Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: This is not a drill.
This is the age of mine podcast.
Hey. Hey. Back again with Agent Mind Podcast. Today we're gonna go. We're gonna go financial on you. Not. It's not going to be boring, I promise. Wouldn't do that to you.
I have a great guest here today. I always love interviewing friends and especially friends that can bring a ton of value to agents out there. Everybody that's listening, someone who has been empowering business owners and entrepreneurs everywhere. Tiffany Vogel, thanks so much for. For being on the show. En. Your. Your company is energetic, cfo, and you got a great podcast, which we're going to talk about. But first, how. How's it going today?
[00:00:44] Speaker B: It's great, you know, can't complain. Also, it's about to snow again, so I don't know how about that. But we're making it.
[00:00:51] Speaker A: No one in Georgia.
[00:00:53] Speaker B: You know, that's the thing. Keep the kids in school.
[00:00:55] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Right. I know. Let's. Let's brine the roads.
[00:00:59] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:01:00] Speaker A: As they were. Cool. So. So thanks for coming on. And I know this can be.
Don't take offense. This can be a boring topic for a lot of people, but it's so important for people that run their own business, especially agents, oftentimes they get into the business and they don't realize that they're running a business. A business. So. And even if you've established you've kind of got hit in the head with the hammer and you've established that you're. You need to start paying attention to the actual running of a business and the financial side of things, there's still a lot that you can help with and advise on. So. And I like where you're going with it. So I'm. I'm going to stop talking. I'm going to let you give us. Give us the rundown of, like, what. What your. Your company is all about. Because I think it's a fresh company. I think it's very needed. So give us the rundown of what your company's about, what you do, how you help, and then we'll dig into the. To the. To the meat of it.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: Absolutely. Well, my goal is to not be the boring old finance person and to make this fun because it. It's so critical to the business, but it. Yeah, it. Looking at spreadsheets is a. Is a nightmare for a lot of people. And I like to look at it as I take the numbers and put them in a magic crystal ball that is my brain and convert it into something that you can actually use in your business.
And I mean 20 to 30% of our income goes to taxes. So that's a big thing I like to look at. I'm not a cpa, so the difference between what I do and a CPA as a CPA is going to look at that historical data that your company has and what you've been doing for the last year and put that into something the IRS can use. I like to look more at the strategy and the forward looking. So we look at the metrics. Are you making enough per deal? Are you spending too much? A lot of times I'll look at the overall systems to make sure that the infrastructure is in place. Do you have bank accounts designated for your business? And I love agents because they always buy my lunch as an investor, like they're looking for me as a client. And I've heard so many times, oh, this is a business expense. I'm not really paying for it. But you are. It is coming out of your net at the end of the day. So just making sure that we're looking at the finances from an overall perspective and then planning for the future.
[00:03:21] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. That's, that's funny that you mentioned that because it's, it's definitely not, it's not a free lunch. And it's like just because you can claim it on your taxes doesn't mean you always should claim it on your taxes, number one. And B, I don't, I don't think I curse. I'm, I'm talking way out of turn here. I should let you do all the talking on this. But I know that you can't claim 100% of meals either.
[00:03:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:03:43] Speaker A: So, so that's just, so that's just one little minor detail that is a huge misconception among agents. So I'm glad that, I'm glad you brought that up.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: Absolutely. It's 50% for meals. And I mean, yeah, it's, I have seen it so many times where people are like, oh, this doesn't really count as an expense. And the way I like to look at it is I get 20% off that thing that I'm expensing.
And I like to look at what am I already spending money on that I could write off.
[00:04:11] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:04:12] Speaker B: So for example, like if you're, you know, doing a photo shoot, you could write off having your hair done for your, you know, your company branding, but it's making sure that it aligns with the business and you're not just willy nilly writing off things just for the.
