# Overcoming the odds: Army Vet authored "Bootstrapped Millionaire," and provides government contracting advice.

An episode of [Money Making Conversations Master Class](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1264705641), 24 Oct 2024, 32 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/b1db7263-d1a3-4d00-8976-af62012aab44/7819311e-2a71-4db6-aab6-b20d011031a5/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=35a10561-3e1b-4d05-a529-af62012aab6a

Listen and subscribe to Money Making Conversations on iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, www.moneymakingconversations.com/subscribe/ or wherever you listen to podcasts. New Money Making Conversations episodes drop daily. I want to alert you, so you don’t miss out on expert analysis and insider perspectives from my guests who provide tips that can help you uplift the community, improve your financial planning, motivation, or advice on how to be a successful entrepreneur. Keep winning! Two-time Emmy and Three-time NAACP Image Award-winning, television Executive Producer Rushion McDonald interviewed, Tim Mercer. He is the author of Forbes Books "Bootstrapped Millionaire." He is also the CFO of Cadence Ventures, INC. It is a boutique private equity firm that invests in private mortgage notes and offers "nontraditional" financing to real estate investors, builders, and developers. As a private lender with discretionary capital, we've become a reliable capital partner for real estate professionals needing execution and timely closings. Tim has over two decades of experience in finance, real estate, and government contracting; Mercer is currently the CFO of Cadence Ventures, INC and IBOX Global, LLC, ranked #357 on Inc. 500’s list of the Fastest Growing Companies. Talking Points/Questions * 1) Phases of entrepreneurship (i.e. solopreneurs, intrapreneurs, business owner, investor) 2) The importance of financial literacy and how to level up your financial knowledge 3) How government contracts can help scale your business 4) Advice to small businesses seeking to get into government contracting 5) Why real estate is the safest and most profitable investment 6) How to invest passively into real estate #BEST #STRAW #SHMS Money Making Conversations Master Class with Rushion McDonald is America's premier entrepreneurship, business leadership, financial literacy, and wealth-building podcast featuring successful entrepreneurs, executives, founders, celebrities, and industry experts sharing actionable insights for professional and financial success. Business Podcast Entrepreneurship Small Business Business Growth Financial Literacy Wealth Building Black Entrepreneurs Minority Business Leadership Executive Leadership Business Funding Marketing Strategies Personal Development Startup Advice Sales Training CEO Interviews Founder Stories Professional Development Economic Empowerment Business Success Networking Brand Building Innovation How to start a business Small business funding Entrepreneur success stories Business leadership podcast Wealth building strategies Black entrepreneur podcast Minority business development Marketing for small businesses Business growth strategies Startup funding opportunities Executive leadership training Financial literacy education Success mindset podcast See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:05] Speaker 1: Welcome to the show. I am Rashaan McDonald, the host
[0:08] Speaker 1: of Money Making Conversations Masterclass, where we encourage people to
[0:11] Speaker 1: stop reading other people's success stories and start planning their own.
[0:16] Speaker 1: Listen up as I interview entrepreneurs from around the country,
[0:19] Speaker 1: talk to celebrities and ask them how they are running
[0:22] Speaker 1: their companies, and speak with dog profits who are making
[0:25] Speaker 1: a difference in their local communities. Now, sit back and
[0:28] Speaker 1: listen as we unlock the secrets to their success on
[0:31] Speaker 1: Money Making Conversations Masterclass. Hi, I'm Rashan McDonald's host the
[0:36] Speaker 1: weekly Money Making Conversation Master Class show. The interviews and
[0:39] Speaker 1: information that this show provides offer everyone. It's time to
[0:43] Speaker 1: stop reading other people's success stories and start living your own.
[0:46] Speaker 1: I'm here to help you reach your American dream. My
[0:49] Speaker 1: guest is the author of Bootstrap Millionaire. He is also
[0:53] Speaker 1: the CFO of Cadence Ventures is a boutique private equity
[0:57] Speaker 1: firm that invests in private mortgage notes and offer there's
[1:00] Speaker 1: non traditional financing to real estate investors, builders, and developers.
[1:04] Speaker 1: Please work with the Money Making Conversations Masterclass. Tim Mercer,
[1:08] Speaker 1: how you doing, my.
[1:08] Speaker 2: Brother, I'm doing quite well.
[1:09] Speaker 3: Thank you for having South Carolina, Bornuth, Carolina.
[1:13] Speaker 1: You know, you know your book, you know you found
[1:15] Speaker 1: Humble Beginnings. You know, tell us about South Carolina. Well,
[1:19] Speaker 1: umble beginnings.
[1:19] Speaker 2: Yeah, four kids, right, four kids, that's right. Yeah, grew
[1:22] Speaker 2: up my mother had four kids. Grew up in a
[1:24] Speaker 2: small town mullin South Carolina. Yes, it's funny because it's
[1:29] Speaker 2: part of South Carolina, which they actually wrote a documentary
[1:33] Speaker 2: on that part of South Carolina. They called it the
[1:35] Speaker 2: Corridor of Shane. Oh why yeah, Well, because my understanding
[1:40] Speaker 2: is that that part of South Carolina had or may
[1:43] Speaker 2: still have had the worst school system in the entire US. Right,
[1:48] Speaker 2: And when I grew up, I was grew up in
[1:50] Speaker 2: the seventies and eighties. So it was a tobacco town, right,
[1:53] Speaker 2: I mean tobacco fields, warehouses and those types of things.
[1:56] Speaker 2: Not much of an industry outside of that. A lot
[2:00] Speaker 2: of great, great people, great humble people. And and but
[2:03] Speaker 2: it helped me, it helped me to really be able
[2:05] Speaker 2: to establish them. I guess the foundation of who I
[2:08] Speaker 2: am today as a man.
