oh eight, and Iraq in 2009, and then got out in 12.

Okay. I actually have I was a quartermaster by MOS, so I was a fueler and I was in an Apache helicopter battalion for seven years, and our sister unit was the 160th guys from Black Hawk Down. And so we were always doing, missions that were in support of those guys, which meant we were in places that as a fueler I didn't expect to be.

Right. So when I joined, they the recruiter was like, you want to drive this truck over trees in a swamp? And you are, do you know, cool kid stuff? And I was like, hell yeah, I do. I never did any of that. But I got to drive a fuel tanker through Baghdad. And, you know, they love to shoot at those things.

And, I've done helicopter missions, and we've been attached to lurch teams, and, it was it was a cool gig, just kind of based on the unit that we were in. I was fortunate enough to be surrounded by really cool people, and got to experience stuff that most people with my MOS and specialty would have not.

But also I did went through stuff that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. So it's a mixed bag, but it also makes you who you are. And and you know, I was having this conversation with a buddy of mine the other day because I get to be the one a lot of times that the guys that I served with call when when they're down, when they're having struggles, when somebody dies, whatever it is, I'm usually one of the guys that gets the call.

And, one of my buddies was kind of down beating himself up the other day. I told him, I said, you don't get to enjoy the good things in life without facing the devil every once in a while, right? Like you, you don't get to go through life without having to deal with shit and expect it to still be just great and rainbows all the time, I said, so you take the lows because they make the highs feel that much better.

And you just you, you find happiness in those little things. But we also end up being really, really stoic in that sense. Which kind of goes in line with our conversation this morning. We were on the phone. It's like when my youngest goes, well, dad, you didn’t get any Christmas presents. I'm like, okay, I'm cool with that because I got to see all this.

I was fortunate enough to be here and I have friends that aren’t. Right. Yeah. So you just kind of take it all in stride How old are your kids? My oldest is 17 and my youngest is 12. He'll be 13 in February. So did you... 17... I'm trying to do some quick math. My oldest was alive for two of my deployments.

Okay. My youngest was born, two years or a year and a half after my last deployment. Okay. So my oldest was, he was six months old when I went to Afghanistan, and he was a year and a half, year and nine months or so when I went to Iraq the second time or the fourth time, my fourth deployment.

Third trip to Iraq. Yeah. So fortunately he don't he doesn't remember much, but he's gotten to he got to a point. I'd say probably 3 or 4 years ago where he started asking questions. Yeah. And it was the typical questions. Right. It's like, have you killed anybody? Did you see anybody die? Was it hot over there? It the combination of questions is so very weird.

Right. It's like, how is the weather? Were there dead bodies? Did things blow up? Like it's this weird combination of things and, but he started asking. He's got to the point where he started asking some of those questions, and I said, buddy, you're just not. You're not old enough yet. And his mom and I are divorced, and we don't we're I guess we're probably civil.

It's probably the best way to put it now. But I guess he had gotten plenty of stories from her about what that looked like from her perspective. And so obviously he's going to have questions. I told them, I said, when you get when you're 18, we'll have we'll have some some deeper conversations. I said, because one of the things that you'll figure out is that guys who went through a lot of shit are not going to talk to you about it, I don't care are there's stuff that I, my wife doesn't know to this day and for I think for a period of time that stressed her out.

She's like, I'm your wife, you should trust me with everything. And I'm like, I don't want to relive some of this shit. Same thing with your kids. It's like you, you sheltered them because I went through this phase where it's like, I don't want whatever image my kids have of me to be changed, good or bad, by what I might tell them coming out of those conversations.

Right. Because I've seen it happen with friends growing up, I had guys that I grew up with who I come back for more and they're like, you just you're you're different. You're an asshole all the time. Like, if you went through some of the stuff that I went through, you'd have a different perspective on things as well.