[00:04:25] Speaker A: Sake of It, Yeah, well, we could, well, you know, a ton of questions just flooded into my mind. It's like can I, can I, you know, claim my shoes on, on because I walk a lot or whatever. But we're not going to get into that, the details of that. I would suggest just a quick plug for you right away if you want more strategy on that, like reach out to Tiffany, all her contacts, me in the show notes, we'll talk about how to get a hold of you towards the end of the show for sure. But what, so let me, let me start here. I know you mentioned that you're not a cpa. So what's the difference between you and a, a CPA or a tax professional or even like a, a financial advisor.
[00:05:02] Speaker B: Yeah. So I like to pull bookkeepers into this conversation as well. So your bookkeeper is looking at the transactions and putting them into buckets. So you can say this is meals, this is advertising, wherever it should go. Then the CPA is going to take all that data, compile it nicely, send it to the irs, probably work on some tax strategy with you. Where I come in as I'm looking at your KPIs, your key performance indicators, what metrics should you be tracking?
And sometimes we pull like your time into that component as well. For agents in particular, one of the things I would love to play around with is what kind of client is best suited for your business. Because we all know, I mean I'm a real estate investor. I know so many investors who will take agents around to a hundred houses and never do a deal with them. I know, analyzing.
[00:05:52] Speaker A: I've been that agent.
[00:05:53] Speaker B: I know, I know. And I mean it's, it's brutal. As you know, our first time home buyer is the right client for you and how you advertise and market and you know, service people. So it's kind of a look at the overall picture of the business and the time, the energy and the money. And I incorporate a lot of like the woo woo spiritual stuff within my business because it's had a huge impact on me. And I mean my husband Eric and I built On Purpose Investor, which is helping with the mindset stuff. So I've kind of taken that and compiled it into the finance because when we all have money stories and things that we do subconsciously that come into play and if you don't catch those things, you can wind up blowing through paychecks without even really knowing it.
[00:06:40] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because I think it was your, your first episode or your Second episode, you really dove into mindset.
[00:06:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:06:48] Speaker A: And like money and all that stuff. And it really made me think of, I've been digging into like my own cognitive dissonance lately where like, you know, I have two conflicting beliefs that are like stuffed in my subconscious and because of that they like, I can't like move forward. Like that's the, I guess the very, very, very, the fifth grade level or the, the second grade level of what cognitive dissonance is. Yeah, but, yeah, and, and you, you mentioned that in that episode and yes, I don't think you use the word cognitive dissonance. Dissonance. But you, you definitely said like you, we're, we're trapped by our beliefs. Yeah, and I'm paraphrasing but, and it's, it's so true. Like you, you, if you, you can believe that you can do it, but if you don't deep down believe you can do it and you don't change that, that subconscious mindset, then you're, you're, you're, it's going to be hard for you to kind of break through that. So you can really kind of do it. It's, you got to do a little bit of self searching work and all that stuff. Like what do you expound on that a little bit?
[00:07:48] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean what pattern I realized in our life is we're all or nothing with my time and energy and with our money. So as a real estate investor we would buy a house, fix it up, deploy everything. I mean loan on 401ks, credit cards. We would, I mean this last round on the Airbnb we've been working, we got to where we were so tapped out we didn't know if we were going to make the mortgage payment. And I mean they give you a grace period. So like we would have been fine, but we closed our refinance literally the day our mortgage was due. And I told my husband, I can't keep doing this. You know, we've got two kids and one on the way and our time was the same thing. I mean we would put all of our time into it. So that's what I'm saying. It's not just money, it's your energy and time as well that comes into the pattern. And I mean I can see that copying for agents as well. Like you go all in especially, you know, we're coming up on spring and that time of year is the best time for activity.
And how can we smooth if we can't smooth the income necessarily, but we can smooth how you're pulling it into your personal life and have a plan. So, you know, let's say 60% of your sales come in Q2. Well, let's make sure we're not pulling all that money and spending it personally and have a plan so that, you know, December, you still have an income to pay yourself.
[00:09:10] Speaker A: Yeah, that's. That's a good point. And I, I do know, like, budgeting is. Is a huge. A huge challenge.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: That's a bad word.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: Us agents, we don't like that word.
[00:09:21] Speaker B: No one likes the word.
