The Investor Mindset - Name Your Number Show [$]

NYN E14: Building Wealth and Breaking the Mold: The Power of Investing and Entrepreneurship with Adam Contos

Episode Summary

In this episode, host Steven Pesavento talks with guest Adam Contos, former CEO of RE/MAX, to discuss his journey from a working-class background to achieving financial freedom through investing and entrepreneurship. Adam shares insights from his mentor, the importance of community and mentorship, and the role of active investing in building wealth. Discover the power of surrounding yourself with growth-minded individuals, finding purpose in investments, and creating a diversified portfolio. This episode will inspire you to break free from traditional thinking and explore the possibilities of financial success.

Episode Notes

Key Takeaways

  1. The importance of having "no touch" investments and planting seeds for long-term wealth growth.
  2. The power of community and mentorship in shifting mindset and achieving success.
  3. Choosing friends and associates who are growth-oriented and can positively influence your financial journey.
  4. Finding work that you love and are passionate about to create financial rewards and opportunities for investment.
  5. Building a diversified investment portfolio with a mix of stocks, real estate, and secure investments, actively managed by experts.

Resources Mentioned

Interested in connecting with other like-minded individuals? Then join our VonFinch Private Capital Network.  Learn more at http://www.vonfinch.com/invest

About our Guest:

Adam Contos is a former CEO of RE/MAX and an experienced entrepreneur. Growing up in a working-class family, he broke free from traditional thinking and embraced the world of investing and entrepreneurship. Adam has a deep understanding of the power of active investing, building wealth, and surrounding himself with growth-minded individuals. With his diverse experience and success, he continues to inspire others to achieve financial freedom through smart investing and a purpose-driven approach to wealth creation.


 

CTAs

Are you looking for High-Performance Business & Mindset Coaching?  Schedule a call now and see how we can be of service to you. http://www.investormindset.com/discover

Establish your relationship with VonFinch now for exclusive invite-only opportunities. Schedule an introductory call now at http://www.vonfinch.com/call.

Download your free strategy guide, The Passive Investor Playbook at http://www.vonfinch.com/playbook

Are you looking for High-Performance Business & Mindset Coaching?  Schedule a call now and see how we can be of service to you. http://www.investormindset.com/discover

Investing to Hedge Against Inflation - Free online training at https://investormindset.com/start

Episode Transcription

Steven Pesavento  0:00  

Hi,

I'm Steven Pesavento, and welcome to the name your number podcast presented by the investor mindset. As someone who comes from a challenging childhood, I've spent my life seeking financial security, personal growth, and ultimately freedom, the freedom to not wake up worried about the next paycheck, but rather with the confidence of knowing that my passive income pays my bills without the need to think about it. When you name your number that you'll earn passively, that creates your ultimate quality of life, that I believe you've achieved real freedom. Welcome to my show. It's time to name your number.

It's supposed to be fun. I think a lot of business owners when they're running it, they get so stressed out and serious. Or maybe people who are working in a career or job, they forget that if they bring that energy and attitude of making it fun, if you don't like what you do, do something else, make a change. Welcome to the name your numbers show presented by the investor mindset, we're on a mission to create financial freedom for over a million investors. And when you name your number, the number you want to earn passively, every month that creates your ultimate quality of life, then I believe you've achieved real freedom. Now, let's get into the show. today. I'm excited to have Adam Kontos in the studio. How you doing today, Adam?

Adam Contos  1:23  

Great, Steven, thanks for having me. It's nice to see you. Yeah, I'm

Steven Pesavento  1:26  

excited to get into it. For those of you who don't know, Adam, it recently retired as a CEO and board of directors of REMAX holdings, one of the largest real estate firms out there. And he's really known as the CEO of the people. And he's been able to lead and grow teams in that business and the franchise and, and your story is really inspiring. And so I'm really excited to talk about the vision and the life that you're creating, and, and really understand how to think from that CEO perspective, as we get into things today. Well, I'm

Adam Contos  2:03  

looking forward to it. And yeah, this is, it's an interesting topic. It's one I hear a lot about from my friends, and I can't wait to dive into it with you.