But then also you'd get those guys who were like, you just think you're this badass and you're so tough and whatever. It's like, no, I just went through stuff that hopefully you never have to go through and it changes you as a person. And so then you make a choice of, am I going to let this affect me adversely, or am I going to use it to to be uplifting and advocate for people?

And that was a tough transition for me to have. That didn't happen to for me until, December. No. October of 22. One of the guys that I served with committed suicide. And I got the call, just like I always do. And the that one, it got me because he went out, drove out from his house, sat on a bridge for hours like they pulled his cell phone records and his GPS location had him sent out there for hours and then just jumped.

And in those hours he called nobody. And that was like, why not? Why didn't you call? I would have answered, I don't care what time it is like. Call me. And I beat myself up about that one for quite some time in my life was like, you either need to turn it off or turn it all the way out.

And like you either need to start advocating and and being open about the stuff that you've been through and the struggles you've had, or you need to just stop talking about it. And so I chose to do what I'm doing now was like, if I get an opportunity to talk about, I talk about it, but there still is things that I don't I don't put out publicly.

There's some things that I don't openly talk about because it's nobody's business. And again, I don't I don't want certain things that may come out of my mouth to change who I, who how people see me. But also every veteran goes through this. They either have this overinflated version of what they went through or this underinflated, and they have this idea of like, if we're all sitting in a room, I'm gonna look at you and be like, Bob, you went through a lot more shit than I have.

And you be like, no, I haven't. I? There's that version or the hey, let me tell you about all the stuff that I did, and most of us live in the middle of that, and I just don't feel like getting into that pissing match with a lot of people so. Well. And one thing that I've learned, and I'll say this, I've never done any kind of, you know, combat any kind of military service.

So but one thing that I've learned over the last couple of years is like, we had to really be intentional about what story we tell ourselves. You know, because we were all traumatized, we all struggle from something that happened in our childhood. Something happened I mean everyone. Yep. And you know, like you said, you have the overshare that it's like poor me, me me me me.

And then you have the people that won't talk about it at all. And the people get tired of my opinion, the overshare. But then, like the person that will talk about it like frustration there, there's there's value there because like people, people need to hear that. Like people. People need to hear your story, you know? Yeah. I went through that.

And I don't know if you and you probably have it in, but I did Eric's show, okay. And that was a lot of what I think drew him into having me on the show, is that a lot of the guys on his show were recovering alcoholics or addicts or whatever, and mine was about trauma. And I said, try being addicted to adrenaline.

Right. You don't come down from that quick and easy. But I told them, I said the problem for a lot of people is that my generation of service members and the generation right before me is probably the worst. And I'll catch some flak for that from somebody, I'm sure. But the guys who serve between Desert Storm and the FIF campaigns, nothing happened unless they were in Grenada or Somalia.

But those are really isolated things. Nothing happens. So they didn't they didn't get the attention from the public that our generation got. I don't want that attention quite frankly. But we still get it. And I remember coming back and the reason I, I didn't mean to cut you off, but the reason I did is to be important to what you were saying is when I came back, when I got medical out after four deployments, I was struggling with that sense of self-worth.

I was struggling with loss, the survivor's guilt, and some of these other things. And my dad was a corpsman in Vietnam, and to this day does not talk to me about shit. And when I came home from my fourth one, I was like, I need somebody that I can talk to that has been through something comparable. I didn't have anybody because I had done for years, and at that point, really nobody else around me had now.

And I have guys that I know that had done five and six years in, but just because they were in longer. And so I went to my dad, and my dad would not talk to me about it. And it was a point of contention for me. I remember being so mad at him. And finally my mom came to me and she's like, he remembers what it felt like when he was going through that, and he didn't want you boys to go through that.

And then I'm the youngest. She goes, and then you did it. And not only did you do it, you went for him into it. And then my older brother joined five years after I did. And he's still in the Air Force and she's like, and you guys just went completely into it. And he doesn't know how to rationalize that.