[2:10] Speaker 1: We talk about you know, I come from Fifth Ward
[2:13] Speaker 1: in the city Houston, Texas, and we all come from
[2:17] Speaker 1: that humble beginnings. And then what did you take away
[2:21] Speaker 1: from that that you still like a badge of courage,
[2:26] Speaker 1: I think yeah today.
[2:27] Speaker 2: Well number one I think is, you know, treat people
[2:30] Speaker 2: the way you want to be treated, right, you know,
[2:33] Speaker 2: And my faith is one of the main things that
[2:35] Speaker 2: I that I gained from growing up in the humble
[2:38] Speaker 2: beginnings like that, because when you grow up in humble beginnings,
[2:41] Speaker 2: man behave everything we do we rely upon God, right,
[2:44] Speaker 2: And so my mother always taught me to to be
[2:47] Speaker 2: respectful of people, right, treat people the way you want
[2:50] Speaker 2: to be treated. Always taught me to depend on God
[2:53] Speaker 2: for everything because that's the only way that you're gonna
[2:55] Speaker 2: make it. And I still feel that way today. I mean,
[2:59] Speaker 2: I mean every every day when I wake up and
[3:01] Speaker 2: pray every morning, I know that the only way I'm
[3:03] Speaker 2: going to make it through today is vibral relying upon
[3:07] Speaker 2: my faith. So so I think that was the most
[3:08] Speaker 2: important thing for me growing up. You know.
[3:12] Speaker 1: Then you know, uh, Tim Mercier, when would say that's
[3:17] Speaker 1: a simple name, yeah book bootstraped millionaire, now humble beginnings.
[3:24] Speaker 1: Doesn't the associate himself with the word millionaire.
[3:27] Speaker 3: Right, how right?
[3:31] Speaker 1: How I know that we don't get the real fast,
[3:34] Speaker 1: but how what is your secret of success? To sit
[3:37] Speaker 1: up and tell us that you can author a book
[3:39] Speaker 1: called bootstraped Millionaire.
[3:41] Speaker 2: Well, you know, when we first when I first wrote
[3:44] Speaker 2: the book, the title was supposed to be bootstrapped Entrepreneur, okay,
[3:47] Speaker 2: and so we wrote we worked with Forbes to kind
[3:50] Speaker 2: of they they published the book, and it was interesting
[3:54] Speaker 2: because the guy that was helping helping me create the book,
[3:58] Speaker 2: they kept using the word millionaire. I mean, I didn't
[4:01] Speaker 2: understand why they kept saying bootstrap me in the bootstrapm
[4:03] Speaker 2: in there. And at first I really didn't want to
[4:07] Speaker 2: title the book bootstrap me in it because I didn't
[4:09] Speaker 2: want to come off and make it seem like being
[4:14] Speaker 2: braggadocious or anything like that. But I felt that there
[4:18] Speaker 2: was an importance in that because the word bootstrap is
[4:21] Speaker 2: the key word, right. If it's somebody from South Carolina
[4:25] Speaker 2: country boy like me who grew up didn't know nothing
[4:28] Speaker 2: about business, nothing about finance and learn it the hard way,
[4:34] Speaker 2: if I could do some things to put myself in
[4:37] Speaker 2: a position where I could, you know, have that title right,
[4:41] Speaker 2: that's so to speak, you know, or achieve a certain
[4:44] Speaker 2: financial success, I think hopefully it's a testament to other
[4:49] Speaker 2: young men like myself to say that if he could
[4:52] Speaker 2: do it, I can do it.
[4:53] Speaker 1: Okay, Okay, I ask you this question. That okay, cause
[4:56] Speaker 1: when you respond, when you look right right there, Charles Swall,
[5:00] Speaker 1: it says two point three million dollars. It's kind of
[5:03] Speaker 1: like that through their surveys. Yeah, millionaire status. When you're
[5:08] Speaker 1: here to term two point three million dollars and the
[5:11] Speaker 1: word millionaire, what does that mean to you?
[5:13] Speaker 3: Are you rich?
[5:16] Speaker 2: Well? I would say, Now the question is is it
[5:20] Speaker 2: two point three million liquid? Right? That's that's that's another question, right,
[5:25] Speaker 2: is it liquid? Or is it you know? I mean
[5:27] Speaker 2: now if you have assets, that's a good thing because
[5:30] Speaker 2: I think a lot of people over time, all of
[5:33] Speaker 2: us touch a million dollars, right, I mean through our lifetime.
[5:36] Speaker 2: The question is how do we manage it? Right? Do
[5:40] Speaker 2: we do we keep most of it? Do we buy
[5:42] Speaker 2: assets that help us to continue to grow? Because Len,
[5:45] Speaker 2: the truth be told, and this is not no offense,
[5:48] Speaker 2: but a million dollars really is not a lot of money.
[5:50] Speaker 2: When you when you break, when you really break it down,
[5:53] Speaker 2: you know, it's not a lot of money. But when
[5:55] Speaker 2: you grow up the way I did, probably how you
[5:57] Speaker 2: did we drive to say, man, I want, I want
[6:01] Speaker 2: to become a millionaire, and then when you get to
[6:04] Speaker 2: a point where you probably have either touched it or
[6:07] Speaker 2: maybe you have assets or things of that nature, you
[6:10] Speaker 2: begin to realize that it's really not a lot of money,
[6:12] Speaker 2: and it actually creates more anxiety for you because you're
[6:15] Speaker 2: trying to figure out, now, how do I how do
[6:17] Speaker 2: I level it up and go higher than that?
[6:20] Speaker 1: Which leads to my next question financial literacy, because that's
[6:23] Speaker 1: where it really comes to because you watch television a
[6:25] Speaker 1: lot and that we're millionaire if you and that, if
[6:28] Speaker 1: you're a person who's tracking in that millionaire million dollar range,
[6:31] Speaker 1: you go.
