Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to the show, tom. Very happy to have you. Hello, alan, thanks so much for having me. You've been passionate about aviation and it's led you to find business opportunities, which is fantastic. I talk a lot about and I get a lot of questions about hey, what's the industry that I should start a business in? And my first non-real estate related business was actually pest control and I love that industry. I'm very passionate about the industry, but I'm not really passionate about bugs and critters and stuff like that, so it's a little different than your take. Tell me about how you got interested in aviation and how you parlayed that into a business slash career.

Speaker 2: 0:42

Yeah for sure, when I first got interested in private aviation, probably like many people of my age, when I first saw Top Gun in the movies.

Speaker 2: 0:50

I was like I want to be a fighter pilot man, and so I told my mom. She took me out to the local airport. I started doing flying private lessons and within three lessons I quit. I couldn't take it. I got headaches every time I went up there and it just wasn't enjoyable for me. I thought I wanted to be a fire pilot, but I couldn't. I couldn't handle it, so I kind of put that on the back burner for a little while and my main career when I first got out of college was actually a youth pastor.

Speaker 2: 1:20

I was really passionate about my faith and I had a good experience growing up in my Catholic church locally and so I wanted to be a youth pastor and I did that for about a decade. And then I turned my attention to helping a local music school grow with the marketing and sales as a manager there, and at that point in time my wife and I we had five kids and we were just sick and tired of living paycheck to paycheck. Even though we were passionate about something, we still needed to pay the bills and we always felt like there was something more for us out there. And that's where I saw an ad online for sales. I don't even think it said jets, I think it just said high luxury items.

Speaker 2: 2:03

I walked into the office, found out it was at the airport and I found out that it was selling private jets. I think it just said high luxury items. I walked into the office, found out it was at the airport and I found out that it was selling private jets. And I guess they liked my smile. They took a chance on a guy that didn't have much aviation experience and the rest is kind of history and just kind of rekindled my love for aviation and flying. And when you fast forward a couple of years, I successfully did complete my pilot's license. So I am an actual pilot now and I own my own little 172 plane and aviation's been my life for the last couple of years.

Speaker 1: 2:34

That's cool. So what year was that that you walked into that new opportunity?

Speaker 2: 2:40

Yeah Well, funny enough, it was during COVID. I had put my two weeks notice in at the music school and then two weeks later, everything got shut down and the agency called me and they said hey, dude, just so you know, we can't hire you right now, you're going to have to wait. We don't know how long I was out of a job and I just kind of had to sit there for six weeks, which you know, I ended up doing another side project that I was working on at the time and made stuff happen, and then, six weeks later, they brought me in.

Speaker 1: 3:12

You know that's. I mean, that's an interesting dynamic, right, like you were really passionate about being a youth pastor, you're passionate about the music store. When, if someone were to ask you, hey, tom, you have to choose passion or money. Which do you choose?

Speaker 2: 3:29

Well, it's kind of funny because we've my wife and I've had that conversation, you know, and what I have found is when, when the stars align, uh, it's having that enough finances so that we can also not just participate in our passions but participate on a higher level. And so now I can pour in. I'm still involved in the church as a volunteer youth minister because my kids are middle school, high school age. My wife and I still play music at church, but now I'm able to pour into these kids from a different place. Play music at church, but now I'm able to pour into these kids from a different place. I'm not pouring into them from a place of want and scarcity, which has its own merits from a faith perspective there's the humility component of it, but now I can pour into these kids and into my passions from a place of abundance, and I think there's something to that.

Speaker 1: 4:22

I'm a father. I have three um, wonderful children. 90 of the time they're wonderful um. I have a 10 year old boy, maddox. I have a eight year old boy, jackson, and a four-year-old daughter, olivia, and I don't talk about it much on this show, on my social platforms, a little bit here and there, and I think people get confused with how much time and and how much of my life they are Um and and right now they're they're kind of they're they're at really pivotal ages. I think kids are, no matter what age they're at, um.