That's the part that people miss, right? I can sit here and tell you the stories about my trauma, but how it affects me only affects me. The trauma that you may have dealt with when you were a kid or an adult or, you know, I, my wife and I have conversations about this quite often because she's been through some stuff that I, I kind of sit back and I'm like, Jesus, how do you handle that?

But she does the same to me, right? So how we validate or invalidate each other stuff is part of the reason that a lot of people don't talk, right? Because everybody's going to have an opinion about how there is. But to your point, the stories need to be told to you. Right? Like there's a there's a soldier that, died in my arms in 2010, and I can't for the life of me bring myself to go to her headstone because I'm scared to death that I'll run into her family.

And I don't want to tell that story, because whatever version they got is probably not the version that I have. Right? And I don't want it. I don't want to have to live that scenario again. But at some point I'm probably going to because it's what needs to happen. Right? Right. But how do you how do you tell somebody the version that they thought of this scenario for the last ten, 15 years is potentially wrong?

Yeah. So you don't want to invalidate the way that maybe they've already gotten their closure and you don't want to open it back up. So it's a mixed bag you know. Yeah. Grief is just yeah. It's A mixed bag as well because there's no there's no right way to handle it. There's plenty of wrong ways to handle it, but there's no right way to handle it.

That's why. So many people deal with addiction and things like that. And luckily, I've been able to skip over that. And, you know, knock on wood, I've never had the the suicidal things that a lot of guys that I've served with have. And but if you don't think the, the depression and the anxiety and the struggle and all that would just like with anybody else, exist, you're crazy, right?

You know, it's just like, how much do you let that weigh you down? And some days it brings you to a halt and then some days you can just carry it on and you just get to pick and choose every morning. That's the cool part, right? But.

All right. Well he's brought the mood down. Then we it's like no idea how I'm going to follow that thing. But it characterizes a lot of people in the construction industry, right. Because most people don't end up here because things were going great for them. Most people didn't end up in the construction industry because they grew up going.

When Career Day was happening in elementary school, they were like, I want to be a roofer. It just didn't happen. Most, most of us landed here because something went wrong. Something some string of things was unfortunate and we had to dig ourselves out of a hole or out of addiction or debt or whatever it was. And so every one of us is carrying some form of shit with us, and we just have to we have to be accepting of that for other people.

But then when we're in a position where and I think this is where you and I connect a lot, when you're in a position to positively impact people, you go out of your way to do that because that pays you back tenfold. It doesn't undo any wrongdoings you've ever done. It doesn't undo the shit that's happened to you.

But if it can reduce the weight that somebody else is carrying, then you go out of your way to do it. Well, and, and, you know, we're all here to make money. That's what makes this world go around. But the the highly successful that I've learned, like, there was there was pain to it. There were there was a rhyme or reason, like there are people that say, I'm going to start a roofing company because I know you have to make really good money.

However, I've watched some of them and they're still not in the roofing space, you know? Right. They get burnt out. They don't understand what they're actually getting into. You know? So, you know, there has to be that shift where it's like, I want to help, you know, people out. I think every successful business owner I've met in the last ten years or so ends up, and if they're successful, ends up in that space where it's like, I've done enough for myself, right?

I'm going to start pouring out into other people or into my community and my church, whatever it is, whatever that thing is for you, they always find it right? Right. Or they get stuck in neutral and they're just kind of doing their thing. But I think that that's really where you define true success and where your legacy lies.

Right? Is like, how do you when you die? How are people going to remember you? Right? How what is it that you're leaving behind and for some people, that's a really easy answer. And I feel that I want to get to that point. I don't know that I ever will. I don't ever know that I'll be satisfied enough with what the impact that I've had on anybody.

Right. But maybe I will. Well, and I mean, I honestly, I think that's why we connect so well because there is just that level of like, you know, I, I heard Ed Mylett, a few years ago at Riften and, read most of his books and listen to his podcast, quite a bit. And he says that, the day he meets his maker, when he meets, you know, when he meets God, he wants God to show him a picture of what he could have been.