Steven Pesavento  2:11  

Yeah. So let's start off on more of a personal note by looking back at earlier in your life, what events or influences from your childhood shaped who you are today, and how has that played a role on your money or investing journey?

Adam Contos  2:26  

Well, I love this question. So just a little bit about myself that day, after I graduated high school, I joined the Marines. I spent a little time in the Marines and in the marine reserves, and got into law enforcement. After that I was third generation law enforcement. My father was a federal law enforcement officer, my grandfather was a local law enforcement officer in Ohio. But he worked with the feds, he actually worked with Eliot Ness. So you know, when you look at some of those things, you know, my dad actually did what Eliot Ness did. So it was kind of funny, I got into that. I did 11 years full time, from a family of Blue Bloods, family of cops, and I still volunteer at a local law enforcement agency. That's kind of my give back. But um, I learned a lot going through kind of that government piece, and my dad was very structured and how he approached finances, although we weren't really taught very well how to create wealth, because we were taught how to create a retirement plan based upon a pension process, or something of that nature, which that's not creating wealth. You know, for everybody out there, creating wealth is creating, you know, massive levels of growth over many years in investments and, you know, creating assets and things of that nature. And it's great if you can come up with a 401 K or pension but, but for crying out loud, I wanted to do more than that. And I was an entrepreneur, so I started my own businesses. I started an online business in the late 90s, which taught me about supply chain and drop shipping and dealing with a kind of a mindset in the late 90s. My customer base was predominantly government, and nobody wanted to buy anything online. They didn't trust the internet at that point. It's not going to stick around, you know, things like that. But we don't know what happened there. And then I got into consulting, I started a consulting firm doing counterterrorism training and homeland security consulting. And that blew up, I sold a consulting product I created to the real estate space, and really caught the entrepreneurial bug when I was in the real estate space because it is one and a half million entrepreneurs out there. You know, they're, they're broke every day until they sell a house and then they have to go out and find another one and another one in another one and another buyer. So it's a fascinating space. But there's also a lot of good use of money and a lot of bad use of money when it comes to the entrepreneur space because a lot of people just, you know, oh, I made a bigger commission. I'm going to live to those means that that bigger commission, and then you don't make it again. And now you're upside down. So all of these different things and my mentor Dave liniger, who is the founder of REMAX, he, he had me read a few financial preparation books, financial wellness books, like Richest Man in Babylon, and Three Feet From Gold and Rich Dad, Poor Dad, and you know, some of these, some of the basics that you come up with in life. And, and then the friend of mine, Darren Hardy wrote a book called The compound effect. And I really started learning about that. It's, it's just fascinating when you look at, if you put your education to your finances, your finances can grow like your mind is growing like your education is growing. So all of that played together to put me where I'm at. Now, we're investing in businesses, I left REMAX like you had mentioned, Sarbanes Oxley says, I can't do business with somebody who's, I can't have a business partner, who's also our largest shareholder. So I'm like, Okay, that's cool. You know, I'm, I'm wanting to follow the rules. And, you know, we wanted to go out and have some fun, because you'll get much more time. So go make what you got. And so we've been buying franchise businesses, which traded good multiples and have good scalability, and you can create really good wealth on the franchisor and franchisee and regional owner sides.

Steven Pesavento  6:26  

Yeah, it's so interesting, too, because, you know, you grew up that kind of working class, middle class, you know, son of police officers and feds. And so you really learn that traditional way of thinking, go to school, get a job, you know, work towards a 401 k or a pension and gold watch and hope that someone else is going to take care of you. What was it along the way that led you to starting to think differently, to break that mold and realize that business entrepreneurship investing was going to be a necessary piece of really getting into the life that you wanted to create.