[00:09:22] Speaker A: No one likes the word. However, I see so many agents, and I've done it myself. I fall in this trap myself where I will put out some money for marketing, whether it's buying online leads or Facebook ads or whatever. The. The thing is that I'm spending money on. And then I'll hit like a, you know, I'll hit January, December, January, and there's a little bit of a dry spell. And all of a sudden I retract and I'm like, I can't spend all this money. And I stop. I stop the marketing. I stop buying leads. I see agents do that all the time. And then. Then it's like, okay, now what? Now you don't have the, The. The pipeline engine that fills your pipeline. So what now what do you do? So it's like a. It's a overcorrect often.
[00:10:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:03] Speaker A: So like, planning and just having a little bit of thought beforehand is. Would be huge. So such a game changer. Yeah.
[00:10:12] Speaker B: Yeah. I like to look at projections, not budgets, because what you typically spend may not be what you want to spend in the future.
And let's say, like, you want to bring in a transaction coordinator or a virtual assistant or, you know, add some software. We can put that into the projection and see how does that impact your cash flow and how does it impact your profit. So they're two different things. And at the end of the day, like, what you report to the IRS is not necessarily what comes in your pocket. So, like, for example, if you're paying a loan and you're paying interest and the loan pay down, that loan pay down doesn't show up to the irs, but you feel it out of your checkbook. So I like to look at a holistic view of what's the cash situation.
And let's, you know, we can forecast, oh, we think we're going to sell this many houses at this price point and quickly come up with a rough estimate, and then we can adjust our expenses to align with that to make sure that you're taking home what you want to take home and making sure you have that reserve so you can pay the marketing in January.
Because let's be real, if you stop marketing in December and January, that's going to hurt you in April. Home sales are ticking up when you really want that marketing.
[00:11:24] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. And, and I'll tell. I do want to get into like kind of the, the basics of just briefly touch on like the financial.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:34] Speaker A: Worksheets, I suppose. But before we get there, I'm, I'm going to give you a pattern. And, and I think that agents listening are going to, they're going to relate to this. I know some of them will for sure. So we, we go gangbusters. We have commissions coming in pretty much all summer long. We're pretty good to go and we're, then we're paying the bills.
We take a vacation because we deserve it. And then Christmas comes and there's if, if you got kids like me in high school and middle school, it's like they just get more expensive as time goes on. So like there's those surprise expenses from the, you know, every day the letter come home from school is like, we need $5 for X treat for the teacher or 15 for this. We could talk about that all day. But then you, you get to the end of the year and you kind of start running out of money and your closings kind of slow down. Then tax season comes, so you scramble, you file an extension and then you got to get your first couple of closings to, to cover your tax bill. And it's like, it's, you're like chasing it. I, for a long time I felt like I was chasing my tax bill. It was. And like just chasing my bills and just kind of like just treading water honestly.
And that's a horrible feeling. For sure.
[00:12:50] Speaker B: It is. And that's the pattern we've lived with. Our investing is just going all in and it's not a fun place to be.
[00:12:58] Speaker A: Yeah. And it, and it's, it go. It holds true for a lot of like small business owners. You know, if you're a baker and you open a bakery, it's, you know that running a business and running a bake shop is not something that you've developed skill set at. So there's a lot of surprises in there. I think the same thing is with, with any, any business that you open or any business that you, that you get into. And being a real estate agent, if you don't believe that you are Running your own business and you're a small business owner. Like you have to make that mindset shift.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:13:29] Speaker A: Otherwise you're gonna, you're gonna run into, into some trouble. Believe me. I give you some stories.
[00:13:34] Speaker B: It's an expensive hobby at that point. If, yeah, as a business, definitely.
[00:13:38] Speaker A: And so cool. So let's get, let's, let's dig into the, to like, how do we set this up? Like, give us the, like the like pre college level because you, you got your masters from Georgetown. So I can't, I can't talk on that level. I wish I could, but I can't. So give me the, the like the 8th grade level of what, like what's a P and L cash flow sheet, balance sheet. Like how does that all work together and how is it helpful for us?
