He Quit Corporate America To Build Million Dollar Businesses | Here's How...

Most people dream of leaving their hometown the second they have enough money. Today's guest did just the opposite and it might be the most powerful business decision he ever made. Scott Lingle walked away from a cushy $200,000 W-2 job and jumped off the cliff into entrepreneurship and he came out on the other side with two successful business exits. He likes to say he made a lot of money on Wall Street, but now he's all in on Main Street. He got there by finding A players, building a team he could actually step away from and rewiring how he thinks about money. Today, he's pulling back the curtain on how he built it, how he got out, and how he's using it to invest in the next generation through High School Hustle in his hometown of Danville, Indiana. Welcome back to another episode of the Roots podcast. I'm Max Moore, joined by my co-host Tyler Lingle and today we have a one-of-a-kind guest, the guy that created Tyler. [laughter] His dad, Scott Lingle. Scott, thanks for coming on the show. Yeah, thanks for having me on. Fired up. Yeah. We're going to kind of launch a softball question, which this is a Tim Ferriss question. So, I'm sure you're very familiar with this question. And we didn't Yeah, we didn't tell you we're going to ask this question, but I'm curious to hear hear what you would say. If you had a billboard on I-465 that everyone in Indy would eventually see, what would you put on that billboard? Wow, good one. I think I would go with faith over fear. The number one command in the Bible, it's in there 365 times, is fear not. And I think you know, my passion right now is kind of raising up the next generation of entrepreneurs and the thing that holds kids back and adults back is fear. And I think if you lean into faith in Jesus, you can overcome a lot of fear. Mhm. I'm sure we'll get a lot more into faith. Obviously, it's made a huge impact in my life. I would say I don't know if I'd be half the follower of Christ without having you in my life. So, I think that's the biggest impact outside of entrepreneurship. Um, but I I think that leads really well into kind of the question we wanted to start with or the story we wanted to start with, which was you've you've probably told this story like 50 times, which is you were at Golden Rule, cushy salary, making I think quarter million dollars a year. You know, obviously my my mom, Linda, was like thrilled, like we're great. I'm heading into college and then you lightning strikes, I guess, your brain and you're like, I have this big idea I want to start not one business, but two. What was going through your head at that decision point? Yeah, great question. I think it had been going through my head for about 10 years prior. Um, every time I'd go out My my job at Golden Rule got bought by United HealthCare. And so, I worked for the number one brand in kind of health care, health insurance. And my job was on the sales side. So, I ran all of sales for like um more or less kind of whale hunting. So, all their biggest distributors, I had a team that I built up from scratch and we went called on all those top distributors. And what occurred to me every time I'd go out and I'd meet with another distributor, one they'd be like half my age. I was like 45. And two, they'd be making like, you know, 10x what I was making. And not that it's all about money, but it's, you know, money buys freedom and I did want freedom. And so, I'd I'd get back in my car. I'd be with a rep and I'd get back in the car and I'd I'd be like, you know, what the heck are we doing? Like, these folks are not, you know, they're not any smarter. Um and they just took risk. And so, that had been brewing for like 10 years and I knew someday I was going to do it. Like I I would literally go out on calls and I would fill notebooks full of, okay, when when I pull the trigger, here's what I'm going to do. And I had like 10 years of notebooks and finally I just felt like the risk of staying was greater than the risk of leaving. And thought, man, I got to take this I got to take this plunge and um and and the tough part was you're exactly right. Came home and told Linda, my wife, and you know, she's like, you're nuts. Like, what do you you know, like you make more than anybody any of our friends. Like, I had a great job. And not only did I have a great job, but I had also bought myself a lot of freedom. So, like one of the things I was doing, I was trying to knock out the top 100 golf courses. And I think I'd played like 68 of them. It was nuts. So, I had a great job, making ton of money and she's like, why in the world would you do this? And I just said, you know, I think God's wired me to do this and if I don't take a shot, like I'm going to have a massive regret. And sure enough, it worked. I had two. The other thing I would tell you, I had a friend um guy by the name of Ivan Spener that had been a mentor um that I watched and watched this guy, you know, really crush it in all areas of life. And my first one was a partnership with him and I think I learned a ton from him and it hadn't Had it not been for him, I think we all need mentors at different stages in life, like it wouldn't have worked. So, he coached me, he encouraged me. He's like, you're nuts if you don't take the shot. He's like, you know, I've seen a lot of people that work in corporate America and he said, you're very different. And I think that confidence gave me his confidence gave me the confidence needed to go out on my own. I love how like the Lord puts people in our lives to just speak wild sentences. No, but give you that rocket fuel. As we're building Roots, a question that consistently stirs in my brain is, how do you build something with the intent to exit? So, going into Remodel Health, what were some of the practical things that you did business-wise so that you could exit? Yeah, early days of Remodel Health, it was me and another