Adam Contos  7:03  

So I mentioned Dave Lineker, my mentor, he told me about a, a philosophy that he had, and he has not just built great and massive businesses, but he's also create great creative, great investments that have paid him back very extensively. And he always told me a couple things, one of which is have your no touches in this world is what he called them. And that was money that you put away, that you don't touch you, that's you're planting seeds. And if you go and mess with those seeds, they'll never grow. So I first learned that concept where I was, I was just watching a 401 K and going, Oh, I got my match at the end of the year or something like that. And you're right, it was, oh, now I'm five years now I'm 10 years, and you get the pen or the watch or the you know, the little trinket or whatever they give you at the Christmas party to say thanks for for coming. But you know, I really learned about it when I started seeing what true growth of wealth can create. And I don't mean, he who dies with the most toys situation, I mean, the person who can have enough to give back to their communities who can put their kids through good schools, and I'm a two time college dropout. By the way, I eventually went back and got my MBA, but I was, you know, kind of bootstrapping life early on. You know, I owned a house by the time I was 22. But it was, you know, was like 100,000, our house. And I was bootstrapping myself working extra duty jobs and things like that. There had to be a better way. And I want you to dip your toe in the pond of hanging out with some people who've done it, who've said you can do it too. You break those barriers, the glass ceiling went away. And I thought I can be as wealthy and successful as I want to be.

Steven Pesavento  9:01  

Yeah, it's when you start getting around successful people that you start realizing that it's possible for you to achieve that same success. It's the power of community, the power of being around great mentors. It's like, if you're thinking about changing your mindset, your mindset is your thoughts and beliefs that directly lead to the actions you take. And therefore the outcomes you experience. And those really come from your life experiences. It takes kind of getting into community it takes listening to shows like this, going to meetups, going to masterminds, connecting with great mentors that allows you to then step in and see oh, well, hey, if they can do it, I can do it. And actually start making some of those changes in your life.

Adam Contos  9:43  

Yeah, Stephen. Jim Rohn put it best. I think when he said we're the average of the five people we spend the most time with. And if you take in, have all those five people put their bank accounts or their you know, their financial statement on the table. Where are you at? Uh, and I'm not saying that you should pick your friends based on how much money they have. But for crying out loud, how do you pick your friends, I mean, you know, it's when you look at the world we live in, you know, the, the world needs every part of society. And we have, you know, we have people that dig ditches for a living, and you know, what they hang out with people who dig ditches for a living. And that's great. They love it, they're happy, they get together on weekends, have a barbecue, you know, crack a beer, go to a game, whatever it might be. But, you know, none of them have a yacht or anything like that. And you know, you're and not that that's the end all be all. But which part of life do you want to live in? We can be whatever we want to be, we just have to choose to go there. And that's Jim Rohn. was right. Yeah, go pick the five people that you want to be like. So, you know, I've surround myself with people who love to grow, people who love to give people who are kind. And that's, you know, that's success. Those people have become very wealthy in what they do. And we all share ideas on how to do that.

Steven Pesavento  11:12  

Yeah, I love that. I always call that focusing on growth, giving and gratitude, it's like, you're gonna live from that place, and you surround yourself with other people who are like that, they help make you more of that kind of a person, if you're hanging around, a bunch of people are happy where they're at, they're not really looking to move forward, then you're gonna start falling into that complacency. But if you're around a bunch of people who are growing and learning, you're going to be more excited about doing that. Same with giving. Same with living with kindness and gratitude. I think it's super important. So you worked a long portion of your career for REMAX helping to grow that company and to being one of the largest real estate platforms out there. Talk to me a little bit about, about your path towards financial freedom, how much of your financial freedom that you have achieved came from the business that you really invested your life to help build? And how did you look at investing playing a role, knowing that you had a great mentor who was investing around you, I'd love to learn from some of those lessons that that you learn from, from your mentor?