[6:32] Speaker 3: Brother, million dollars?
[6:33] Speaker 1: What you Why are you excited about a million? How
[6:35] Speaker 1: long do you expect to live exactly with a million dollars?
[6:39] Speaker 1: That's where the financial literacy comes into place. Why is
[6:43] Speaker 1: that an important part of your book?
[6:45] Speaker 2: Because man, I mean it's everything right if we don't
[6:48] Speaker 2: understand finance. In my opinion, right, I think everybody needs
[6:53] Speaker 2: to understand finance because it's the pillar of everything. Right.
[6:58] Speaker 2: If we don't understand it, then there's no way for
[7:00] Speaker 2: us to really level up. Right, I mean, I learned
[7:03] Speaker 2: how to make money growing up working hard, right, you
[7:06] Speaker 2: work hard, you do do everything people tell you to
[7:09] Speaker 2: go out, they work hard, you study, become smart. So
[7:13] Speaker 2: making money was never really a problem for me, But
[7:16] Speaker 2: knowing how to grow it and to keep it that
[7:20] Speaker 2: was the hard part, right you know. And I and
[7:22] Speaker 2: I learned how to save money as a young young
[7:24] Speaker 2: man and save money pretty well, But that part about
[7:28] Speaker 2: growing money was the hardest part for me because that's
[7:30] Speaker 2: why I made a lot of mistakes trying to grow
[7:33] Speaker 2: the money, trying to invest in things that I didn't
[7:35] Speaker 2: know about, trusting other people with with my money, right,
[7:40] Speaker 2: financial advisors and things of that nature. So I learned
[7:43] Speaker 2: that I had to learn it for myself to in
[7:46] Speaker 2: order to prevent me from being taken advantage.
[7:48] Speaker 1: Of it, right right, right, right, right now, let's let's
[7:50] Speaker 1: talk about this because you military got honored, right okay? Well,
[7:54] Speaker 1: how important was that has that been in your life?
[7:57] Speaker 1: To have went to the military and the army capacity.
[8:01] Speaker 2: It was the most important thing, right, I mean, because
[8:04] Speaker 2: they taught me discipline. They taught me disciplined. It gave
[8:07] Speaker 2: me a purpose and a vision for my life. When
[8:10] Speaker 2: I was growing up in Mallas, South Carolina. I didn't.
[8:12] Speaker 2: I didn't have much. I didn't have much discipline, right,
[8:15] Speaker 2: I mean my mother was a very loving person, so
[8:18] Speaker 2: she she really did a lot of things for us.
[8:20] Speaker 2: I'll tell people I really wasn't. The military taught me
[8:24] Speaker 2: how to be a man. It put me around other
[8:27] Speaker 2: men and helped me to be able to grow and
[8:31] Speaker 2: to see the world in a different perspective. That's when
[8:35] Speaker 2: I started seeing the world differently. I started seeing that
[8:38] Speaker 2: I could achieve different things. If it wasn't for the military.
[8:40] Speaker 2: I don't think that any of this would have ever
[8:42] Speaker 2: happened for me.
[8:43] Speaker 1: Now that that's important for you to say, Tim, I'm
[8:45] Speaker 1: talking to Tim Mercer. He's a CFO of Cadence Ventures,
[8:49] Speaker 1: which is a boutique private equity firm that's investing in
[8:52] Speaker 1: private mortgage notes. Educate me now, when you said private
[8:57] Speaker 1: mortgage notes, what does that mean?
[8:58] Speaker 2: So think about like when you go buy a house, right,
[9:02] Speaker 2: you go to the bank and you get a loan, right,
[9:04] Speaker 2: That's that's actually a mortgage note. So it's a mortgage
[9:08] Speaker 2: enough most most of us think that the only people
[9:11] Speaker 2: that could and the bank is investing in that note.
[9:15] Speaker 2: So the bank gives you a loan for half a
[9:17] Speaker 2: million dollars to go buy the house. They you know,
[9:20] Speaker 2: you put a down payment, but you got a mortgage
[9:22] Speaker 2: that you have to pay back to the bank until
[9:25] Speaker 2: that that that that debt is satisfied with. Private mortgage
[9:29] Speaker 2: knows are the same thing, right you and I, all
[9:32] Speaker 2: of us can buy private mortgage notes. I do it.
[9:35] Speaker 2: If someone an investor wants to buy a house, maybe
[9:39] Speaker 2: a fix and flip, or he wants to buy a
[9:41] Speaker 2: house to to rent out, he has to get a
[9:45] Speaker 2: mortgage from someone. So they'll come to someone like me
[9:48] Speaker 2: privately to get a mortgage, the mortgage on it. I
[9:51] Speaker 2: will extend the money to them for for that property
[9:55] Speaker 2: and then they just pay me back a monthly interest.
[9:59] Speaker 2: You right, My money is protected by the asset because
[10:03] Speaker 2: I got because I got a lean on the property.
[10:06] Speaker 2: Pretty much the same thing the bank does. We do.
[10:08] Speaker 2: We can do the same thing as private individuals. And
[10:11] Speaker 2: that's what the private mortgage know.
[10:12] Speaker 3: It's but.
[10:14] Speaker 1: A special called fd I C that protects the bank.
[10:17] Speaker 2: Right where the fd I C is what fd I
[10:19] Speaker 2: see is the was what protects our money that sits
[10:23] Speaker 2: in the bank right right, you know, And and of
[10:25] Speaker 2: course fd I c they basically govern traditional banks, but
[10:31] Speaker 2: we're not traditional bank.
[10:32] Speaker 3: That's that I brought it up.
[10:34] Speaker 1: So so why am I doing business with you and
[10:36] Speaker 1: I don't have those famous for letters behind your company?