co-founder, not Ivan, another guy named Justin Klemisch. So, I think you guys both know Justin. And we did have that mindset from day one. We said, hey, we want to build this with the end in mind. And the end was, let's have an exit. We both read two books early on, two I'd recommend. Number one, we read Traction and we implemented a kind of a light version of EOS, Entrepreneur Operating System, very popular. Um, and the other one that we read was Built to Sell. Have you ever read that? I've not. I've read Traction. Built to Sell, like simple little book. It's almost like reading The One Minute Manager. I mean, it's that basic. You can read it like in an hour. And I think it's just the meme that stuck with me that businesses that are sellable are businesses that don't need you to work there. And you could literally leave it for 6 months and go on vacation and the thing would run as well or maybe better without you. And so, we went into this like thinking about, okay, what's it going to take to get there? And everything was like systems mindsets and delegation. So, every day I would go in thinking, okay, how do we systematize whatever we're doing and how do we delegate it so that we're not the bottleneck. And that was the mindset from from day one and we built it around that. And I think what happens, the hardest part, him and I are both from the sales world. And so, that's our secret power or super superpower. Um, so the hardest thing that to delegate in my opinion is getting rid of being the number one sales guy. I think every business owner, for the most part, is like the number one business development guy. And getting rid of that responsibility is really, really I think the hardest. And so, once we cracked the code on that, we found sales guys that could actually do it better than us, then we had real freedom and then we had something that could be sellable. And it probably took 5 years to get there. What does that recruitment process look like? Is it monetary structure for the sales guys or just hiring A players? Or do you find them out? I mean, my whole world's been about A players. I think A players attract more A players and you know when you have an A player if you thought, okay, and you think about it, all the people on your team, who would you freak out if you got the phone call and they said, hey, I'm leaving today? You know you got an A player if you you're like, holy crap, what are we going to do? And it so, we built a team of A players. And then I think the other huge thing, the guy running Remodel Health today, at one point he was our fractional CFO, guy named Austin Layman, that's incredibly leader. His superpower is creating the right financial incentives. He's mind-blowing at this. And so, early days we put systems in place that made everybody like an owner. So, we had like an equity incentive program and profit sharing programs. And what you want sooner or later, a team full of A players and a team full of people that think like owners. It's we had that because of Austin and because that's his superpower. Everybody thought like an owner from almost like early days. I bet we put that in place like year three. And you want your whole team thinking like owners. And I think a lot of people listening to this might be thinking, oh, that's crazy. Like, don't ever give away your equity. We both know Jeff Kittle, he has one of the largest property management and apartment syndication businesses and he doesn't give any Actually, he doesn't syndicate cuz he has all the equity. How have you thought about that? Like, how much equity are you giving these A players? Because a question a lot of people would have. Well, first of all, Jeff Kittle's a beast, great friend of mine and like wouldn't argue with his success. to get him on the pod here. He he's incredible and if you can pull off what Jeff did, more power to you. And I think there's more ways, you know, there's a lot of ways you can skin the cat and have success in business. My approach is more I'm a very delegation mindset person. Like, I like the I like to play as much as I like to work. And so, I've always thought like, how do I give all my work away? And if you're going to have that mindset, then you need to have a mindset where you're going to share the wealth. And so, um, I think from a from a standpoint of wanting to work less and delegate more, it makes sense to lend itself to, like, let's give a lot of equity away. And And keep in mind, like, um, you know, we just we we created like a lot of millionaires. I mean, we just had an exit at the end of '24, and I think out of that a dozen millionaires. Uh, so, you know, if you can grow it big enough, like, there's a lot to go around. That's incredible. It reminds me of the saying, like, you can have a whole grape or part of watermelon. There you go. And a lot of people have been, uh, preaching that to me right now, so something, uh, we're kind of working on behind the scenes. models work. I mean, I'm not knocking the other model, but I think, um, certainly, uh, by by delegating and giving away some equity, like, I think you can scale it faster, in my opinion. Quick pause here, because if you own property in Indianapolis, your contractor matters more than you think. That's why we've consistently recommended Nick Giuliani and the team at Off Leash Construction. They handle everything from small repairs to full-scale renovations, and most importantly, they do the things the right way. They have an insane new tool that lets you upload your inspection response and get a quote in minutes. Check the link in our bio to check it out and connect with Off Leash. All right, back to the show. So, what I think what's really hard for A players that are like sales dogs or say me and Max is when to delegate, because you know you're going to get that person in and they're going to like basically biff the first few, you know, jobs or tasks or sales calls they have. Um, how do you let go of