Adam Contos  12:20  

Well, when you when you work for a public company, and we went public, probably eight years after I started there, so we had a 401k match. And you know, you'd have bonus programs and things like that, and I knew that if I worked towards, you know, hitting bonuses, hitting numbers, things of that nature, I would be rewarded, and it would give me an opportunity to invest that money. So it was a combination of that, as well, as, you know, you have other smaller income streams here and there. You know, I did some keynote speaking every now and then, or some coaching every now and then. And it's it's a function of, oh, I got this money, instead of going out. And, you know, sure, cool watches and pens and cars and stuff like that are great and fine, reward yourself. But make sure you're also rewarding your bank account when some you know, you get a bonus. So like my wife, and I would win a bonus would come in, she would get a bonus prize, I would get a bonus prize, the kids would get a bonus prize of some sort, like, you know, we would go to Disney or something like that. But the rest of that money went into investments. And I knew that as I continued to grow over time, with all of these investments, as well as any sort of stock or, you know, shares of the organization that were awarded, through hard work that way through equity awards. It was a combination of building it throughout that so was a lot of it from Remax. Yeah, because I wanted to be the best I could be at REMAX horse. And I knew if I was then I would have opportunities I you know, becoming the CEO, for instance. I mean, that's, you want to create wealth. And if you have an opportunity to go be a CEO, go do it for crying out loud, because it's it's definitely a good tailwind for that.

Steven Pesavento  14:07  

Yeah, no, I love that. I think a lot of people get it twisted. When they think about investing, they think, hey, well, I need to like stop working at my job, or that's the goal, or that's the plan. It can be if that's your goal is to be able to retire early, great. But oftentimes, if you can find work that you love, that you're passionate about, where you're growing, where you're learning, where you're surrounded by other people, we're all doing the same, you can be rewarded very well financially and then have the opportunity to then funnel that money into assets that pay you. So let's talk a little bit about that from from an investment perspective. What kind of investments have you liked, obviously, you work for a public company, you probably own a lot of stock in that company and other companies in the markets. What other types of things have you looked at? Have you been owning real estate that you own and manage? Have you invested in funds and syndications other types of private equity? What types of deals have you liked that have been, you know, worked out? Well,

Adam Contos  15:05  

for you? Well, I'll tell you the probably one of the best things I've ever done is hire a really, really good money manager. So I do utilize one of the largest wealth banks out there to, to manage a lot of my wealth, but it's active with me. I mean, we, we have conversations constantly about what's going on in the markets. I'm very aware, you know, a lot of people are like, they put their money someplace, and they leave it there. And they're like, Oh, I, you know, after 20 years, I'll have enough for retirement, which is, that's a bunch of garbage, because things change, I mean, even large fortune 500 companies go out of business. So you have to be active and aware and secure and diversified in what you're doing. So, you know, one of the one of the best things I ever did was hire somebody to do that for me. And he manages, he's got access to my cash. And we have a whole bunch of short term bonds and things that I can, I can access relatively quickly, but also have some long term, dividend paying, you know, value stocks, in really good organizations in a diversified manner. I'm a big fan of just finding good dividend paying stocks and just continuing to roll those things, you know, don't, don't go after them unless you need them. And you should be living in a means where you don't need to touch those things, but that you can keep adding to them. You know, everybody's like, I want passive income, I'm like, don't you want to have purpose, because our you know, that's cool if you want to go sit on the beach every day, but I go to the beach like six times a year, and I go to the mountains like 20 times a year. And I love having purpose of building businesses and investing my money and having the scorecard of my my successes and my goals and things like that. So. So it's a combination, I've got probably a third in real estate that my wife and I have, she was a real estate agent. So you know, we were good there. It's done very, very well, for us, we've probably tripled or quadrupled that value in in the short term, you know, over the past call it a decade or so. But ultimately, a lot of our secure investments and you know, we do have a, we have a risk community around everything we do, we have some that are risky, some that are risky. But you know, we also have the ability to say, I've got the cash if I need to for, you know, if the entire economy falls apart, I can survive. I'm good. And I think you just have to look at it holistically from a big picture perspective, be diversified, be safe. You know, you got all these people that ran out, maxed out their credit cards out on NF T's and Bitcoin, and what happened to them? And I'll be the, I'll be the first to tell you, I don't have any crypto. But I was like this close to getting into crypto. Yeah. And I'm like, no, okay, well, you know, I didn't know anything about it, that I know everything, everything about all the businesses I'm in. So I'm not blind to what we're investing in, and is diversified in, it's kind of fun to play with.