[10:40] Speaker 2: Well, because, for one, banks don't land on the type
[10:43] Speaker 2: of stuff that we land on. So if you if
[10:45] Speaker 2: you wanted to go and fix and flip.
[10:47] Speaker 1: A house right now, or my building that I own.
[10:50] Speaker 2: Well, well this building, well, this building, you would probably
[10:52] Speaker 2: get a loan in this building because you you your
[10:55] Speaker 2: business owns this building and you occupy it within your business.
[11:00] Speaker 2: So that's safe for the back.
[11:01] Speaker 1: Okay. Cool.
[11:02] Speaker 2: Now, if you own this building, if you own the
[11:07] Speaker 2: building and you was renting it out for someone else,
[11:10] Speaker 2: the bank probably wouldn't give you a loan for that
[11:13] Speaker 2: because that's more of an investment versus it being owner occupied,
[11:18] Speaker 2: right right, So it's a little more riskier for the
[11:21] Speaker 2: banks in that regard.
[11:22] Speaker 1: Okay.
[11:23] Speaker 2: So, so the bank would probably give you a hard
[11:27] Speaker 2: time doing that. So you would have to come to individuals,
[11:30] Speaker 2: private individuals. Private equity firms. Think about companies like black Rock, Vanguard,
[11:36] Speaker 2: and although those are private equity firms, they're just large
[11:39] Speaker 2: private equity firms, right, So we're private equity. Were just small.
[11:43] Speaker 1: Okay, okay, we're getting in the game. Yeah, in the
[11:45] Speaker 1: game now. In your book Bootstraped Millionaire, you know you're
[11:48] Speaker 1: talking about phases of being un entrepreneurs. You know, I'm
[11:51] Speaker 1: an entrepreneur. I can't tell you how many mistakes I made.
[11:55] Speaker 1: I tell them on my show all the time. I
[11:56] Speaker 1: didn't have a budget.
[11:57] Speaker 2: Yep.
[11:58] Speaker 1: I went in have a plan or didn't know how
[12:02] Speaker 1: to scale. It was a comedy club open, a comedy club.
[12:04] Speaker 1: I figured I charged people ten dollars. They feel everyone
[12:08] Speaker 1: that had three hundred and seventy five seats sold liquor
[12:11] Speaker 1: didn't think about the tax I paid on the liquor.
[12:13] Speaker 1: It was a lot of things I didn't think about.
[12:15] Speaker 1: So I was deep in the game, going where's my money.
[12:18] Speaker 1: It was like I was working really hard, but I
[12:20] Speaker 1: was breaking even because I didn't put together a plan.
[12:23] Speaker 1: So I continue to say that I am a person
[12:26] Speaker 1: who made mistakes to my audience to let them know
[12:30] Speaker 1: that it's possible for you to make the same mistake
[12:33] Speaker 1: that I made if you don't listen to the right people.
[12:36] Speaker 1: I con consider you Tim one of the right people
[12:39] Speaker 1: to listen to. What are some of the phases of
[12:42] Speaker 1: entrepreneurship that you were discussing in your book, and also
[12:46] Speaker 1: some of the things you picked up since the book
[12:48] Speaker 1: has come out.
[12:48] Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean all of us start out, and for
[12:51] Speaker 2: sure you did too, as a solo preneurs. Yes, we're
[12:55] Speaker 2: in business for ourselves and by oursels, right, I mean
[12:58] Speaker 2: that's how it started out, a solopreneur, and that's great, right,
[13:02] Speaker 2: I mean that's you. You're just you're kind of just
[13:04] Speaker 2: doing this thing on your own. But then you start
[13:07] Speaker 2: to let I think that there's other phases of that, right.
[13:09] Speaker 2: I think that's one phase of entrepreneurship that a lot
[13:12] Speaker 2: of people don't focus on, is being an entrepreneur. An
[13:16] Speaker 2: entrepreneur is someone who works along as I right, that's right, Yeah,
[13:21] Speaker 2: that's that's someone who works with entrepreneurs like yourself. Maybe.
[13:26] Speaker 2: So let's say, for me, I will come and work
[13:29] Speaker 2: with you in your business. Right, it's still your business,
[13:32] Speaker 2: but I'm an integral part of that, right, So I'm
[13:34] Speaker 2: bringing my talent and skills. I may be your employee,
[13:37] Speaker 2: but I'm an entrepreneur because I have the entrepreneur mindset.
[13:41] Speaker 2: But I'm just not gonna take all the risks that
[13:43] Speaker 2: you're taking right, okay in things that nature right. So
[13:46] Speaker 2: entrepreneurs are very can be very successful people. I mean
[13:49] Speaker 2: the with the gentleman that used to work with Bill Gates.
[13:53] Speaker 2: He he I think he used to own the Seattle Seahawks. Yeah,
[14:00] Speaker 2: I think it's Bomber Bomber. I think the clippers, Yes,
[14:03] Speaker 2: that's he started out as an entrepreneur like he worked
[14:07] Speaker 2: with Bill Gates. Bill Gates took all the resks, but
[14:09] Speaker 2: he still became a very successful So so you have solopreneurs,
[14:14] Speaker 2: you have entrepreneurs, obviously, you have your small business owners.
[14:18] Speaker 2: And then the one that I like the best is
[14:21] Speaker 2: just being an investor.
[14:24] Speaker 1: About the word investor, hit the word investor, tip, I
[14:27] Speaker 1: hear the word money. Now, why are you gonna invest
[14:29] Speaker 1: you don't have no money?
[14:31] Speaker 2: Well, think about it. I mean if you if you,
[14:34] Speaker 2: I personally think that you can become a meionaire without this.
[14:38] Speaker 2: I think it's a myth when people feel that the
[14:40] Speaker 2: only way you become financially successful is being an entrepreneur.