[00:14:03] Speaker B: Well, even before you get to that, I think it's having the foundation of designated bank accounts and credit cards, if you use credit cards for your business and then having some kind of software. I mean you can do the Excel sheet game, but it's a pain in the butt on the real estate investor side. I built out a framework for them to use Google Sheet for up to five properties because past that it is not worth the headache of tracking those expenses. But as an agent, you have active income and active expenses. With a rental property, you might have a repair every six months. So it's a little easier to track that in Excel or Google Sheets. But I would recommend getting some kind of software. QuickBooks is kind of the gold standard for accountants. I hate it. I think it's not user friendly for a business owner and that's one thing.
[00:14:52] Speaker A: Yeah, I kind of, I struggle with QuickBooks.
[00:14:55] Speaker B: It's terrible. I mean I'm in this stuff and love it and I hate QuickBooks.
[00:14:58] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:14:59] Speaker B: But I'm an entrepreneur and business owner first, not an accountant. And the accountants like it because it feeds into their back end system and makes their life easier. So I personally, for our active income, we use a tool called Wave W A V E And it, I think it's free still, they might have added a price to it. But if there is a price, it's maybe $20 a month. QuickBooks starts I think at 50amonth or something. It's expensive and it's cumbersome. But Wave is super easy to use and I link in my bank accounts and I can go in once a month or however often I feel like it and just check off, categorize whatever I need to do, add. You can upload receipts directly. So you have all that tracked and it spits out a P and L, a balance sheet, cash flow statement, and anything else you might potentially want.
I would start with that is just making sure you have the bank accounts one, so that when you're feeding it to the accounting software, you're not pulling in all of, like, the kid stuff and all the, you know, personal expenses. It just makes life easier.
[00:16:03] Speaker A: So do you recommend. Of course we're gonna. We're gonna tread the line of. Of financial advising and advice. But as a business owner, like one business owner to the next, would you advise that we set up ourselves as a LLC or some kind of. Of. Of company that's like, separate from our personal. Because I know a lot of agents, they just get their. They get direct deposit right into their personal checking from their.
[00:16:28] Speaker B: I am. I am not an attorney. I'm not a cpa. One of our mentors says he has two licenses, a marriage license and driver's license. So, yes, absolutely. Coming as a layman, someone who's just been in the business. So not official advice, but I would have an llc because, I mean, I don't know what the liability side is as an agent, but if something were to happen and someone tries to sue you, you want it to go through that entity and not to yourself personally.
[00:16:55] Speaker A: Yeah, there's a level of protection and.
[00:16:58] Speaker B: It'S cheap and it's really not hard to do. Then you'll need an EIN, which you can get from the IRS in about 10 minutes. I don't recommend paying an attorney a lot of money for this. I'm sure there's YouTube videos. It's. I mean, within. I can start an LLC in Ein in an afternoon and get a credit card. I mean, it's pretty straightforward.
So I would just caution. Don't pay an attorney thousands of dollars to set this up.
[00:17:22] Speaker A: Yeah, it is. It's fairly easy just to Kind of. Just to figure it out. It is. It is pretty easy. I used legal Zoom for my first llc. It was. It is what it is. But, yeah, they just. They just try to sell you more stuff. They upsell and upsell, which you don't need to take any of that. Just set the LLC up, make yourself the. The. What is it? The manager, and then.
[00:17:43] Speaker B: Yep. And you need an operating agreement. And honestly, as an agent, you're in an attorney's office probably most days. Ask the attorney that you close with if they can give you an LLC operating agreement. I guarantee. I mean, I can't guarantee, but the attorneys I know would just give you one. Because it's boilerplate and nothing crazy.
[00:18:00] Speaker A: Yeah. And I, I have, I know that for a fact. I know several closing attorneys that have done that for a fact for agents, for sure. So check. It doesn't hurt to ask, that's for sure.
[00:18:09] Speaker B: Absolutely. I mean, and if that one closing attorney won't do it, I'm sure another one would.
[00:18:13] Speaker A: So, yeah, somebody will.
[00:18:15] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:18:15] Speaker A: Yeah. So the, so we got our, so we got our systems kind of set up and it's.