And he wants he wants to see that version, like, literally, like, you know the saying if you play football or leave it all out on the field. Oh, like holy cow. Like that. That resonates with me. Like I, it's so much bigger than a roofing company and I, and I tell the team that all the time.

Right. You know, we hired Ellie and you know, I don't pay Ellie. I wish I could play Ellie more, you know what I mean? Right? But when we hired her, she was working two almost full time jobs. Right? One during the day and practically one half way through the night. And she got to work one job, and she got to be a mom, and I.

And her mom, thankfully, was helping her with the kids at night when she was working that second job, but, like, that's what gets me going. Impact, you know, because, like, okay, now, now the kids have their mom back, like, you know, you talk about a legacy, you know, and I say this all the time like, I want a legacy that, you know, one generation from, you know, like, I always think of and now we're starting to have more little kids.

But I always think a Little Joe is one of my sales reps. Stepson, technically, but he's raising him as his son. And, like, Joey's kids are going to be positively affected by what me and Emily's doing here. And that Joey's kids will probably never know who Bob and Emily Hole is, right? However, like, you know, the legacy that I could, you know, like that.

That's what I get. And only people that are truly in business to actually make a difference. Like, understand it. Like, you know, some people say, well, look at that nice truck. Okay. But six years ago when I was driving a rusted truck, they wouldn't start, have to die. And I know a lot of guys who still have that truck.

Yeah, right. They just won't get rid of it. It's sitting, you know, I sat with a contractor last week, and he's like, when I drive everyone to. I'll just hop in the 88 Chevy. Yep. And I'll drive it and I'll pull up to a job site and the crews will look at me and be like, does this guy do it?

He goes, but that's how I ground myself and like, hey, good for you. Like, good for you for keeping that piece of of your own legacy intact. Right? Of like never losing sight of where you came from is huge. And, you know, for some people it is the material things. Some people do all those things, but they grow out of them.

Right? The amount of guys I've seen that have gone out and bought Ferraris and mansions and do all this other stuff, at some point they switch gets flipped and they're like, I don't really care about this stuff anymore. Like, I want to give back to somebody. I want to go do something really cool for people, you know? And and that's it.

Right into, like I said, the some of these people are never gonna know your name. Right. And that's okay. Well, and what the point I've gotten to now is like, I want to take care of my wife, like, just builder, really nice home. And nothing like to me. It's really nice, but nothing that's crazy, you know, like, we could all build a lot bigger one, and that's just who we are, you know?

It's it works for us. Yeah. You know, and like I said, it's still it's still a really nice home. I mean, this is the first house that we've had that we've been able to fit a pickup truck in the actual garage. So. Which is crazy, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The funny part is, like, our garage is bigger than our first house ever was, you know?

So, but, you know, that's that's where I'm at on that kind of stuff. Kind of like what you said about Christmas gifts and that kind of stuff, like, you know, like I want, I've always said this and maybe I shouldn't say this out in public, but I'll say it like, I want people jealous of how well I take care of my wife.

Like, you know, to me, like, and I like that. I appreciate that's like, that's what like I want. And and my wife isn't materialistic. Now, would she each other drive a fairly new truck or a 25 year old truck every day? She'd rather drive a newer truck, you know, but when you step back and said something about that guy that drives at 88 truck, my crew is driving the first diesel truck that I bought, when we were, when we started the business and, and I've told them and I've told everybody when they're done with it.

Thanks. Coming back to me. And that's just going to be my farm put around truck like you know that to me. Like, you know. And and it was actually perfect. I sold the first truck that I bought to help pull trailers to my brother, and he showed up to watch my kids. My son had a cattle show this fall, and he parked right beside my wife's new truck.