[14:45] Speaker 2: I know a lot of people who work in work
[14:49] Speaker 2: for companies, work in corporate who have done very well
[14:53] Speaker 2: if they saved their money properly, properly got you mesa
[14:57] Speaker 2: dollars in assets and things that for one k's and all. So,
[15:00] Speaker 2: if I got a million dollars in the full one K,
[15:03] Speaker 2: if I know how to invest that money properly, think
[15:06] Speaker 2: about it. If I got a million dollars in the
[15:08] Speaker 2: full one K, and if I can invest it in
[15:11] Speaker 2: something that allows me to make ten percent a year
[15:14] Speaker 2: in a your return, all while preserving my principal, then
[15:19] Speaker 2: what I'm turning, I'm flipping that money over and over.
[15:23] Speaker 1: That famous words compound interest.
[15:26] Speaker 2: Who more?
[15:27] Speaker 1: If I known is exactly if I know? If I
[15:30] Speaker 1: compound interest, boy, I wouldn't be seeing that.
[15:32] Speaker 2: Talk with you.
[15:34] Speaker 4: Please don't go anywhere. We'll be right back with more
[15:37] Speaker 4: money Making Conversations Masterclass. Welcome back to the Money Making
[15:45] Speaker 4: Conversations Masterclass hosted by Rashaan McDonald. Money Making Conversations Masterclass
[15:51] Speaker 4: continues online at Moneymakingconversations dot com and follow money Making
[15:56] Speaker 4: Conversations Masterclass on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
[16:00] Speaker 3: That's where financial literature come from.
[16:02] Speaker 1: That's why it's important for people to open your book
[16:05] Speaker 1: and understand it's a journey. I like the fact that
[16:07] Speaker 1: you you share with us your journey, share the fact
[16:10] Speaker 1: that your mom was single. Mall. You know what I'm saying,
[16:13] Speaker 1: there's nothing, there's nothing, there's no fluff. You know, there
[16:17] Speaker 1: was no golden spoon or opportunity to deliver to you.
[16:20] Speaker 1: That means that you're you are a person who served
[16:23] Speaker 1: in the military. But along the lines, how did you
[16:28] Speaker 1: make that transition? Because you the CFO of Cadence Ventures
[16:32] Speaker 1: and we're gonna get the government contracts in a minute,
[16:34] Speaker 1: because I remember when I saw it. I said, I
[16:36] Speaker 1: got to talk about that because of the fact that
[16:38] Speaker 1: you get all these emails talking about government contract com
[16:41] Speaker 1: contractors Sam Sam Sam from Sam Dota, Go get that
[16:44] Speaker 1: a minute. But I want to get to that moment
[16:46] Speaker 1: of transition that you felt that I was different.
[16:51] Speaker 3: It took me. It took me in my.
[16:53] Speaker 1: Forties to appreciate what I had accomplished because I used
[16:57] Speaker 1: the words like lucky, right place at the right time.
[17:00] Speaker 1: And I may have put too much in faith because
[17:02] Speaker 1: it's hard work is.
[17:03] Speaker 3: Tied to faith. Absolutely, So when did you realize it?
[17:08] Speaker 2: Well, my journey is and you probably read it in
[17:11] Speaker 2: the book. Right when when I first got out of
[17:13] Speaker 2: the military, I came back to Atlanta went to school
[17:16] Speaker 2: at the RITE and that's when I got into tech.
[17:19] Speaker 2: And this was at the time when the Internet and
[17:21] Speaker 2: all that type of stuff was just coming out, right,
[17:24] Speaker 2: And so I ended up getting a skill, right and
[17:27] Speaker 2: that and that at that time, it was tech skills.
[17:29] Speaker 2: So I truly believe everything starts with a skill, right,
[17:32] Speaker 2: getting a valuable skill that somebody would pay money for.
[17:36] Speaker 2: And I started working at the height of the tech boom,
[17:41] Speaker 2: started working and made a lot of money at that
[17:44] Speaker 2: point in time, and of course at that time, I
[17:49] Speaker 2: really didn't know what to do with them. And I
[17:51] Speaker 2: actually saved a million dollars. I mean literally had saved
[17:54] Speaker 2: a million dollars cash and this was like late nineties.
[17:58] Speaker 2: Didn't really know what to do with it because I
[18:00] Speaker 2: was illiterate, right, and financially, financially literally, that's why financially
[18:04] Speaker 2: literal ended up and I lost it all, right, I
[18:07] Speaker 2: lost all the money after me and my wife had
[18:11] Speaker 2: got married and all that type of stuff. It just
[18:12] Speaker 2: everything just went downhill. But that taught me a great lesson.
[18:18] Speaker 2: That's when that's when I realized that, Okay, you know,
[18:21] Speaker 2: I was able to make that money back then. The
[18:23] Speaker 2: only thing I have now to do is I got
[18:27] Speaker 2: to go back to the roots of what got me
[18:29] Speaker 2: there and start all over again and build it back
[18:31] Speaker 2: up again. And fortunately I was able to do that. Right,
[18:34] Speaker 2: you know, several years later, that's when it became to
[18:37] Speaker 2: me and realized there's a Bible speaks to the point
[18:41] Speaker 2: where they says God has given you the ability to create. Well,
[18:44] Speaker 2: that's when that became real for me. Yeah. Right, that's
[18:48] Speaker 2: when it became.
[18:49] Speaker 1: You know the interesting part about it. You know there
[18:51] Speaker 1: are different phrases because I'm going through that same thing.