Speaker 1: 5:03

I think it's really cool that you worked with youth, because the world's such a crazy place right now and I think it's kind of always been but with the internet, with social media, with access to crazy information, with COVID happening and all these moving parts, being a father is, you know, much more important to me than being an entrepreneur. I believe that I'm going to be a father forever, right? I believe? You know I have a strong faith in God. I believe that it's going to last into perpetuity, whereas my career as an entrepreneur, as an investor, is more of a short-term gig. So I think it's really cool that you've had this opportunity to spend some time with the youth and they're so impressionable.

Speaker 1: 6:05

And One thing that I've learned and this goes back to the question about passion versus money it's like you're measured. We try not to judge others, but it's natural, it's a survival mechanism and there are some people that you will not be able to reach. Without achieving a certain level of success, you will not be able to reach them, and it's not that your goal should be to reach everybody, but you know, people talk you hear a lot of, usually in the religious community or whatever. They talk a lot about money's evil or whatever, and it definitely can be used for evil, but my opinion has always been that it's more of a tool. It's kind of like a shovel right, I could do bad stuff with a shovel, I could hit somebody with it, right, or you know, whatever. There's a few more analogies there. What has working with the youth? How has that impacted you in terms of your professional life and what you want to achieve financially and professionally?

Speaker 2: 7:18

Yeah. So what was kind of interesting about the story, as I was going through as a youth pastor, music person, a lot of my quality time with my kids was through volunteering, through coaching and stuff, and I love that. But then when I went into sales with aviation, I had to put that on the back burner and the company was pretty clear about that. You can't leave early to go coach your kids, and so what was interesting was that there was a shift there from being present to them, like after school and stuff, to not being present. But when I was present with them, I was present in a different way. Like hey, we could take a trip now. Like we can go on vacation this year because we actually have funds for it. Or when I take them to a soccer game, hey, we can actually afford a Chick-fil-A sandwich. Hey, bring your friends. Like we can pay for your friends, and that was that was rewarding in its own way.

Speaker 2: 8:04

And so for me, um, when it comes to giving back, or when it comes to quality time, when it comes to how my faith, life and my working with the youth has informed me moving forward, my goal in the future, like I just I recently started my own brokerage.

Speaker 2: 8:22

My goal is to reach out to people who were like me, that had the heart of a servant, that were hungry for success but just never had the right vehicle. So now what it does for me is I now have a vehicle. I now have a way that I can transform my life with income, and I want to share that with other people that most brokerages are probably looking for someone that's a pilot or has sales experience or whatever. I'm looking for the right, like the kind hearted people that are going to work really hard because I can teach you the soft skills on how to talk to someone and how to sell a jet so that it can transform your life. So I'm looking at it from that perspective of how can I transform someone's life, not just how can I sell more jets for myself.

Speaker 1: 9:05

You hear this analogy quite a bit. I've heard it probably a hundred times in my life or more. But you know about how, how to get the most rocks and you know if you have a bunch of rocks and water and you need to put, put, put in a glass jar, right, you start with the big rocks first. You start with the big rocks first and then you can kind of fill in the gaps with the smaller rocks and the gaps there with the pebbles and then the gaps there with the sand and then you top off the water and if you do it that way, you can get the most out of the jar right, the proverbial jar. But if you put the sand in first or the water in first, you're not going to get those big rocks. And I've seen that in my life. I have somebody that I'm relatively close to that he's very, very successful. He put, you know, but he put the water in first. And for me, my faith and my family, those are the big rocks. And what I worry about a lot of times when I'm talking to entrepreneurs especially folks getting started, because the startup phase is such a a grind is I want to make sure that they have those big rocks in the jar, first those things, that because the other stuff's going to come. That's what. That's what I've learned. If you, if you get um, that stuff right, you don't screw that stuff up, um, you'll, you'll be able to fit the rest. You can pave a way to success, you can figure it out.

Speaker 1: 10:34

But a lot of people, tom, they'll say, no, this is like it has to be. My life for a decade or this is all that matters, and I'm not saying that they don't have an initial focus isn't required, because it is. But you know it's so important because people will say, hey, you know a lot of times they'll say, hey, I don't have anything to give, but once I do, I will, and then, once they do, they don't. It's like you have to figure out how to give of your time and money before you have it. That's when it's interestingly enough, that's when it's the easiest and you develop these patterns. But that's kind of an interesting path that you've taken. I think it's really cool because you have this perspective.