I just bought her, and I just snapped the picture of it. Yeah, because I'm like, there's where it began. You know, there's where we're at now. And like I said, fortunately, Emily's not a materialistic person. Because, like you said, like, that stuff gets old. But I also, I hate the people that hate on the people that have something nice because there is nothing wrong with having something nice.

And one thing that always cracks me up is like when people complain about the people that have stuff nice, like, I know some people that have some nice things, and I also know the amount of money that they donate to charity and stuff. And it's like, okay, like, you know what? What I've come to is like, I've got to keep that kind of stuff.

Like at a balance. Yeah. Like, you know, like there's nothing wrong with this, but I've got to make sure that I'm giving. Yeah. You know, way more than, than than I'm receiving. Well, there's that old saying to, there's like, nobody, nobody who's ahead of you is ever going to be the one criticizing you. Right. Like, and there's some, some.

Yeah yeah yeah yeah, yeah. And that's right. And it's that must be nice mentality. Like it is nice. Yep. But you also didn't see the years that it took for me to get here. But you also didn't see you know, the times that I mean Amy and I joke about it because there was, there was a point gaffs seven years ago that me and two buddies stood in the kitchen splitting up like 380 bucks, because that was all that we had between the three of us, because we had to bet on going down for this contract, and we lost it, and everybody lost everything.

And we stood up. We said in the kitchen, counting wins and 20s, and we're like, all right, guys. So it's been real. I'm going to go move back in with my in-laws because I'm on my third failure, you know? And yeah, I'm with you though like I want I have my priorities right. And so I want everybody to to envy Amy and I's relationship.

I want everybody to look and be like, that dude loves the shit out of that woman because she is live with me through. She came in post all of my deployments, single dad, and she's put up with my PTSD and all the shit that's come along with that. And then me not being able to fall into the 9 to 5, 40 hour a week job to random, let's go try make money selling widgets, you know, whatever it is, and ended up here.

And we've outgrown the financial capacity of like my entire family, with the exception of 1 or 2 people. And we get to look, look at that and we get the money. Must be nice, right? All of this. And so Amy's the same way. Not materialistic at all. Never asks for shit. And then one year she's like, I think I want a Louis Vuitton person.

I was like, I got you right, and now she's got a couple. But she has like six fake ones and everybody's like, oh, look at all these. I'm like, that one's fake and that is fake and that was fake. That was $30 and that was $60. And people don't see it. They just see the, the, the shit that goes along with it.

But our industry is so materialistic too. And we do so many conventions that if your wife isn't walking through there with a Louis or red bottoms or something, there are people who won't work with you, right? And while you don't want to work with them long term, sometimes they're a foot in the door to some other stuff and you kind of got to play the game sometimes, but it's obnoxious.

And the amount of roofers that I see posting pictures of shingles and they're like this and it's their Rolex, and they want to make sure that you see that they have the Rolex. Me like, look at these shingles. They're like, yeah, I mean, we know it's the Rolex. We got it. It's no different. It's funny because I got to watch, this Apple Watch on with two different color bands right now.

Listen, I'm gonna need you to step your game well, and you know, you know, that actually will kind of lead into this. Like, what is that one failure, that you did. And I will, I will start with, with with mine. And, and it's more just, I mean, it'll, it'll make us laugh until we about fall out of a freaking chair here.

But. So I wanted to go work for myself. I wanted to own my own business. Emily knew that when we got together, my dad raised me. Have an 8 to 5 and have, you know, a side hustle, like, always be working. You know, that was before side hustles were cool, you know? And I always baled hay fed cattle on the farm.

Kid at heart. Never really made any money. Just really enjoyed working my ass off for nothing, apparently. You know. Right. But. So we were trying to figure out, like, what? What did that look like? And, so we started, we I signed up to do this property, cleaning up and doing things for foreclosed houses. Okay.