[18:54] Speaker 1: I had to twenty twenty three, I had to make
[18:56] Speaker 1: a layoff staff. Yep, because when I realized the plan
[18:59] Speaker 1: that I in place, I was just losing money. That's
[19:01] Speaker 1: you know, the savings was going this way. The income
[19:04] Speaker 1: wasn't going That's why the savings was going shrinking. And
[19:08] Speaker 1: that's a tough decisions. That's probably the most honest point
[19:12] Speaker 1: that you have to make from being a person who
[19:15] Speaker 1: has turned the corner realized their flaw or being homeless. Yes,
[19:19] Speaker 1: it is a point where you have to humble yourself
[19:22] Speaker 1: and realize that you have the publicly admit you're failing.
[19:26] Speaker 3: Yeah, and a lot of.
[19:27] Speaker 1: People don't do that, whether in personal life or as entrepreneurs,
[19:31] Speaker 1: talk about that moment of realizing that this plan is failing.
[19:36] Speaker 1: How do I admit it and know how I turn
[19:40] Speaker 1: it around?
[19:40] Speaker 2: It's a matter we all have to pivot, right. You
[19:44] Speaker 2: had to pivot in twenty twenty three. Right in twenty
[19:46] Speaker 2: twenty a lot of people probably ran into a lot
[19:49] Speaker 2: of things with everybody. I think as entrepreneurs or if
[19:52] Speaker 2: you in business or in high professional you have to.
[19:56] Speaker 2: You're going to have to pivot sooner, like something is
[19:59] Speaker 2: going to happen in your life that's going to cause
[20:02] Speaker 2: a shift. Right. You know, good days don't always last
[20:06] Speaker 2: all the time. That it's peaks in valleys, right, So
[20:09] Speaker 2: when you go into those peaks, you have to be
[20:11] Speaker 2: mindful and tell yourself. At least I had to tell myself, Okay,
[20:14] Speaker 2: I now have to adjust to this. I may have
[20:17] Speaker 2: to change. I may have to realize that I'm going
[20:19] Speaker 2: to have to give up some things. I remember me
[20:21] Speaker 2: and my wife we had to give up our home
[20:24] Speaker 2: right because we were in a situation where we were
[20:27] Speaker 2: about to get foreclosing. We had to go by a
[20:30] Speaker 2: smaller home, and I had to bring down my salary
[20:35] Speaker 2: to accommodate me being able to pay for that smaller home.
[20:37] Speaker 2: Leave the big fancy house, go to the smaller home.
[20:40] Speaker 2: But that was what we had to do to be
[20:43] Speaker 2: able to reset. So I just think we have to
[20:46] Speaker 2: be humble enough to know that that's the word to
[20:49] Speaker 2: keep work.
[20:49] Speaker 1: Because arrogance, you let arrogance win. You're homeless. Yes, you know,
[20:54] Speaker 1: humble will allow you to sit back and take a breath, Yes,
[20:58] Speaker 1: and also be able to evaluate yes, Because I'll tell
[21:02] Speaker 1: you when COVID hit the twenty twenty, I ignored it.
[21:06] Speaker 1: You know, I had money in the bank. You know
[21:09] Speaker 1: I had employees running up and down, and you know
[21:12] Speaker 1: you weren't wasn't nobody making money in COVID, But I
[21:15] Speaker 1: still was paying people instead of saying, hey, lay off
[21:18] Speaker 1: people because the government's going to take care of these people.
[21:20] Speaker 3: I layoff.
[21:21] Speaker 1: But arrogance, then, the blindness of arrogance was on me
[21:26] Speaker 1: and I That's why I was That's why I wanted
[21:28] Speaker 1: to bring you on the show to be able to
[21:30] Speaker 1: have this conversation, because you can't have this conversation with everybody,
[21:33] Speaker 1: because that moment of being able to testify this is
[21:36] Speaker 1: some more to testifying the people that I've experienced experienced
[21:40] Speaker 1: it this way, you've experienced it another way and gets whey.
[21:44] Speaker 1: Guess what the key to it was not let arrogance
[21:47] Speaker 1: win talk to it.
[21:48] Speaker 2: I like that. Yeah, yeah, because arrogance, I mean what
[21:51] Speaker 2: those things that pride comes before the fall, right, You've
[21:55] Speaker 2: heard that before? Yeah, And I truly believe it, pride
[21:58] Speaker 2: becomes before the fall. I remember when I was the
[22:02] Speaker 2: first time I had was doing had to achieve financial success,
[22:06] Speaker 2: I became arrogant. I remember my wife would tell me,
[22:09] Speaker 2: she was like, look, you're getting a little too too
[22:12] Speaker 2: arrogant for yourself. And and that's what led to my
[22:17] Speaker 2: my demise, right, because she things that I was doing financially,
[22:22] Speaker 2: decisions that I'm making about investments. She would tell me
[22:26] Speaker 2: that I should question those things. But I felt arrogant
[22:29] Speaker 2: and felt, well, you know, I know what I'm doing.
[22:33] Speaker 2: And so that humbled me to where I'm today. I mean,
[22:38] Speaker 2: I trust me, I've I've been humbled to the point
[22:40] Speaker 2: where I know now that hey, look, you you can't
[22:44] Speaker 2: trust just yourself, right, ible said, lean lean on God's understanding, right,
[22:50] Speaker 2: And that's what I believe in now, is that hey, look,
[22:53] Speaker 2: that's why I pray every morning and make sure that hey, look,
[22:56] Speaker 2: God come to me watch my blind side because I
[22:59] Speaker 2: can't see. But on on blind side I need to.
[23:01] Speaker 2: You know, especially in business, you just don't know what's
[23:03] Speaker 2: coming down the road and you need that protection. So yeah,
[23:08] Speaker 2: I mean it gonna be this. You know they're gonna
[23:11] Speaker 2: be this type interview. Did you tell me that's true? Yeah?