Steven Pesavento  18:18  

Well, there's a bunch of gold within there, I encourage listeners to really rewind back and listen to it again. But one thing that I think you pointed out is that you've got an amazing money manager, you've got an amazing team of people who are experts, and you're actively managing those investments, meaning you're not just placing them and praying that it's all going to work out, you have somebody who is an expert in understanding where your money should be, and you're actively a part of that discussion, making those decisions. I think a lot of people they go and get a financial advisor, and if they don't have the knowledge themselves to be able to ask the right questions and be able to make those decisions can put them in a bad position.

Adam Contos  18:59  

Right. And I'll be the first one to tell you that. I know a lot of people who've gotten into, you know, being financial advisors. And there's nothing more scary than like when your cousin says, Hey, I, I got my certification. And I'd love to manage your money for you. And you look at me, like you're driving a, you know, a 2001, you know, piece of junk car with 300,000 miles on it, because you can't afford to get a new one. And you're living in an apartment, where's your money? So it's, that was one of my questions of my financial advisor is whose money do you manage? How much do you have? And show me your track record here? And then what resources do you have because, you know, something happens to him. He's got a team and you're you hit the nail on the head. It's it's a good solid team of people. The I mean, there's an attorney on there, there's analysts on there there's, you know, a constant IRS that I can pick up the phone and go, Hey, what's going on with this? Send me this, or, here's the other reality is I can borrow against me, there's money for great interest rates to any of my investments and pick up the phone call, I need $2 million to go buy this place. And they're like, Okay, we'll send it to you right now. So I mean, it's, it's about the big picture of knowing how to do it, right. And I would challenge anybody who's watching YouTube videos and say, Oh, I'm gonna go do that, too. Just pump the brakes for a second, and go figure out who's a professional that can help you with this. Sure you pay a little commission. But for crying out loud, they should be making you money instead of costing your money.

Steven Pesavento  20:38  

Yeah, absolutely. I agree. I think one of the things is people get excited about investing. And and I believe it's something to get excited about. But it's so important to actually pause, invest in yourself, start learning some of the key skills and knowledge that you need to be able to make good decisions, to be able to find good, supportive team members, experts who are great at what they do, so that when you do make those decisions to invest, it's from a place of confidence, instead of making a bad investment, and then thinking there's something wrong with investing when it actually comes down to where you started from. But there's something else that you you mentioned, that I think is really important to underline. And you really alluded to it. But it's really kind of this dream life, vision, the kind of life that you want to live, you mentioned that you want to have purpose and you want to have growth, and you want to be working towards that mission, a lot of successful people that I talk with, aren't looking to go hang out on a beach and retire early. And so I absolutely relate to that. I think it's so important for people to get clear on what they want, and why they want it and get clear on what's the purpose of the investments. Because, you know, for me, the reason that passive income is important is that I'm building a mission based business, and I'm going to keep grinding, I'm going to keep working, and I'm going to keep enjoying the process. I don't ever plan on stopping. But I do know just from real life personal experience that, you know, life can be shorter than we think it's going to be I, you know, maybe three or four years ago, three and a half years ago, at this point, my sister passed away in a car accident, I think when that happened, and you lose somebody so close to you, my younger sister, it makes you realize just how fragile life can be. And that it's actually these kind of things are inevitable. And I don't say that from a place of let's be negative. But realistically, anything can happen any time. And so the reason that it's important to be smart with your investments, and to make passive income, or at least make sure that your family can be taken care of if something happens to you. But what I'd love to hear from you is a little bit about what your life vision is what's important to you, I know you're in the middle of a transition, you're excited about acquiring new businesses, you've got an incredible skill set, you've you've built an incredible amount of wealth, like what's next for you? What emotions do you want to feel? What things do you want to do? What are you excited about? And kind of what's that mission that you're working towards?