control and how do you think about when to do that? Yeah, I think once you get your pipeline built up big enough that it's meeting your expectation of what you need to live on. And you Because until then, you're kind of always thinking about like scarcity mindset, and I got I don't have enough to pay the bills. Once you've exceeded that number of, hey, I've got enough coming in in revenue that we can pay all our bills, um, and then you continue to grow that pipeline, then you get out of that scarcity mindset and you get toward abundance mindset, and you're willing to start giving all your leads away, but you kind of need to get to that point. Like, for me, I had to get to where I at least made what I was making in my annual income at at United Healthcare, because that's what was paying the bills. And once we exceeded that, then I had no problem, like, let's let's give give all the leads away to all of our next generation, you know, A players. Uh, but I think until you get there, like, you're going to always have that mindset, like, I don't have enough to pay the bills. I think what I heard, um, from someone much smarter than myself was once someone can do it 80% as good as you, Yeah. away. 100%. And I feel like that's helped me realize, like, okay, they're never they might not ever be 100%. Like, we actually have agents on our team that I think are better than us at being a buyer's agent. Um, so that's that's where you really want someone who actually can, with their full attention on it, do better than you. But, if it's like administrative crap, like, running, um, bookkeeping or something, it's like if they can do it 80% as good as you, you probably have higher-level tasks that you can leapfrog to, which the only way to make 12 millionaires, I feel like, is if you keep leapfrogging. I think the hard part for people is knowing how quickly to start doing that, but I guess it's could be provision once you have that provision kind of there. varies. Like, um, Justin and I, we were sales guys, and we knew how to do business development, and we were really good at that, uh, but we had no idea how to run payroll, how to build a website, how to like all the, you know, software that runs your business. We didn't know any of that. So, we hired Cameron Mason. You guys both know Cameron. Uh, the kid was like 22 at the time, but he acted like he was 40. And, um, it was easy to delegate all that, because we didn't know what the heck we were doing. And Cameron just stepped in and he literally ran the whole company other than sales. We handled sales, he handled literally everything else, accounting, finance, payroll, HR. And he did that probably for the first 2 years. So, like, in that scenario, like, um, you know, we had no problem giving it away, because we had no expertise. Now, when it came to sales, you're probably right, it was harder to give that away, because that's where our expertise was. And probably where, like you said earlier, I'll call back to, you like to play as much as you like to work. And my guess is sales probably feels like play a lot of the time. Until you got to write up the paperwork and send over the contract. Yeah. Then it starts feeling like work again. 100%. Uh, just taking a leap there, cuz that's what happens with Tyler. Mhm. Yep. Absolutely. Within, um, the the culture at, um, there was two businesses, and I don't think a lot of people know this, but I know this, ISG actually blew up like a balloon and exited first, which I think probably helped have the confidence to run similar plays with Remodel. What did that first How did that, um, first exit, I guess, change your mentality on how to run the run a similar play at Remodel, and and how to, you know, just be a better entrepreneur? Like, did that first exit change any mental models for you? 100%. I mean, one gave me a ton of confidence. Once you have one win at anything, like, just gives you confidence. Like, confidence breeds more confidence, right? Success breeds more success. Um, so one, um, I think that one there, just so you know, went from zero to 6 million in EBITDA in 6 years with three people. It was crazy. Like, right place, right time. machine. Total cash machine. Really everything to do with, um, there's a lot of benefits to starting late. So, I was 45. I'd been in the insurance industry working for the number one player for like 20 years, and we just saw an opportunity that we knew was going to be a gold mine. Um, and we struck when the timing was perfect. And, um, so, yeah, you could not be more right. Um, what was interesting is uh, I was having so much so much success with ISG that I spent no time on Remodel Health. So, for the first saying you you kind of thought it was a dud. I thought it was not going to go anywhere. Totally. I remember I was like a summer intern, and like Justin and Cameron were off on whiteboards, like, messing around, and you would like go in a separate office and just close deals for ISG. To their credit, one's [laughter] the money maker here. To their credit, Justin Clements, Cameron Mason, Matt Boden, uh, was your roommate. Those guys get all the credit for like year one, cuz I was I was nonexistent. And funny enough, Remodel ended up being bigger than ISG when it was all said and done. Uh, again, they they carried it year one, and then I think just I jumped back in, and and I didn't add a ton of value, but, um, what what what I spend most of my time on is recruiting talent. And I'm just a big fan of you find a lot of A players, you give all your work away, you pay them really really well, above market, and you're going to grow something pretty cool. What's the age range of the A players? Is it guys under 30 or in their 30s, like, as you're recruiting and going through that process? I think it's all over the board. I think, um, I think what I look for, cuz right now I've got I've got a bet on a kid that, um, was a sophomore in high school, came out of high school hustle, and he's grown a business, and I've got a I've got a bet on that kid right now. So, he was 16 when I made a bet on him. Um, and then I could find a 60-year-old, uh, if they had the right ingredients, I would bet on them. But, I think what it what it comes down to for me, um, the way I'm wired is I'm addicted to personal growth, personal development. And what that means is every day I'm trying to get like . 