[23:17] Speaker 1: Well, you know, I've been blessed man because I can
[23:19] Speaker 1: sit up here and have these conversations and and uh,
[23:22] Speaker 1: God just putting me in a position to be able
[23:24] Speaker 1: to accommodate information that I'm receiving and then sharing it.
[23:29] Speaker 4: You know.
[23:30] Speaker 1: But one question before I get to the government contract,
[23:32] Speaker 1: what exactly is Caden's venture?
[23:34] Speaker 2: So Kayden sventure's again small private equity group. Me and
[23:38] Speaker 2: my wife started his company a few years ago because
[23:42] Speaker 2: we started realizing that when we get older sixty five,
[23:47] Speaker 2: we're not gonna have a retirement. Well we know, so
[23:50] Speaker 2: security is't gonna be there for us. Right. My wife
[23:52] Speaker 2: had some money in a four to one k with
[23:55] Speaker 2: the current with previous imployeries she had, and it took
[23:59] Speaker 2: me some time, but you know, I kind of convinced her.
[24:01] Speaker 2: I said, listen, let's let's take the money out of
[24:03] Speaker 2: the four and k let's start this business use as
[24:07] Speaker 2: a seed, and let's start a a financial company where
[24:11] Speaker 2: we start lending money to real estate investors. That's that's
[24:14] Speaker 2: really what the whole, the whole premise came about. I said, look,
[24:17] Speaker 2: we can lend money to real estate investors. We can
[24:20] Speaker 2: help them get their projects off the ground. Our money
[24:24] Speaker 2: is safe because we can collaborterize our money with the
[24:29] Speaker 2: projects that they're doing, and we can get a better
[24:31] Speaker 2: return than what we're getting by leaving it in the
[24:35] Speaker 2: stock market, because of the stock market is up and
[24:37] Speaker 2: down for that, right. And that's what we started doing.
[24:40] Speaker 2: And I mean, I mean, since we've been doing I've
[24:42] Speaker 2: probably grown her portfolio probably about twenty five percent a year,
[24:47] Speaker 2: you know what, you know, just investing it into real
[24:50] Speaker 2: estate projects, you know.
[24:52] Speaker 1: Because you just CFO of case, that's right, Yeah, yeah.
[24:54] Speaker 2: Investing in real estate projects. And so now you know,
[24:57] Speaker 2: we we did that for a couple of years, just
[24:59] Speaker 2: with our own money. But it was very difficult because obviously,
[25:05] Speaker 2: you know, our money would get stuck in these projects
[25:07] Speaker 2: for six months, twelve months and things of that nature.
[25:09] Speaker 2: But then when we learned. We eventually learned how to
[25:12] Speaker 2: start you know, selling the selling the mortgage notes. Right,
[25:16] Speaker 2: so we so we would you know, we sell those
[25:18] Speaker 2: marketing notes to insurance companies, right because they'll they'll buy
[25:21] Speaker 2: the mortgage notes from us at a premium, right, And
[25:24] Speaker 2: so it allows us now to just keep taking that
[25:27] Speaker 2: same capital stack.
[25:29] Speaker 3: Right and just keep rotating right now.
[25:33] Speaker 1: You know, when I saw your information come to me, Tim,
[25:36] Speaker 1: I'm talking to Tim uh CFO for Cadence Ventures. It
[25:42] Speaker 1: was talking about government contract and more. I get so
[25:44] Speaker 1: mad when I see stuff by government contry because you
[25:47] Speaker 1: get a thousand emails and by sam dot government. It's free.
[25:51] Speaker 1: You don't have to pay anybody to upload your information
[25:55] Speaker 1: on sam dot go. But they have these contracts. These
[25:58] Speaker 1: emails come through, say pay me a fee, pay me.
[26:00] Speaker 1: Do you have all these other people talking about how
[26:03] Speaker 1: easy it is to do business, talk.
[26:05] Speaker 3: About all these millions and millions of dollars.
[26:07] Speaker 1: That you can make with government contracts. I'm not saying
[26:10] Speaker 1: as a scam, but it's not easy. It's not talk
[26:13] Speaker 1: about the process. Everybody's process is different. Because I have
[26:17] Speaker 1: experience with it, That's why I was excited when I
[26:20] Speaker 1: email I said, can we talk about how did you
[26:22] Speaker 1: get involved with government contracts?
[26:24] Speaker 2: So I got involved in government contract in twenty twelve.
[26:28] Speaker 2: I was this was coming off the back end of
[26:31] Speaker 2: me losing all the money, trying to find my way,
[26:34] Speaker 2: trying to get my way back into business. And as
[26:40] Speaker 2: actually I was working on a contract with a good
[26:42] Speaker 2: friend of mine who kind of helped me to get
[26:43] Speaker 2: back into it because I had gotten out of it
[26:46] Speaker 2: for for many years. Good friend of mine kind of
[26:48] Speaker 2: helped me get back in. We was doing some international
[26:50] Speaker 2: work and I would come back home because my wife
[26:53] Speaker 2: was still here in Atlanta, but her girlfriend was telling
[26:55] Speaker 2: her about government contracts, and so I just started looking
[26:58] Speaker 2: into it. I didn't know much about it, and started
[27:00] Speaker 2: looking into it and started learning about it. Georgia Tech
[27:03] Speaker 2: has a great program called GT pack that that kind
[27:06] Speaker 2: of teaches people for free how to get involved. Free.
[27:10] Speaker 2: Yeah free, that's real.
[27:11] Speaker 3: Yeah it's free.
[27:12] Speaker 2: But I'm telling you it is. Government contracting is very complex.
[27:15] Speaker 2: It's very complex. It's very a lot of compliance. You
[27:21] Speaker 2: gotta DoPT your eyes across your t's And the first
[27:25] Speaker 2: thing I did is I got into the eight eight program.