And the first one we get assigned, I believe at this point. Yeah, I'm selling roofing for, company, and, and and my son was, like, still in it, like he was less than a year old. Okay. And we get this. The first assignment's, like an hour and a half south of here. And it's supposed to be like, there's a few things, like tarp, the roof.

Do this, do that. And I'm like, okay, we can do that. And I get there. And I wasn't prepared at all. I mean, like overgrown like, you know, and then like, they have these pay sheets, it's like, how are these guys making any money at all? And, I couldn't even tarp the roof because something else was wrong that had to be done first.

Or like, I think they were going to have to bring a guy in to fix something structurally or something. But anyways, I go out there and I'm like, I look at Emily, I was like, don't know what the hell I'm doing here, you know? And I call back and the lady with a straight face is like, okay, yeah, we can, we can get that done.

So you can come back and finish this. He's like, but there is a fecal removal, on this, sheet, and it pays $6. It was a toilet with no water that somebody had decided to take a dump in. And I was cleaned out for 6 to 6 weeks. So every once in a while, a couple times a year.

But me and them later, this, like, ready to, like, stream at something. We look at each other and say, it could be worse. We could be cleaning shit out of toilet for six hours. That's interesting. That's funny, though, because you couldn't make that up if you had it. And like, everybody sees the success of a roofing business and, like, literally, I seen a guy two days ago and he's like, I'm proud of you.

And I said, thank you. I used to be like, super humble. Like, I wouldn't say much, but now I make sure I say thank you for that compliment, you know? But like, they don't know the things that you tried before. Oh, 100%, that were a complete failure, you know. Yeah. So we I definitely have won probably plenty.

The biggest and I'll go biggest from a financial impact, which I spent years trying to get Amy out of the 9 to 5 mentality because she the, the whole time we dated and got together like she always she was a pharmacy technician. So she was always at the CVS working and she made decent money for what it was.

But it was. But there was always that look of like, I'm doing what the pharmacist does and the pharmacist is making 150 grand a year and I'm making 50, like, what in the world? So that always bothered me for her. And so I was like, when we started the PA firm, we started together. And but she was relatively like she didn't know the industry, so she only interjected herself where she felt necessary.

And so we were like two years into the PA firm and I was like, babe, like, you got this. Like you. You understand how business, right? I said, there's an opportunity with this hurricane, we should start an industrial hygiene company because we used industrial hygiene on so many water claims, because we want a professional with the stamp to come in and say, this is mold, this is this type of more.

This is whatever I said. We have some certified people that we could use. We'll start a LLC and we'll go in and we'll solicit some work in the hurricane. It would be great. Right. And so we did. And I said, I'm going to be hands off. You just let me know if you need my help or whatever, which I can't help myself.

I was very much hands on and we she's like, hey, I'm going to fire this dude. His name was Trevor. She's like, I'm gonna fire Trevor. I don't I think he's screwing us. And I was like, oh, he's he knows what he's doing. He didn't know what he was doing. So that I company made $1.3 million in 90 days.

And we were like, oh, shit. We figured it out. Like, this is this is our ticket. We we don't have to pay for him anymore. This this thing's going to kill it. 60 days later, we had $0 because a lot of the contracts were written fraudulently by Trevor. And, the stuff that we were paying for that was going to the labs to get tested weren't actually going to the labs.

He was taking the money and doing whatever. And then one of the contractors sued us. And so, Amy, I got Amy off the cusp of, like, I don't ever want to own my own business just to doing it, making a million bucks in 90 days, losing more than a million bucks in the 60 days following. And then a company came in who wanted the brand, which I thought was really weird.

They pay. They offered Amy to take over all of the debt and the lawsuit for in exchange for 100% equity in the company. And they're like, sign here, walk away. We'll take over everything. And she's like, I just feel like it's a failure. I'm like, it is. But it's like the best case scenario failure that you could you could have and to this day, she doesn't let me live it down.