Speaker 1: 11:27

I experienced a lot of guilt. I got married later. I didn't have my first son until after I graduated from law school and things were pretty tight back then. But it was never, you know, like some of the stories that I hear, with people really struggling. But your perspective is very refreshing because you're thankful with the situation that you're in now that you can go to Chick-fil-A and take you know, take some of your kids' buddies with you. Um, and one thing that I'm worried about is making sure that I pass it on to my kids. Like, how do I pass this on to my kids when, um, I definitely didn't grow up, as my kids are growing up, um, have you, have you come across that at all? Have you ever had thoughts about, hey, how do I, how do I instill this attitude of gratitude and, you know, thankfulness in my children?

Speaker 2: 12:21

Well, I think it's been kind of an interesting journey for our kids, cause the older, my son, who's 13,. You know he started out with us where, you know, when we first got married, we lived on the same property as my parents in like their guest house, so like we were always there and you know he's experienced like grandma was always helping us. He experienced paycheck to paycheck, he experienced not being able to go to Chick-fil-A, so he kind of grew up with that. Now there was kind of an opening. We had a couple of cool opportunities, you know, for the past couple of years, while I was working with the brokerage, you know, and my income, just you know, kept increasing, doubling year over year.

Speaker 2: 12:56

And what's interesting is now that I've gone out on my own, like there's a big scale back. So we're kind of like going back to like okay, like you know, how do we balance between, you know, growing something and and and the lifestyle that we, that we were getting accustomed to the last three years? So I think, for a lot of, for my older, the older half of the kids, the first three, you know, they kind of experienced a little bit of what it used to be like and then they came out of it and now we're kind of going back. So I think they're going to have a good perspective of it. And what I'm kind of excited about is that challenge that you're talking about, you know, for the younger ones, because I see this as just like the start and it's only going to get you know better.

Speaker 1: 13:35

Moving forward there's this balance between, I think, with with kids, especially where it's like you, you want to show them what's possible. I grew up in a small farming community on the Oregon Idaho border and I was just there this past weekend actually. Community on the Oregon-Idaho border and I was just there this past weekend. Actually we go back quite a bit for a couple of reasons, spend our summers there, but in the town that I grew up in and I learned a lot of really good skills, I learned how to work hard and things like that. But people rarely leave the area, they don't go see what's out there. And luckily my mom, she wanted me to get out of the house as soon as I could and go explore the world. And so on one hand, you want your kids to see what's possible, which is pretty much anything. They can be, whatever they want to be, but on the other hand, you want to keep them grounded and as parents, I mean we're in a really tough situation for a lot of reasons. It's tough.

Speaker 1: 14:42

Being a parent and being a husband is those are the two of my toughest jobs, my most rewarding jobs, but two of my toughest. And but it's important that we we help them realize hey, you can go conquer the world. No-transcript. Don't do that, because then the reward will be empty. It will it, you know you'll. You'll get there and you'll feel some sense of achievement, but it won't last. So um interesting conversation. I've never chatted um with anybody about this. Before we move on, what are your kind of closing thoughts about being a father and working through these types of issues with your children?

Speaker 2: 15:23

Well, I would say I've got two, two quick stories. One as far as like trying to show my kids how to, to, to, to grow in business. You know, one of the things that cracks me up is my oldest son, who's in middle school. He has learned that if he goes to, you know, the local publics and buys a pack of gum for like five bucks of like you know 20 sticks, he can go to school and sell them for like two to five bucks a piece. And so he started that entrepreneurial. Yeah, I know it's crazy, but he's starting that because he's seen, you know, we're trying, like I try things with them, like try that, that, that you know Facebook, marketplace stuff and you know, expose them to that kind of stuff. So I try to show them. If they ever ask for something, it's like, yeah, what money do you have? You know, we kind of started that early because we didn't have any money. So if you wanted something, you know, go find a way to make it happen.