01% better. And I believe in the magic of compound compounding interest. And if you just stack . 01% on top of . 01%, which means you're reading books, you're listening to podcasts, you're in the gym. If I find a person with that mindset, I don't care if they have any experience in my lane at all, if they can if they can apply that to whatever lane I'm in, they're going to kill it. And you can you can notice those people, or you can you can sometimes train it. Uh, I'd rather find somebody that already has it, and pour into those people. When do you know you have a person with the right in I think you were touching on this, but to make it more explicit, like, when is your brain lighting up when you've recognized this person has the magic ingredients? Like, pre-hire? What are those ingredients? You're saying pre-hire? Yeah, pre-hire. Pre-hire. So, in the interview, they're taking ferocious notes. You're not taking notes, you're probably not the right guy for me. You're asking incredible questions. If you If I get to the end of the interview and I say, "Hey, what questions do you have?" and they have none, like, no no chance I'm hiring that guy. I want people that are super curious. Um, and then I'm just looking for people that tell me that that they they they take the initiative to tell me how much they're learning and reading. If you're not a reader or learner, like, no thanks. It's we built a culture like around that. Like, we have nothing but players that like to get up and read every day. Um, we're we're a faith-based culture, so we want people that are diving into the Bible every day. Uh, we pray as much as we possibly can at remodel health and we kind of tell people, "Hey, if this is going to weird you out that we're praying and we're having Bible studies, like you might not want to come here." Like we try to scare you away if you're going to be afraid of that. Uh, but we're looking for people like us that are like wired to be addicted to self-improvement and self-learning and even better if they love Jesus. Jesus and self-improvement. There we go. It's the magic combo. And I know why you asked the question cuz we're in the middle of a growth phase right now and it's like the second that you beacon out over hiring and we're we want agents. It's like, oh, you know, knock knock on the door. So many people lining up to join and then trying to weed through like the best weeding process that we've done is bring them on and see what happens and then the rest of the team's like, well, there's 10 new people in the room. You know, where how am I going to eat now? [snorts] Um, so try to get ahead of that in the interview process is something Roots is trying to grow in. Well, one thing I left out that's probably most important, coachability. So somebody that and one that that means you got to be really humble and coachability like what I do all my life for the last 20 years, I try to have five coffee meetings a week from people I can learn from and that's because I want to be coachable. Like I want to learn in all areas of life and if that doesn't come out in the interview, like I don't want to hire you. Yeah, I mean the ingredients are they're super curious asking like questions for us especially self-learner, reader, faith over fear. They they exhibit that. I don't think you want someone someone with a limited fixed mindset and coachability and a lot of humility. I mean, that sounds like a founder and really what you're looking for is future founders but put the golden handcuffs on them. Yeah, which I think is what you're doing with that equity. I think the one thing that me and Max have to work on is like we once we get them in, they they they like the gold the the culture and the community I think is the golden handcuffs and the relationship. There are financial incentives too but um, it's hard to recruit those A players because they usually have a really good position where they're at. And a lot of times they're making Yeah, in our industry they're already making a lot of money. They're at a higher split level and they're like, why would I go to you guys and give you guys money? So we have to like that value proposition is just something that I think you have to have crystal clear. most A players are already employed really really well. Um, very rare you're going to find an A player that's looking for an A Usually not desperate. It's a you're you know, my mindset is always be recruiting. Like you're a perpetual talent recruiter. Anywhere you go, anybody you talk to, even if they love their job, figure out a way to start planting seeds that hey, we're building this rocket ship over here and someday I'm going to get you on board and drip on people for a long time and you'd be surprised, you know, it's all about building trust and relationships and the time might be right like a year from now because you've been planting those seeds. Mhm. I love that. I love that always be recruiting mindset and being able to like you can pour into people before they're even in your culture. I think what's really hard for Roots is infiltrating a industry with faith. Like I mean, let's be honest, it's a real estate industry. It's all flashy money, cars and awards. There's not a lot of people that are screaming about faith over fear and we're trying to be different in that which is attractive to some and those who are attract like that we're attracting. Yeah, get them on board. Uh, but I'm more passionate about the ones that aren't attracted by the faith. Let's bring them in. Yeah. And let's go on mission. Yeah. Uh, that's