How To Build A Six-Figure HVAC Business With No Experience (Step-by-Step Blueprint) 🚨

29:22You have to have that hunger and you have to have that drive in you and they will take you and mold you. into what you, you know, they want you to be, you know, because they're going to make an investment into you. You know, they'll send you to schools. I know guys that didn't have any EPA certifications, but they were just so good at what they do, companies would hire them. I know guys that worked for electrical companies that were illegal immigrants, but the boss just knew that they were so good at what they do, they ran the whole electrical jobs. So, you know, companies just really want people that can sell, good workers, and, you know, things that can, you know, help them to get through.

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33:47For Massachusetts, 1-800-327-5050. For Iowa, 1-800-BETS-OFF. For Puerto Rico, 1-800-981-0023. In partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel. Yeah, so you mentioned the EPA certification. That's important. Are there other certifications that they need to have? Okay, now this is good you said that. Now, this is what could really help people out there. If you want to get into the trade and you don't have much money and you're discouraged, if you're smart enough and you're a good person that could comprehend things, read things and comprehend and then answer questions, you could go to Mainstream Engineering 608 and you could take and practice for your EPA examination.

34:31certification um the epa is about 100 questions it's 25 questions in each section i believe it's four sections there's a type one type two and then there's the universal certification so once you get your epa it's basically that's your air conditioning license so let's just say like you guys right now you could take two or three weeks out and you could say all right I'm going to study this pamphlet and take my EPA test. You can get certified and just get your EPA, not know any air conditioning, just take the test. This is how my business got started. My cousin bought the EPA test on a Friday. She studied it.

35:12She was a school teacher. She took it on a Monday and she just barely passed it. And that's how we started our company because she passed her EPA that she knew nothing about air conditioning. Now, that EPA certification lasts for the rest of your life. There's no renewing it. And that allows you to buy air conditioning equipment. You could shop in the supply house. Like, you guys do a lot of building and stuff like that. You get your EPA, you can say, all right, guys, I'll buy all the equipment. Just give me the list. You guys buy all the equipment at the cost and make them do the labor. That's one way you could just say by just having your EPA.

35:52I made my sister get her EPA. I made everybody around me get the EPA because you never know when you might need to go to a supply house, buy a water heater, buy a furnace. You can actually buy it and make your person come and put it in. So that's a very simple process. You don't need to go spend$20 ,000 a year in school because at the end of the process, it's to get that EPA. which once you get that piece of paper, it's pretty much you can do what you want as long as you understand the practices of air conditioning and the rules and regulations of what the EPA is providing. You know, if you're driving in your truck, canisters have to be in an upright position.

36:34You know, gases have to be labeled. Once you learn all those things, that's really what the EPA is about. The Environmental Protection Association wants you to do good air conditioning practices. But even when you get your EPA, that doesn't mean that Rashad could call you and say, hey, come fix my air conditioning, because you don't really know any practical skills. You just know what the Montreal Protocol wants you to know and things like that. But that certification will get you into any supply house, order anything, and companies will hire you. they will hire you and say all right he took the liberty of getting the epa because you technically can't work around any refrigerants or gases unless you understand the laws of safety and what to do but that's very good because once you get that you can skip a lot of the process you know so talk about the low low voltage wiring basics like what's the basic okay well basically with low voltage wiring um everyone has a thermostat in your house and stuff so if you pop your thermostat off the wall and you look at the wires behind it you're basically going to always see these terminals r y g common w and then i have an o slash b here terminal these terminals are in every thermostat no matter what you have so r represents power um that's 24 volts so r would be 24 volts of power y represents ac that's for cooling the g terminal would represent the fan that's what brings your blower motor on your fan on the cy would represent common and that's a 24 volt terminal as well the W terminal that's for your heat that's always going to make heat so these wires go from here to your inside control board this here is a control board that would be in every single house or some type of control board like this that would go from your thermostat to your control board so here are the wires here that are on the board Y W G in common so these same wires go to your inside unit whenever you have an air handler or a boiler and this would turn on the indoor unit and then it would also turn on the outdoor unit so basically r would connect to r y would connect to y the g terminal would connect to g common would go to common w would go to w and then for air conditioning y would go outside to the condenser and common would also come outside to the condenser to bring 24 volts to the contactor to start up your outdoor unit.

39:23So that, in layman's terms, that's just how your low voltage would work. But then you would say what powers up your control board to make your low voltage work would be your transformer. And in this trade, we work with step-down transformers only. Can you guys still see me? Yeah, yeah, yeah, we got you. Okay, so basically with Transformers, everyone has this in your house or your buildings or whatever you're doing. You have to have a Transformers. So these two wires, the black and the red, I could connect 120 volts to these two wires, and it would step it down to 24 volts on this side. This side always stays with 24 volts.