Whether you're LLC or not, it, it makes so much sense to track your expenses and your income because if you're not, if you're not paying attention to it, if you're not tracking it, it means you're not paying attention to it. And if you're not paying attention to it, that's. Something is going to go awry somewhere. I mean, you might, you might luck out for a couple years, but somewhere along the line something's gonna, something's gonna happen that's gonna be really a tough, tough tangle to get out of.
[00:18:49] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:50] Speaker A: So.
[00:18:50] Speaker B: Well, and I think there's a level too of what if you could work the same number of deals a year but take home, double the income just in knowing where your money is going and optimizing for taxes and making sure you're writing off the right things and just having a strategy around it.
[00:19:07] Speaker A: I was about to say that the strategy to it, and, and that's something that you can, you can absolutely help with is kind of setting up what.
When. Once you're tracking and you see all that, see your numbers, it's much easier to, to make tweaks to your approach. And you can see things that aren't working, you can see things that are working. And even a, a subtle change in the, as a real estate agent, even a subtle change in just a few thousand dollars increase in your average sale price per transaction can mean a ton of money at the end of the year. So it's like just little tweaks like that.
[00:19:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:43] Speaker A: So I'm, I'm glad. I'm happy. I don't know of any other person or company that is, that has kind of set up this coaching financially for small business owners because you do other, you don't just do real estate. Right. You do other.
[00:19:57] Speaker B: Right. It's small business. I would say under a million dollars in revenue is kind of the sweet spot.
[00:20:02] Speaker A: Gotcha.
[00:20:02] Speaker B: And I mean, it came about because we had enough real estate that I left my job and was sitting around and I missed this component in my Business, because there's not a whole lot to analyze. I mean, we do an annual portfolio review to see if we need to make some. Some exchanges or trades. But I missed it. And I realized, like, it's not something business owners just know. I mean, I have a super unique skill in that. I love this stuff and I'm good at it. I mean, I was the kid doing long division just for fun in elementary school.
[00:20:32] Speaker A: Weirdo.
[00:20:34] Speaker B: I know. But you know what I've learned? Like, let's leverage that to help other people.
[00:20:38] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:38] Speaker B: And take that weirdo ness and apply it. And Yeah, I love. I mean, I, I had a client in real estate. They were flipping and doing rentals, and they were keeping too many of the rentals so they couldn't cover their overhead. And they're making that couple hundred dollars a month forever, which is nice. But they couldn't afford $300 in camping equipment to go out with their kids.
[00:21:00] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: You realized real fast. Oh, you just need to make sure you're flipping a couple houses a quarter and then you can cover that overhead and then you can keep whatever.
[00:21:09] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:21:09] Speaker B: So that one mindset shift for them change their whole life. Because now they have consistent cash flow to cover the overhead and they're growing their rental portfolio. But they were so cash poor and they had all this equity, but they couldn't eat the equity. And yeah, it's just these small tweaks. But you don't see it if you don't have the numbers for one. And just my experience and the fact that I love this stuff, I can just see things that most business owners aren't gonna pick up initially.
[00:21:37] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, I like is that like we, as real estate agents, we know that hiring a coach is important.
And what, what a real estate coach does is completely different than what, what you can provide. And what. Because a real estate coach is going to, you know, teach you. Hopefully teach you how to go hunt for leads, get leads, develop a, A sphere of influence, you know, and get, teach you how to get business coming in and teach you how to build a pipeline. But. But then what? Like, it's not all of them. Maybe a rare few can kind of really teach you that, that specifics of now that you're, you're, you're, you're running, you got revenue coming in now. How do we maximize that and how do we tweak it so that you get to keep. Keep more of your money.
[00:22:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:22:21] Speaker A: And, and work less. Really? Is what, what everybody, I think, wants. Absolutely.
[00:22:25] Speaker B: It doesn't matter. How much you bring in. It's what you keep for your family at the end of the day. And yeah, I mean, in our investor circles, the people that are like, oh, I have a hundred doors, and it's like, cool, but you're working to the point of stressing yourself out, and you're probably gonna have a heart attack. And, you know, there's so many secondary effects. You don't see your kids. But if you could tweak that and have a handful of doors that's enough and is optimized, then you have more time to do what you want to do and you're not hustling, chasing the wrong type of client.