Remember that time do we did this like I know. So I've had to be a lot more restrictive on who I bring into our life. But we have this story forever. It's like, remember that time we made a million bucks in 90 days and then lost it, and we lost a half a day or two months. But yeah, no, that's but those are the things that people don't see.

Oh yeah. They, they think that it's just like, oh, you guys are you know, they see the nicer cars and it's like, I don't want to have to do maintenance on a car anymore. I spent my entire 20s and part of my 30s change in brakes in the driveway, doing all like, oh man, I blew a head gasket.

You know, I, I remember living in government House or the base housing, the government housing. In Fort Carson, taking apart a 3600 Pontiac motor. I blew a head gasket making $30,000 a year trying to do that on my own because I couldn't afford to pay a mechanic to do it. Like, now I'm just like, oh, I'm going to buy a nicer vehicle that I don't have to deal with this shit anymore.

Like, I just don't want to because I'm doing other stuff. The last thing I want to do is be sitting out here and that's I want to do it. Like if I'm like, you know what, I would put a lift kit on something or whatever. Like I did that on her last, Tahoe. She's had, she had I was like, I'm going to put a lift on this.

I ordered it and I put it on myself for the buddy of mine because I wanted to. Right. It wasn't a necessity thing. I'm not breaking down the side of the road. Anytime I see somebody broke down on the side of the road, I'm like, I don't envy you. Well, it's funny because, we've got heated seats and a couple of the trucks, and, my dad told me one day he's like, your kids are spoiled.

He said, they got my truck and asked to turn on the heated seat or something, and I started laughing because my dad's probably never had a vehicle with a heated seat on it. But, I said, kid, you're lucky. I said, growing up. I said, the trucks that hardly have heat in them. I said there was five of us kids that would stack deep with dad in a standard cab truck, I said, so we generated our own here.

And, you know, and it's it's always funny, you know, to to swap them stories with the kids. But as we wrap up, I guess, one thing that I'm just going to drive home, you kind of brought it up like, when you marry. Well, because I think you got to marry well before you want to necessarily do this, but, mentor friend Dave Ramsey says, like, if your wife has a feeling you should trust that feeling, and, you know, you pretty much solidified that.

And thankfully, Emily sounds very similar to Amy, where she doesn't, like, bring it up every day. But, you know, there is there's it's right on time. Yep. There are them times, you know, and like, we even look back of like, you know, hires and stuff like that. And she's like and that is one I had one particular hire that she's like, I told you not to hire that person.

And I think she was hired. Those people too, right? Where it's like for whatever reason, you relegated yourself to being like, I got this one, right, right, I do, and then you end up being completely wrong. But then that ex-girlfriend theory exists with everybody. When that cancer is person's gone, everybody comes out of the woodwork like, we knew, like, why aren't you freaking same anything, right?

You know, the only person that ever does, probably your wife, right? Right. Because in Amy's the same way, she does not miss me. So, like, I don't like this person because they're people that I'm, I'm, I do business with. Now where who we sitting there having dinner and she'll go if they say it to you, they're going to say it to everybody else.

Just keep that in mind. I'm like, yeah, I understand sweetheart, you know. And but she's she's not wrong. Right. You know. So but I tried I tried twice and failed. And the marriage thing got it right the third time. So it's fine. They meet. I've been together for this will be 14 years in June. And like, we finally figured it out.

The first two were a joke. Good. When's your anniversary? June 20th. So ours is July 9th. It'll be 14 years. July 9th. Yeah, yeah, it's seven nine, 11. That's how. Oh, that's how I wish I had that amnesia like that. Yeah, I remember being a numbers guy. That that that works for me. Right. So that's fair.

But yeah. No, I appreciate your time tonight or tonight. Today, sir. And, appreciate your friendship and your willingness to always help us out. Yeah. This has been awesome, man, I appreciate you. I mean, yep, thank you. This has been, edition of the Hoel Truth podcast, brought to you by Hoel Roofing and Remodeling. Thank you for joining in.