been the best part of running this team for sure. Yeah, I think we're trying to build a build a culture of abundance mindset which is rooted in faith over fear versus scarcity mindset. I'm competing with [clears throat] all the other agents because there's 13,000 agents in Indianapolis. Like it's really easy every day I probably struggle with that of like, why am I in this industry? There's no boats here. It's it's just a challenging industry probably not too dissimilar than insurance. I want to ask you about the exit I guess exits in a way that probably nobody has asked you. How do you think about money and investing differently after the exit than your entire life adult life before the exit? What changed? Yeah, um, I'm thinking about purpose way more than I ever have before. So I'm 57 and I think at this stage of my life I have more vigor and more energy and more excitement for life than ever before because I've been able to really focus on what I believe is my true identity, what God has put me on Earth to do and for me that's two things. That's Jesus and that's entrepreneurship. I think God's wired me to have certain gifts in entrepreneurship and if I can raise up kind of the next generation of entrepreneurs and have them be kingdom minded, I think we can make a big dent in Indianapolis and in Danville which is where I'm living personally. It's so how I think about money differently now, um, you know, made a lot of money on Wall Street um, but getting a lot of purpose and meaning on Main Street. And I want to pour all that money and that time into both building up, raising up the next generation of entrepreneurs but also pouring it back into my local hometown and that that's just fun. Like I heard this quote a while ago ago, um, happiness is a trailing indicator of impact. The more impact you have, the more happiness you're going to have. It's so that's why I'm kind of thriving in life right now is cuz I'm I'm doing, you know, it's more fun to kind of do what I'm doing now at this stage and make an impact and purpose than it is making a buck. And we were kind of doing both which is cool and I think that's what you guys should be thinking about uh, but I'm thriving in it even more because I've got the ability to do kind of whatever I want whenever I want and pour it back to my community has been a blast. Mhm. They say favor isn't fair. Yeah. Uh, I love that. The proponent you just hit on it of keeping money in Danville and having that money be poured back into. I was at a high school hustle event recently where you're talking about like you are you might go to college and you might leave but the [clears throat] percentage of people I think you had an actual stat that leave hometown and go to the city and start working or move out of state. Right. Um, how is that kind of uh, propelled this next chapter of keeping hometown money hometown? Yeah, great question. Um, so there's kind of like a brain drain I think going on in all these small towns where if you are an A player and you're like top 10% and you're going to be an entrepreneur, uh, good chance you're probably not staying in a small little town like Danville. You're moving out, you're going to Indy, you're going to Chicago, you're going to New York. Um, how can we incentivize, entice those kids that want to stay and build cool things in Danville and I personally believe it's relationships and I think everybody that's going to crush it in life needs a mentor. Um, I don't I don't know of anybody that I know that's killed it without a mentor. Literally everybody I know you can point to either one guy or five guys or gals and um, so what we're trying to do is we're throwing meetups in Danville. You guys both been to them. Every month kind of like your Roots meetups, uh, learn a little bit from you guys there um, and all we do is we pull a different stud from Danville that's built something really cool. Uh, Tim Wicker was my first one, Electric Plus, the guy's a beast and I invite I've got a list now of 120 on that list. The the the the list is other business owners in the Danville-ish area. So I've kind of pulled from all of Hendricks County and then what I do is we've launched High School Hustle in Danville and we're inviting all those kids and all we do is we throw a one-hour meetup on like a Tuesday at 4:00 and I interview that founder on their how I built this story and um, and then at the end we have any of the students that are building anything cool. They're doing pressure washing, car detailing, come up and pitch what you're doing and I guarantee we're going to get you some leads from all the business owners in the room. So two things are happening. One, we're forming organic relationships in that room um, and two, we're getting them leads which is kind of teaching them how the real world works and then three, every time that I get in that room, I share a little bit of vision, not much, like 5-10 minutes of what I hope Danville looks like in the next 10 years and I think the other thing that will happen is a lot of organic JV relationships. I'm not going to do all this by myself. I need JV partners and they're all going to come out of those rooms. Yeah, the ones that I've been to you've already taught me about business owners and introduced me to people that I didn't know. I live in Danville. I didn't know that these were the players and these are who own that building on the square or what have you and then what a cheat code for a high schooler in a pressure washing company or a gutter cleaning or trash bin cleaning. I mean, if there's a high schooler out there, come clean my trash cans. Uh, come through my neighborhood, you'll get plenty of money. But to stand up on a stage and to business owners say, this is what I'm doing this summer. It's like, oh, that's so cool. And who better to pitch to? I mean, these business owners love hustlers, right? And the next generation they're like they could see themselves at that age being