[27:27] Speaker 2: I mean, you know, you've probably heard of the SBAA
[27:29] Speaker 2: a program.
[27:30] Speaker 1: Right, that's when you make under two hundred and fifty thousand.
[27:32] Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, you gotta have, yes, sir, yes, a
[27:34] Speaker 2: certain threashold. Yeah, But the program was designed to help
[27:39] Speaker 2: small businesses minority on small businesses scale up right, that
[27:43] Speaker 2: can call it a development program. So I got in
[27:45] Speaker 2: that program. But I'm tell you, the first couple of
[27:47] Speaker 2: years I was in the program, I didn't I didn't
[27:49] Speaker 2: make any money, right because I didn't know how to
[27:52] Speaker 2: do government contract And it took me about three and
[27:56] Speaker 2: a half almost four years. Now I was in just
[27:58] Speaker 2: a nine year program. So for the first three to
[28:01] Speaker 2: four years, I'm just trying to figure out how to
[28:04] Speaker 2: do this thing right because there was no one that
[28:06] Speaker 2: could was telling us other than like I said, GT. Packing.
[28:10] Speaker 2: But you know there's a lot of its theory, right, yes, yeah,
[28:14] Speaker 2: So it took trial and error, I mean, but STAKES
[28:16] Speaker 2: made money loss the whole nine to really learn it.
[28:21] Speaker 2: But when I started learning how to leverage the eight
[28:24] Speaker 2: eight program in knowing how to work with the government.
[28:28] Speaker 2: Then a few years later, I think it was like
[28:30] Speaker 2: twenty fifteen, that's when things started changing for me. But yeah,
[28:34] Speaker 2: the government contract. It can be very lucrative, but I
[28:36] Speaker 2: will say it is a very difficult space to navigate
[28:40] Speaker 2: if you don't know how to do it.
[28:42] Speaker 1: Got to be persistent, you got to be patient. Yes,
[28:44] Speaker 1: and got it like you said, gotch across your teach absolutely,
[28:47] Speaker 1: because once you get the opportunity what a contract, you
[28:51] Speaker 1: gotta have your eys doted and your teas cross absolutely,
[28:54] Speaker 1: because they will come at you for an audience. Absolutely,
[28:56] Speaker 1: and that's important that you understand that. You know, I
[28:59] Speaker 1: want to thank you Jim for coming on.
[29:01] Speaker 2: The show man.
[29:03] Speaker 3: Believe me, it was.
[29:04] Speaker 1: It was a friendly interview from a standpoint of we'll
[29:08] Speaker 1: like minded people who have stumbled yes okay, and and
[29:12] Speaker 1: we've admitted on money making conversations master class that you
[29:15] Speaker 1: like Like I said, uh, you know you can fallow,
[29:18] Speaker 1: well you can get up.
[29:19] Speaker 3: Yeah, we fall down and we get up. Okay, that's right.
[29:23] Speaker 2: Uh and uh.
[29:24] Speaker 1: Dony mcclarkin's famous song game out now I think about
[29:27] Speaker 1: two thousand, two thousand one. But the bottom line and
[29:31] Speaker 1: writing Bootstrapped Millionaire, what you want to do? What you
[29:34] Speaker 1: want to leave my audience with?
[29:36] Speaker 2: I would like the audience to understand that Again, if
[29:39] Speaker 2: someone like me a country boy South Carolina didn't have
[29:44] Speaker 2: a lot of you know, mentors anything like that. Right.
[29:47] Speaker 2: I think that if you focus and and and really
[29:52] Speaker 2: truly want to achieve financial success, I think that you
[29:56] Speaker 2: just gotta you gotta lock in, right, you know. I
[29:59] Speaker 2: think first of all, we have to.
[30:02] Speaker 3: Get a skill, right.
[30:03] Speaker 2: I mean, and I almost like I was telling my
[30:05] Speaker 2: nephew this, right, I'll be talking now, say, first you
[30:07] Speaker 2: got to get a skill, right, because you got to
[30:09] Speaker 2: have something to monetize.
[30:11] Speaker 4: Right.
[30:11] Speaker 2: You get a skill, learn that skill, work that skill,
[30:15] Speaker 2: and you don't necessarily have to go out and be
[30:17] Speaker 2: an entrepreneur.
[30:18] Speaker 4: Right.
[30:19] Speaker 2: You can work within corporations or work with other business owners,
[30:23] Speaker 2: help them to scale and grow. But you're learning at
[30:25] Speaker 2: that point in time knowing how to save money, which
[30:29] Speaker 2: is very important, right, and then learn how to invest
[30:31] Speaker 2: and grow the money. It's really it's really a three
[30:34] Speaker 2: simple step process, right, the skill to earn, saving money
[30:38] Speaker 2: so that you can invest, but then learning in what
[30:41] Speaker 2: to invest in. And I think if people put that
[30:43] Speaker 2: focus in doing those things and become more financial literary,
[30:46] Speaker 2: I think that we all can achieve what we're looking for.
[30:49] Speaker 1: Thanks thanks for the financial literature, brother, I love it
[30:54] Speaker 1: on money Making Conversation.
[30:56] Speaker 2: My Pleasure, My pleasure.
[30:58] Speaker 1: This has been another dish of money Making Conversation Masterclass
[31:02] Speaker 1: hosted by me Rushaun McDonald. Thank you to our guests
[31:05] Speaker 1: on the show today and thank you for listening to
[31:07] Speaker 1: audience now. If you want to listen to any episode
[31:10] Speaker 1: I want to be a guest on the show, visit
[31:12] Speaker 1: Moneymakingconversations dot com. Our social media handle is money Making Conversation.
[31:17] Speaker 1: Join us next week and remember to always leave with
[31:20] Speaker 1: your gifts.
[31:21] Speaker 4: Keep winning.

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