[00:22:56] Speaker A: Yeah. 100. And I see that a lot. I see agents get burnt out because they're. They feel like they have to work 24 7.
And I get. I like, cringe when I jump. I'm a part of a bunch of Facebook groups with real estate agents. I don't know why, because it gives me anxiety.
But there's one. Somebody will always say, there's always. Every few days, there's always a comment about a client. And I'm kind of very generalizing here. A client has. Has crossed boundaries of personal time with an agent. And then a majority of the comments on that post is, well, this is. This is 247 job. If you can't. If you can't handle it, you're in the wrong business. And mobile. I'm like, that's. Whoa. Like, what a big misconception. Like, we don't have to. You don't have to do that. You don't have to be 24 running 24 7. But you do have to figure out how to not do that. I mean, there is hustle involved, and you do have to. You do have to turn it on and perform, and you do have to work hard, but you shouldn't have to work at, you know, full. Full throttle for. For 24 7. It's just. You're gonna. You're gonna kill yourself that way.
[00:24:03] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, that's the boundaries you definitely have to set.
[00:24:05] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. So tell us about your. Your coaching program. And you have a. You have a DIY version as well, and give us the details on that.
[00:24:14] Speaker B: Yeah. So I am pregnant, expecting a baby in late June.
[00:24:18] Speaker A: That's right. Congratulations.
[00:24:19] Speaker B: Thank you. Three for three on boys. So it's just the chaos, and I'm so excited. I don't have to buy more clothes or.
[00:24:27] Speaker A: I hear you.
[00:24:28] Speaker B: Monster Jam and Dinosaurs for a very long time.
So I. I've had to pivot a little bit just given the timeline because I, I've got like five months until I need to have a baby.
So I'm just going to do one to one coaching right now.
[00:24:44] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:24:45] Speaker B: The IY will probably come either later in the year or early next year.
I'm also building out a retreat. So we have these awesome cabins up in Helen, Georgia.
My plan there attest to that.
[00:24:58] Speaker A: They're. They look amazing. I need to go visit. But the pictures are amazing. I watched the whole process.
[00:25:03] Speaker B: Yeah. Oh it was a process but we, I want to use that space and that was part of our intention was to make this into a retreat space for us and masterminds or you know, whatever makes sense. And it's just, there's just such a wonderful feeling being up there. So I'm going to host a retreat where we're going to dig into those stages of wealth. So we start with, you know, what you need monthly to all the way up to you have a few money and talk through those stages. Help people figure out exactly where they are in those stages. So we'll build out the P and L and the balance sheet or net worth statement is really what it is and see where you land on that scale and then dive deep into how to get you to that next phase. So if it's cash flow management, debt management, just knowing how to read the financials, whatever it is, we're just going to whiteboard it and kind of go back to basics and meet people where they're at because you know, some people might have it all figured out and some people might be starting at zero and I want to be able to address all of that. So yeah, the people who have it all figured out probably are more of a candidate for the one to one just because we'll. That's where I'll build out like a CFO dashboard and we'll build out the forecast and projections and things like that. So just helping business owners get the clarity on their financials. If they need that infrastructure in place of getting the bank accounts and the accounting software and things like that, I'd help with that. It's just really meeting people where they are and helping them reach that next level financially.
[00:26:36] Speaker A: That's right. I, I love the idea of the retreat. That's a, that's awesome. And I, I have to say I love the name also Energetic cfo because like I know with me and I know a lot of people when they think about finances and managing money, it's like it's it's. It can be draining, emotionally draining and stressful and anxiety riddled. So. And it reminds me of the book by Dan Sullivan. I don't know if you're familiar who, not how.
[00:27:02] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:27:03] Speaker A: Where. Don't ask how you're going to do it. Like just ask who's going to help me figure this out. And like here you are. That's your, this is what you love to do. This is your wheelhouse. This is your flow state. So I would recommend everybody and anybody to at least have a conversation with you.