Adam Contos  23:07  

So I I mean, first of all, I, I want to do what I want to do. And let me let me back up for a second. Darren Hardy told me that his definition is definition of success. I want to do what I want to do when I want to do it, where I want to do it, how I want to do it with who I want to do it with. Okay, so think about all those things. And, you know, all the guys that I know, I, I hang out, I'm part of a mastermind group, and there are multiple billionaires in this mastermind group, and a lot of guys creating a great deal of wealth. But I'll tell you, every single one of us has a lot of fun every day. Now you deal with challenges. Okay, you know, you have an employee who's stealing from you, or, you know, there's a litigation situation that pops up because somebody accuses somebody of something else who knows what it is. And there are these frustrations that happen. Maybe you have to, you know, remove a business entity from your portfolio, because it's underperforming, who knows what it is. But we all have challenges. We all look at these challenges as opportunities to learn about this aspect of business, there's always going to be something and a lot of people I think that are like, I want to retire early, I want to do nothing. They're trying to run from dealing with challenges in life, where the reality is we thrive on growing from those challenges. And this group of guys that I hang out with my business partners, we all look at it and go, you know, we have a saying it's supposed to be fun. So I'm just going to continue to do what I'm doing buying businesses, building businesses, investing in businesses, and I'll tell you, the best way to invest in a business is to own 100% of it, I believe, you know, because you don't have to do With explaining something to somebody else, you can make the decisions and just move on. But, but it's, it's about creating opportunities for other people. And Dave liniger told me once he goes, great business person creates an environment where people can be as successful as they want to be. Let me say that, again, you create an environment where people can be as successful as they want to be. And then you go find people who want to be extraordinarily freakin successful, and then help them grow. He's made more millionaires than probably anybody else on this planet, under REMAX, and with his business, franchises and things of that nature. You know, I'll be the first one to say that I've been able to follow in his footsteps, but it's because I've been able to learn from him. And I followed one of his key rules, and that's be a sponge, learn something new every day, but don't just learn something new. Give it back. So, I guess to circle around and really answer your question, Stephen. I'm buying businesses, I'm building businesses, I believe in scale. And it's, it can be frustrating at times. Sure. Because you You always run into challenges try getting a building permit these days. It's it's a little difficult. But, but it's fun. I mean, we just got a building permit yesterday on one of our new businesses. And we're like, all right, this is awesome. Now we get now we can go to a grand opening things like that. So you know, it's, it's a function of, you know, be an MIT Sloan talked about this with what is it enterprise leadership, this builder to broker. And so you, you become a builder in life. And then after you've been a really good builder in life, you've learned your craft and, and developed it really well, you start augmenting that with being a broker. So you're a builder and a broker, but you're brokering ideas, and you're brokering businesses, and you're brokering growth, as you're building yourself. And as you're building upon these things. So I live by those two words builder and broker, how do I do both of those things in order to grow the business? And we're going to, you know, I intend to buy with my partners here, probably a couple of businesses a year, we buy cashflow businesses, it's great, because as you, you know, you get this extra cash flow that, you know, at some point, you're, you have a great comfortable lifestyle. And all the rest of it just goes into investments in your life. Awesome.

Steven Pesavento  27:40  

Yeah, I love that. And I love what you talked about, in particular, that you're surrounded by other people who are on the same path who think like you think or building businesses themselves. And so you have that supportive network that really reinforces these beliefs. Something else that I really want to underline is that you talked about it supposed to, it's supposed to be fun. I think a lot of business owners when they're running it, they get so stressed out and serious. Or maybe people who are working in a career or job, they forget that if they bring that energy and attitude of making it fun, if you don't like what you do, do something else, make a change, like, I personally never really want to retire because I love what I do. And if I don't love what I do, I'm gonna change what I'm doing, I'm gonna find a different way to do it, and with different people, and really be in that kind of position, because from that place, there's always something new, there's always that growth that can happen. I feel like, if you stop growing, you're gonna start stop feeling that feeling of fulfillment, which I really do think is such a core piece, you have to be giving back and making an impact and doing something in the world to really be able to live up to your true purpose.