that kid. Mhm. I know I've been uh, impacted being in the room with the high schoolers. It's like, how can I get these guys business and start growing? Um, that's awesome. Yeah, what I think is really interesting is you're kind of talking about a blueprint on how to revitalize a small town Yeah. and it's not through competition, it's through community and collaboration of just like Max just said it. Like they're like these are the who's who and I can grab a mentor in two seconds. Um, I love the South Bend story. Have you met with the guys down in South Bend and what they've been able to do? I haven't. Changing up. I'll have to make a connection there. Yeah. Yeah. What um what how what do you think actually keeps these kids there? Like maybe they have a great experience high school also they now have a feather on their pedigree of business maybe they have made you know a few thousand dollars in the summer like I still think it's a challenge in a place like Danville to with the current employment opportunities and and just travel outside of city how do you think they actually [clears throat] decide to stay or is it just a percentage like how do you think about that? Yeah, I think it and again this is a hypothesis. We're going to we're going to run a 10-year experiment and find out but it's fun running the experiment, right? So um I think it's going to be relationships and I think they're going to find guys like you too and they're going to become friends and you guys are 10 years ahead or you know whatever however many years ahead you are um and you're going to pour in your wisdom and your knowledge and I don't think most of these kids are going to like jump straight out of high school or even college into entrepreneurship but what they will do is they'll come work on your team and they'll tell you hey my vision is I want to be you in 3 years. I will tell you those kind of hires are the best hires you can ever get. Uh they are gold for 3 years because they think like owners. It sucks they're going to leave you but you'll get a ton of value years. Pause. A quick break from the episode. The lender you choose will make or break your experience. That's why our team at Roots consistently works with Renato Lima from Approved Mortgage. He communicates clearly, moves quickly, and understands both retail and investment loans at a high level. When my guy Renato's on the deal things move steady. When you get serious about buying click the link in the description and contact Renato today. And so I think there's going to be a lot of kids like that they're going to jump on and the more we can create more business owners doing cool things we can create those experiences and then I think it's a matter of um us you know making the vision come true. So uh we keep telling these stories in those rooms and cool things are going to happen. We're launching the restaurant, we're launching a really cool outdoor um bar and cornhole you know outdoor experience. Uh the next one's going to be hopefully farm to table and then a rooftop bar then an entertainment but the more we keep telling these stories in that room they're going to come true. Mhm. Why did you want to start with uh I'm obviously involved. Um you uh gave me equity in the deal so that was awesome. Appreciate that one. Uh but why restaurant? Why start with a restaurant in terms of real estate investment in a small town? Yeah. Everything uh one thing you'll notice about me um is everything that I ever come up with is is copied from some genius that's gone before me. Uh none of my ideas are original. So he doesn't have original ideas. That's why I read books and listen to podcasts like a machine and there's a guy I came across named John Marsh. John and Ashley Marsh out of Opelika, Alabama. If you haven't checked them out you totally should. And I've actually met John at a conference and they have transformed Opelika, Alabama. I think they own 200 properties and businesses. I mean it's kind of crazy what they've done there but his recipe is number one iconic food and beverage. So good so extraordinary that it'll pull from like an hour or two away. And why that works it attracts a ton of foot traffic and foot traffic attracts the next retailer, the next restaurant. Like where there are people retailers want to be. And so step one in his playbook and again I'm just ripping off his playbook is iconic food and beverage. Now what's interesting in his playbook uh that we're hoping to get to next he says number two you need overnight stay and number three you need uh event centers. Um and so event center is definitely on the radar. Uh overnight stay hopefully we can get some more Airbnbs. I think there are already some but maybe we can get more. Yeah. Yeah it reminds me of Justin Clement's quote where there's margin there's meaning. Yeah. And you can't have mar you can't have meaning without some margin. 100%. It's true. You think about the slaves um the Israelites in Egypt. Yep. There was no meaning because they're slaves. They had literally no margin but they go to the land flowing with milk and honey, the promised land. All of a sudden they can build a culture and um have true wealth including that spiritual wealth. Um one thing I wanted to ask about that you kind of uh dropped a little Easter egg which was how you thought about investing which is Main Street versus Wall Street um stemmed from identity in Christ and I would say that's seeming to have gone up into the right as you've gotten older. I've noticed you seem like less stressed, more joy-filled, more fruit of the spirit which has been awesome. You have you know being now a grandfather like that's just how you build true legacy but what are practical steps you took to um form and grow in that identity in Christ? Yeah, that's good. Uh again ripping off another guy that I've learned from. If you haven't checked out Jamie Winship he's been huge in our family. So me and all my kids have gotten really into Jamie