[00:27:19] Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. I can drop my calendar link in the show notes.
[00:27:23] Speaker A: Cool.
[00:27:24] Speaker B: If you want to hop on, call, just chat and see if it's something that know is a good fit. I'd love to learn more about your business and your family and all that and see how it aligns.
[00:27:34] Speaker A: I love it. And you're also going to be at. I got an event coming up with the Real Estate Collaborative Network on February 6th in Fayetteville, Georgia, just south of the Airport Line Creek bus barn. You'll be there?
[00:27:46] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:27:47] Speaker A: Which is, is, is exciting. I can't wait to introduce you to as many people as I can because I do think it. Sometimes I think it's an.
Financials for us is kind of an afterthought a lot. We're like, we're just trying to figure out how to, how to get to the closing table. How do we get a deal. Like that's a lot of agents are there but it's never too early to really start thinking about this and managing your finances because your intention is to get to the closing table again and again and again and again. And if you don't have at least a little bit of thought put into how that, where that money's gonna, how that money's gonna work for you and what that money's gonna do and where it's gonna go and how are you going to reinvest it and all the, the whole list of things like then you're definitely going to run into trouble. And I off. When I first got in real estate, I often kind of went back to. Went back to zero. You know, I went back to the beginning. Like man, I got. I had some momentum. I did a couple dumb things with, with money. Thought that I was gonna, you know, I was a sucker for every. Everybody that that called me. Yeah. And I was like, I got leads for you. It's guaranteed. Guaranteed closings. Like oh great. Yeah. How much? 300 bucks. No problem. Here you go. But I'm also the guy at a Baseball game. Like every vendor that walks by, I'm like, peanuts? Yeah. Soda? Yeah. Cotton candy? Yeah, right here. So I'm like, I'm that guy. But they can see me coming from a mile away. But I think a lot of people get, get into that circle cycle of, of, of, gosh, what do I do now and then.
[00:29:18] Speaker B: Yeah, well, and just to add, you know, tax time was always stressful for us until we took this and put my frameworks that I know I was supposed to do because, I mean, as a business owner, I didn't apply it initially because it was just me and my husband, like, doing this thing. And then I was like, oh, we need to put these frameworks that I know into place for us. And it saves us so much time at tax season. And I mean, we're in it now. And the amount of time that I used to spend versus now is worth, you know, a ton. What's your, what's your time worth? You know, what's that hourly rate that you could apply to something else? And just having the systems in place has saved us more hours than I can count.
[00:29:59] Speaker A: Yeah, I could. I believe it a hundred percent.
[00:30:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:02] Speaker A: Awesome. So I do want to just one more time make the, make the difference. Not from a legal standpoint, but, but, but pinpoint the difference. If you go to a cpa, they're going to help you with taxes. They're going to look at the historicals and they're going to, they're going to give, they'll give you some guidance, financial advisors, you know, with investing and, and really digging into that type of stuff. Like when, I mean investing, like stocks and bonds and all that stuff. They're going to be great with that. You're filling a need that, that they don't. Where you're, you're coaching us as entrepreneurs and small business owners to really look at our, our financials as a, as a, as the, as what it should be in our business, as the big component that it should be in our business, and it needs the attention. So you, you teach us how to do that.
[00:30:47] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. I want to empower you guys to own your finances. And I mean, for women in particular, I see them relying on their husband or their dad or some other person in their life. And I want them to own their business finances. And, and it's. I will do tax stuff like tax strategy, but I'm looking at it as a business owner, not as a cpa. And your CPA is going to toe the line and you for sure. I like to work in the gray. Like we, we work in the gray, but we also know there's a risk involved with that and we'll push our cpa. And when our CPA throws their hand up and says, hey, that's not one that you want to play with, we don't play with it. But we have figured out how to write off enough that we're. I think our average tax rate over the past few years has been 4 or 5%, which feels very comfortable to me. And applying those strategies. And it's not just because of having real estate. There's other things that we do, but helping people apply those strategies. So a third of your income's not just disappearing in April.