Speaker 2: 16:08

And then the second one was one day I was in the car with talking to a client of mine and some things had gone south or whatever, and this client just went off on me and he was on speakerphone, my son heard it and you know we're sitting there and I get it all the time. So I'm just like, okay, fine, Someone went off on me. But my son is sitting there crying with his head in his hands and I'm like, buddy, like it's okay, like don't worry about it, like what's wrong? He's just like I'm just so upset that somebody was so mean, you know, to my dad and I'm like I get it, I, and I'm like I get it, I, you know, I understand you, but like watch me, like watch what I'm going to do after this.

Speaker 2: 16:51

Like because that was a pivotal moment in my career and I can't get into like the details of what that conversation was about, but that was a pivotal moment in my career where I had a choice to either back down and pretty much walk away from what I was trying to do and what I was looking to do in my career, or I could step up to the plate, take my best swing and move forward. And that was almost a year ago or so now. And I recently went back to my son and it's like remember that conversation where that guy went off on me. It's like see where we are a year later, you know, and that's because I didn't quit.

Speaker 2: 17:26

I, you know I wanted to, to move forward and I I'm so thankful he was in the car with me at that time because he, like that's just now ingrained in my brain and in my life, like that was a pivotal moment for us. Then he was kind of the catalyst for that, because I wanted to show him, you know, watch what's going to happen. And I guess maybe that's part of what we do as parents, you know, is sometimes we try to shelter them from our struggles, our failures. But if they see a struggle and they can see us overcome that struggle, then they can know that they can overcome those struggles as well.

Speaker 1: 18:00

Yeah, that's awesome, man. There's so many great lessons in there, I think, as business leaders great lessons in there, I think, as business leaders as well as parents, you know, I believe in these ultimate principles of truth and that's one of them where it's like don't, if you want to lead somebody, don't tell them to go do it, tell them, watch me. That's I mean that sticks with people, that's that hits different, you know. And and the struggle component, man, I try to get not having enough struggle for my children is one of my biggest concerns and so I'm always looking for ways that I can struggle in front of them and I've recently started, over the last month or two, jumping in really cold water, really uncomfortable, uncomfortable, like you know, doing the cold plunges and stuff.

Speaker 1: 18:54

And because our kids don't see that right, I've been blessed in a lot of ways with, with, with my businesses. Um, I have a couple of decent vehicles and and and things like that, and that's what my kids see. They see, they see the cars or whatever. They don't see the struggle that went into it. They don't see the people that quit on me, they don't see the people that yelled at me like customers and all that. So I think that, man, that's such a a cool story that, and the funny thing is that nothing could teach your son that lesson like that right, yeah, it's the real, it's the real world, stuff for sure I am interested in hearing about the aviation side of your career.

Speaker 1: 19:42

I'm especially interested in hearing about how people can monetize owning airplanes, jets whatever, when they're not using them. And tell me about that. That's very interesting.

Speaker 2: 19:58

Yeah. So in aviation there's a couple of different ways to make money. You can become a broker. The interesting thing about becoming a broker is there's no license, no certifications. You just kind of start, you kind of get yourself going.

Speaker 2: 20:11

I was a youth pastor beforehand, so for those people that might be listening to your show, they're like what do I do? I like planes, but how can I make money with aviation? Well, being a broker is one way that you could do that, and it's the sales skills that you talk about, it's the marketing skills that you talk about on your podcast. And you can grow your own business from that perspective of just listing, selling planes, kind of like a realtor, but with airplanes or private jets, and you can do both. You can do everything. So I mean that might be one way that your audience would be interested in.

Speaker 2: 20:42

And then, of course, if you're at the end of the spectrum, where you're looking to invest, you know basically what you do is you buy a jet and you hand it off to a charter company to rent it out and work it out, and they will pay you back. You know the revenue. It's kind of. It's basically like realty, it's like Airbnb, right, and you and you hand over the asset to a management company that will handle getting the clients and generating income from that specific asset. There's a lot to it, obviously, and a lot of things that I wouldn't advise it for everybody. There's some things to be aware of, but more and more people are becoming excited about private aviation. I watched a couple of videos from Chris Korn and Nick Marietta and other people like that that they're like I'm more excited about private aviation. I watched a couple of videos from Chris Korn and Nick Marietta and other people like that that they're like I'm more excited about private aviation than I am about real estate right now because of what they're seeing in the market.