Winship and uh what he's taught me and I really I just came across this guy in the last couple years um is understanding um when we lean into our true identity the way God like he he he claims and I believe this like God put every single person on this planet for a specific reason to build his kingdom. And we need to figure out what that is and when we live into it is when we're going to thrive and flourish. It's by listening and this dude literally if you go look him up on YouTube there's hundreds of podcasts and sermons like where he's been all over the world. [snorts] And the other thing that he does that's kind of been a game changer for me the guy used to be a cop so he's not like a preacher. Um is all day long every day he says two things. He has two prayers. God what do you want me to do? God what do you want me to do? And he says simple as that. And then it's a matter of like getting really dialed dialed in like John 15 is all about abiding and being attached to the vine and I think that's what we live our life is trying to figure that out in my opinion. How do we get more and more attached to the vine and just abide and lean in like all day every day and no matter what if you're in the middle of a conversation, middle of a deal you're thinking in the back of your mind okay God right now right here what do you want me to know? What do you want me to do? And I think God shows up. And like what's crazy about Jamie Winship is like the miracles in this guy's life. Like the first time I heard him I'm like this is BS. Like there's no way this guy's real. And the more I've like fact checked him it's mind-blowing. So that's how I'm doing it is just stealing a chapter out of his playbook. Yeah, I think it's it's simple and yet really really difficult. Um cuz I think oftentimes our mind is running on scarcity and fear. Like bill you know maybe it's this month like payroll's coming due, bills are coming due. Like oh got to go make revenue. And so like when you're in that sales meeting you're running on fear-based. Yep. Versus Matthew 5 like the the lilies of the field, the birds they don't have to worry about where their food comes from, where their provision comes from. Like he he cares and then um supplies provision for those that love and put him first and running in abundance. And it's hard. Yeah. I don't think it's an overnight thing. I think it's a daily surrender. Think that living in that abundance takes a lot of surrender. Right. Where do you create space for yourself to pray daily? Is this [clears throat] monthly, quarterly? Where where are you going offsite? Like how do you create margin for yourself to be able to grow? Yeah, for me it's just daily practices. So um again I'm a I'm a habit guy and anytime I want to change anything it's like okay it's it's got to start with a habit and where's this habit going to fit in the calendar? And for me it's just getting up early and getting into the word and I'm uh this year we're going through uh the Bible Recap uh guy by the name of Tara Leigh Cobble. Highly recommend it. My wife and I are doing it together so we can talk about it at the dinner table. And it's been incredible. And so that's my that's my Bible reading practice and then uh prayer um honestly the more I can journal and write it out the more I get what what happens to me is a lot of times my prayer today sounded just like the prayer yesterday and [laughter] the more I can write it out it's more intentional. Uh so I find that to be a good practice for me. Mhm. Those journals will be a good inheritance for you. One day. Yeah. Yeah, I was just thinking about mine in my closet and Cal's [laughter] like I don't know if he wants to see all those. Like he'll be like don't be an entrepreneur. So [laughter] he'll learn. Yeah. That's scared out of it. That's crazy. Um We have some outro questions. We frame these as rapid fire but I don't think they they necessarily have to be rapid fire answers. They've never been rapid fire. They're [laughter] like everyone's like I got to go think on the car ride home and stare out into the horizon cuz these are kind of like deeper questions but what is one habit that has changed your life? Yeah, we go back to um so first of all start with a quote. Uh there's a guy named Charlie Jones that had this quote and I'll butcher it but it was something like, you'll be the same person in 10 years as you are today, except for two things. The people you meet and the books you read. It's pretty basic, um, but I would say the habit for me, I've always I've been a reader since I was about 25. Uh, wasn't wasn't a reader young early days. Um, but for me, I have five at least five coffee meetings a week with brand new people that are A-players uh, that I can learn from. And that's a habit that literally has changed my life. One, my my network um, in Indy is like massive, and like I can leverage that in a good way, um, to contact anybody I need for anything at any given time. And Indy's like so perfect for this. And then, um, two, just, you know, learning from all these folks. And what what's happened for me is, um, because I'm kind of pouring into the next generation, like I'm I'm spotting this talent really really early, and I'm investing in them. Um, and so I probably I've probably made 10 bets in the last like 3 years, uh, from people that I've had coffee meetings with that I guarantee are going to kill it that I'm putting bets on. And it's a it's a win-win. Like they're going to win cuz they get my capital. I pour into them as an entrepreneur, and I think they're going to 10x whatever they're growing. How are you uh, filling that list up of people? Like how are you scheduling them practically? [laughter] Um, yeah, you know, I I I get told all the time I need it I have no admin. Like I'm doing it all myself. it all yourself. And, um, but keep in mind, my schedule right now, I mean, I'm growing High School Hustle, I'm working on Danville, and I'm meeting people. That's