Adam Contos  28:53  

Right, and I want to, I want to expand on that purpose a little bit, because you mentioned your sister and her passing. A lot of people when we start talking about investments and stuff, and you know, you'll have people that sit down and listen to podcasts and YouTube channels till they're blue in the face, going, I'm going to learn about investment, there's going to be this magic pill in this whole thing. investment, investment investment, you know, you ask them what they do. And you know, my answer of what I do is I help people grow businesses, but I also live a great life. And we can't forsake the fact that time is precious. You can create more money, you can't create more time. And I mean, he's just, I'm, I'm of the age where I'm over 50 I look at my health. I look at a balance of my relationships. I look at you know, what's the nutrition I'm consuming how much water I mean, I got my giant water container here. You know, how do I do? Why not just make doing this making money fun? But how do I make life fun? And business is only 1/8 of your life, folks. So you know, are you sleeping well at night? Did you tell your partner, spouse, whoever it is, it's important to you in life that you love them today. I mean, they just take a moment and spend time with them. You know, I just went home for lunch. I live literally six minutes from here. I'm in the office. Now, we built our office right next to our neighborhoods, so we didn't have to go. And then we go home a lot. So I went home and hung out with my dogs, and sat, my house is in the woods, I sat in the woods and enjoyed the beautiful Colorado weather. So it's, it's not just about making money, it's about enjoying life. And if you're miserable in life, it doesn't matter how much money you make, or how little money you make or anything like that, you're still going to be miserable.

Steven Pesavento  31:00  

Yeah, it's so true. You know, I learned that early. I'm really grateful for it. I started making more money than I think my parents have ever made early after graduating college, and I realized I still have the same problems. I just had more money to deal with it. And so it was like, Okay, well, I need to look inside and figure out where is where are things off? Where can I grow? Where can I move forward? And, and things like that. But, Adam, this has been amazing. I've got one more question for you. But before I get there, will you tell folks how they can get in touch with you? Or where they can follow you?

Adam Contos  31:37  

Sure. Thanks, Steven, you can follow me at Adam Kahn toast.com. And that has a link to all of my social sites. I'm on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, would love for you to follow me on YouTube, grow my YouTube channel, with a lot of great, valuable information like this. It's at Adam Kontos CEO, or Adam at leadership factory, have a leadership course coming out talking about the soft skills of leadership. Because if you can properly motivate the people that are in your business, they will help you make more money. That's really important. Scale, your leadership skills, your income. So check me out there or just through Adam contests.com.

Steven Pesavento  32:20  

That's a no brainer, definitely go follow Adam and dive into some of that. This has been so much fun. Adam, in wrapping up, what would your advice, be for those listeners who are on that path towards creating their dream life and be able to reach that place, both financially and from all the other aspects of success? What advice would you leave him with?

Adam Contos  32:44  

Given to your investments as much as you can, I mean, it makes sure you are disciplined in doing so because lack of discipline, a lack of discipline creates lack of results. And if we consistently put in, call it, you know, 30% of our income into our investments, you will continue to grow that through the compound effect. A lot of wealth is going to be built over the next couple of years coming out of the recessionary period that the economic downturn, we're already starting to see that happen. So seek professional counsel. Hi, quad quality investment advisors do not really cost you money at all, they make you money. So go find somebody good. And tell them I want to learn, I want to invest, I want to grow, please help me and be kind about it. Because they want to work with people they want to work with. And if, if you're a jerk about it, they can work with you. So, you know, just I guess those little bits of advice. But ultimately, a big smile on your face is supposed to be fun. Have fun doing it, but keep doing it.

Steven Pesavento  33:51  

I love that. Well, Adam, it's been such a pleasure. Thanks all for listening, and we'll see on the next episode. Today's episode is sponsored by von Finch capital. If you're interested in investing alongside me in the same type of real estate opportunities that I personally invest in, then head over to Vaughn Finch capital and join their private investor network. You can do so at Vaughn finch.com/invest. Join me on that next deal. I look forward to seeing you on the inside. Thank you for listening. If you like what you heard, make sure to rate review, subscribe and share with a friend. Head over to the investor mindset.com to join the insider club where we share tools and strategies from the top investors and entrepreneurs and take it to the next level.