Speaker 1: 21:35

That's interesting. So it's kind of like buying a piece of property, handing it over to a property management company, crossing off some dates or whatever, where it's like, hey, I'm going to be, you know, I'm going to be using it on on these dates and uh, fill it up. What type of fee is would somebody be looking at to to use? Uh, so? So is that what you do as a broker? To tell me a little bit about what it means to be a broker, or are you involved in the transaction of buy-sell?

Speaker 2: 22:07

So I primarily do the buy-sell. The investing part is kind of a newer service that we've been offering. So I will work as an acquisition broker, but now, because I've been making the connections with the operators and explaining the opportunity to people, now people are hiring me to be their acquisition broker to buy a jet but also take them through the process of setting up that they can buy a jet and make an investment of it. I mean, and it's a very long sales cycle you know we're talking nine months to a year from you know someone talking with someone and then finding the right operator, finding the right jet and then actually buying the jet, actually buying the jet. So to your original question of like how it works, you basically need capital upfront to buy the jet, and the jet that we're looking at is going to be probably $2 million or more. You know, all the way up to like a Gulfstream, that's, you know, 10, 20, whatever million dollars. So you're going to at least need $2 million to kind of get into the game.

Speaker 2: 23:03

So it's got high acquisition costs and then from there, when you hand it over to the management company, they'll charge a fee. It could be a couple thousand dollars a month to manage it. And then on top of that they will rent it out by the hour. And so if it costs you let's say $3,500 to operate the jet, they will charge let's say, $5,500 an hour to the retail person to use it. And they'll usually take a percentage, like 15% of that, that $2,000 per hour margin, or they'll take a flat rate. Maybe it's $1,500 of that, you know of that, uh, or not 1,500, but a flat rate of that $2,000 per hour. And that's how they make their money that's.

Speaker 1: 23:45

That's interesting. Are you seeing people that get into aviation for the first time going straight to that type of model, or is this usually people that you know they've had a private jet for a while for their own purposes?

Speaker 2: 24:00

they decide to decide to do it but surprisingly enough, a lot of them are first-time aviators. Uh, because they. The part of the key is that you're not going to use the jet for yourself, so you really don't want someone that's already using their jet for 100 to 100 hours a year, because then it doesn't give the charter company enough time to make money and make revenue. It's like buying a vacation house that you're going to use three months, four months out of the year, in the summer, in times of peak, you know where you would want to sell it. So it's usually either first time operators or operators that want to buy another jet in their portfolio and hand it over to an operating company.

Speaker 2: 24:38

Oh, and the other thing I forgot to mention was one of the reasons why people do. It is because of the depreciation, so last year you could actually accelerate. Do is because of the depreciation, so last year you could actually accelerate, depreciate 100% of your purchase. So if you bought a $4 million jet, boom, $4 million in that year was done. Now it's down to 80% and it's going to phase itself out, but the accelerated depreciation that was applied to private jets was a huge boost for the past couple of years.

Speaker 1: 25:05

That's awesome man. That's very cool. I definitely have some more questions that I'd like to ask you, uh, once we uh pause the recording. But that's fantastic. This, this has been great man. This has been a really cool conversation. Uh, very applicable. Um, just people, a lot of my listeners are. They're looking to get to the next level and sometimes, um, the more practical aspect of doing that is is what's important and maybe holding them back. So this conversation been great. People have questions for you or they want to reach out. What's the best uh way for them to contact you?

Speaker 2: 25:45

Just go to theultimatejetguycom Now. My social media handles are on there for Instagram, linkedin, tiktok, youtube, so theultimatejetguycom is where you want to go.

Speaker 1: 25:56

Love it Well. Thanks for joining us today, Tom. I appreciate all the great info and best of luck, man. Thanks, Alan, Appreciate it.