[00:31:49] Speaker A: Yeah. So I would, I would suggest everybody that's listening like you, you need a team of people around you to help you succeed, especially as a entrepreneur and you're kind of you. Oftentimes we feel like we're on an island alone.
[00:32:02] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:32:03] Speaker A: So real estate. Get a real estate coach. Of course, I always be proponent of that.
Hire Tiffany to coach you on the financial side of it because you. What I like is that you. And I think I started to say this before. I don't know if I finished the thought. You have a different, you have a, a different perspective from outside of the being a real, the business of being a real estate agent.
[00:32:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:32:24] Speaker A: That's so valuable because oftentimes agents just talk to other agents and we're in this, this bubble, this, this like fishbowl of information that sometimes, sometimes it reverberates off the glass of the, of the fishbowl. It comes back to us all distorted. So, so it's good to get outside, you know, someone that knows master's degree from Georgetown in advice, you know, on actually how things should operate. Like we can't claim an entire meal on our taxes.
[00:32:54] Speaker B: Right. I like to look at it from the perspective of what has worked in business for 200 plus years and not what's trending. And that's what we're applying here is like core business finance principles. So I'm not an agent. I've been in the real estate game for many, many years and know a lot of agents and have worked with them.
But it's the core principles that apply to any business. The only thing I don't get into is like inventory and manufacturing because that's a whole nightmare I don't want to touch. But yeah, any service based business, this all applies. And it's just tweaking, you know, some of the metrics. But at the End of the day, who your clients are matters, and that's not necessarily something financial, but it comes into play as a strategy in the finances. So we look at the holistic picture and not just the black and white numbers.
[00:33:41] Speaker A: Yeah, it's. It's awesome. I love what you're doing. I think there's such a need for it.
Podcast. The. The Energetic cfo. It's, it's, it's relatively new, but it's good. It's. How many, how many episodes are you in now?
[00:33:54] Speaker B: I think I, I'm releasing eight today.
[00:33:56] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:33:57] Speaker B: So it's pretty new. I'm kind of figuring out my groove and like, where it's gonna go, and I think I'm finally settling in. So now would be a great time to start listening because it's nice. Yeah, I'm kind of worked out the kinks. Yes, absolutely.
[00:34:09] Speaker A: I love it. So if somebody wants to get a hold of you, how would they?
[00:34:13] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm not a social media person. I abhor it. So, I mean, if you find me on Facebook, that's cool. I know a lot of people, a lot of agents I'm friends with as well, but email is probably the best spot. Tiffanynergeticcfo.com website energetic CFO podcast energetic CFO. So, yeah, check me out.
[00:34:32] Speaker A: Awesome. And you have a newsletter, right? Am I getting.
[00:34:35] Speaker B: No, I haven't done a newsletter yet. I might.
[00:34:36] Speaker A: How do I get the show notes that my. I get something. An email from you?
[00:34:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I do. Well, I guess I do have a newsletter. I just send out the, the podcast summary.
[00:34:45] Speaker A: Okay, cool.
[00:34:45] Speaker B: This week. So, yeah.
[00:34:47] Speaker A: So getting on. How do I get on the list for that?
[00:34:48] Speaker B: Just on the website. Yeah. And we're building out a money story quiz right now that should be live in the next week or so, so you can go in and answer a bunch of questions and see kind of what your money story is.
[00:35:00] Speaker A: All right.
[00:35:01] Speaker B: Pretty excited about that.
[00:35:03] Speaker A: My money story, I think is. Would be a tragedy.
A comedy and a tragedy.
[00:35:09] Speaker B: Shakespeare in there, maybe.
[00:35:10] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Well, cool. Well, I love this. I, of course, the question I like to ask at the very end of. Of the show is, is there a question that I did not ask you that I should have asked you?
[00:35:21] Speaker B: I don't think so. I know we hinted at talking about like the P and L and what's in there. I do have a master class that kind of gave a high level summary of the P and L. So if you're interested in that recording, just shoot me an email and I can forward it to you, but, yeah, I think we covered it all.