my And, you know, fit in a little bit of pickleball and golf and travel. Yeah, I love that. That's always like the hurdle for me is I have a huge list, and I like want to get people in the calendar, but then I open the calendar, and we're like booking stuff to May. Yeah. Um, so, but what do you mean? I think seasons of life are important, too, cuz I I think, hopefully, in our 50s I'll have more time for pickleball and just scheduling meetings. I think for me, I've had to realize like I've a 2-year-old, one on the way. For sure. Um, you know, entrepreneur, wife doesn't work, have a expensive mortgage. So, I'm giving myself grace to be like, Yeah. hey, it's kind of just grind time. Like I'd love to do more Yeah. legacy building, philanthropic work. It's just being re- the the legacy and the philanthropic work is pouring into our team. It is finding those A-players, and telling them like, "Hey, you have a place here. Um, we're going to do it in culture that loves Jesus, too." And so, giving yourself grace and understanding the season you're in, cuz I think that's a struggle for a lot of the young I do a lot of those meetings, and sometimes they're even, um, you know, younger than me and and and look up to me in that, and they're like they want to get to where I am overnight. And sometimes it's it's tempting for me or Max to want to get to where you are overnight. Sure. Like I I think we could do that. Like I think we we'd enjoy that. I could put some capital into these guys with their pressure washing business. Sounds like a lot of fun, but, um, you you you can't skip through the Right. the muck that you had to get through. You you couldn't be more right. If I if I went back and looked at where I was at at your age, you guys are light-years ahead. So, you still got a long ways to go. I didn't become an entrepreneur until 45, and it happened really quick from that point. I mean, I went from 45, I think in 8 years I had two exits. But at your age, no, I was like nowhere near where you're at. The How long did the 8 years feel? Yeah, the first I would tell you this, the first four were a freaking grind. Hard as crap. And like every day, like, what am I doing? Why did I do this? Um, but I think once you get momentum and like 4 or 5 years in, like it started like almost getting easier. Once once we figured out like at at remodel health, it took forever to figure out who the five leaders were that run like sales, ops, tech, finance. Um, but once we figured that out, we got those five people in place, got really easy. Mhm. But we probably got had to go through three to five people for each one of those lanes. And then, once we knew we had the right ones, we locked them up. In a good way. Uh, created millionaires. Wow, that's amazing. Yeah. We're definitely We're on year four. So, it's it's been a slog. I'm ready for it to go downhill. What's your favorite place to grab a bite to eat in Indy? I'm going to go with two. So, Danville Breakfast, I'll go Bread Basket. Oh, obviously. Love that place. And then, um, whenever we come visit Tyler and Bree and Cal, uh, over here on the Broad Ripple side, we go to, uh, Roots. Root and Bone? Root and Bone. Yeah. I'm look I'm looking at your shirt, [laughter] but Root Root and Bone. Yeah. Root and Bone. Wasn't named after the restaurant, but it it's a good restaurant. Uh, what will Danville, Indiana look like in 10 years? Good question. Um, I think there will be a thriving restaurant called 20 West Public House Let's go. with an incredible outdoor space. And that outdoor space, I think, is going to be the magnet. We're going to have live bands. It's going to be We're trying to create the third space for Danville. Yep. So, you got work, you got home, and you need a third space. We want that to be the community third space. Um, I think, in addition to that, uh, we're going to have farm-to-table. And hopefully my nephew, Connor Lingle, your your cousin, will be, uh, head chef running that. Mhm. Ryan Lingle will be, uh, the farm guy, supplying all the farm food. Yeah. And, um, [snorts] and then we're going to have a rooftop bar on top of that one. Ooh. And then, who knows? We'll, uh, I think we need some kind of entertainment. Yeah. Um, some some kind of entertainment. And I think event space, um, my wife, Linda, has always wanted to have some kind of wedding venue. And, uh, we've got our our eye on a few there. You got the courthouse. You just get married at the courthouse. [laughter] And, um, and then I think, um, yeah, that's, uh, it's a good list to start with. Are you running the same play of finding A-players to replace yourself within all that? 100%. Like all these, I would not want to run at any of them. I I wouldn't mind owning the real estate. Um, but what we've done with 20 West Public House, uh, again, stealing a playbook from, uh, John Marsh, we're doing a percentage rent deal. So, that we lose together, and we we win together. And what that means is we're starting with really really low rent. Um, and then if they hit a certain target, a revenue target, then I share in the upside after that target. And I think it it's really good for both sides. We win together, we lose together, and I've got a lot of skin in the game to want them to be super successful. Mhm. That's awesome. The impact that it's already made, and you're just through demo on the first floor. Like, uh, it's almost a traffic hazard. People look in there [laughter] trying to see how the the progress has been. I'm not kidding. I I do it myself. And now there's a nice for lease sign with Roots logo on it. So, it's pretty cool. Yes. Yeah, we're going to fill that one up. Well, thanks for coming on the show. This has been amazing. Where can people find you? Yeah, High School Hustle probably is what I'm most passionate about. So, highschoolhustle. org is where you can learn more about me and what I'm passionate about these days. Awesome. Thanks for doing this. It's been awesome. Appreciate it.