40:07If I had an air handler that was 208 volts, this white wire, you guys can't see on here, but the common wire is the white wire. This wire is always used with another wire. So white and orange, you could use 208 volts. The 208 volts would come here. The transformer steps it down to 24 volts on the other side. This 24 volts goes into your control board, and that's what illuminates the lights on your board or the LED lights, and that's what gives the terminals power here. So like I taught in the EYL class, never ever look to the wires for the power. Yes, you can test the wires for power, but it's the terminals that are giving the wire power.

40:59Now, by code, the Y terminal, which is for AC, that would be a yellow wire by code. The white wire would be for W for heating by code. The green wire would be for the fan by code, and blue or brown would normally be used for common. but you can never watch the color of the wires you have to watch where the wire is going to the terminal because somebody could use a red wire for air conditioning for why but as long as it's going to the wide terminal it's doing what it has to do so never look at the colors of the wires always look at the terminal where the wire is going but as long as they're going to the right terminals you're okay and you know so basically if r is getting 24 volts let's just say it's christmas eve in your house troy and the heat goes out and for some reason you think it's the thermostat you want to override the thermostat now you could take off your thermostat and take the r wire and put it together with the w wire and that would override your thermostat and make your heat come on So when R and W make, your heat comes on.

42:15When R and Y and G make, your air conditioning system comes on. So R is like the 24 volts that is connecting with all these terminals that connect with your control board and that will bring on your condenser. So if you put the R, Y, and G together, the air conditioning would come on and the fan would come on. If you want to test your heating to see, is my heat working? You can put the R wire with the W wire. These are just 24 volts. But I would tell you this, never ever jump an R in common, because then you will blow the transformer. You have 24 volts going together. That would be no good. So never ever jump R in common, but you could jump R with all the other terminals.

43:03That's also very good to know for a lot of safety reasons. that's big man just completed a house you talking about that circuit boards getting back to the transformers it's all in line man it's all in line I wonder when you're talking about heating ventilation AC when I'm starting what type of jobs are going to be the ones that I'm going to go to first right like I wouldn't imagine is it heating first is it AC first is it ventilation which was more practical to start um well every home is built with heating you have to have heating in your house air conditioning is a luxury if you have air conditioning that's pretty much a luxury that you have in your house but you have to build the house with heating um it's see what i've noticed is in this trade is that if a company hires you they're going to put you where they want to you may want to be a service tech but you may get thrown on the install team so you don't really have a choice sometimes when you're first coming in you just kind of go with the flow so i might come out of school and get hired somewhere and they might throw me on the install team i might be an installer for three years i might be an installer forever or i may want to get out of installing and try to go to service so either one is good you're going to make good money on either side but it's what do you like to do like installers are like mostly heavy more brutal type of work the service work is a lot more with your brain and a lot more you know regular hand tools and using your brain but installing you have to use your brain too but it's more heavy lifting more you're kind of in the brutal combat you know so if you're a rough and tough guy and you like lifting and you know working with ducks and a lot of heavy machinery then you know installs for for you but if you want to be a service tech and go from house to house and fix things and keep your day moving like that then you know you kind of want to be a service tech you know and just also i wanted to show you guys something this transformer in h track you make your most money off your lowest cost parts this transformer cost about maybe 16 to 30 the most now if a tech comes to your house and your transformer's blown i mean you're looking at at least maybe 500 to 600 bucks to complete that call you know with just labor and parts you know so if you could understand a lot of these small parts it's very good for you a thermostat it to change a thermostat i just changed two thermostats yesterday i charged a customer eight hundred dollars you know and you know thermostats can range between a hundred to four hundred dollars or you know but that's for 15 to 30 minutes worth of work it's not even really like a full hour you know so you could almost make your own price you can charge with your worth um and you could make like once i learned how to change the thermostat i went to every job and change the thermostat you know i was because i just saw the extra money in it you know you can buy a thermostat for 100 bucks make uh an extra 250 in 15 minutes it's not bad money you know there are people that are working hours$30 an hour$40 and that they have to work hours and hours after taxes to get to like a$300 for the day or 400 you know so if you can make that very very quickly that's what I love about the uh the art trade it's like you know you can just make so much in a very little bit of space of time as you were saying it um I'm thinking about the thermostats.

46:49I got an Echo B. It's a little bit more than$30. No, your thermostat's going to be more because it's Wi-Fi. You need that common wire to operate your thermostat. That's what illuminates your thermostat because there's no batteries in there. I'm thinking from a safety standpoint, what are some of the procedures and protocols when going into a job? Because you're dealing with electric, which can be extremely dangerous. What are the things you tell people before going into a job? um basically when i train all my guys i i do a lot of safety training as well as you know we go into the house you got to come correct uniform booties um always turn off the power if you're not sure what you're dealing with um troubleshoot from there sometimes we have to troubleshoot with the power live but always you know go to your practices um you know start with the basics, but you definitely have to use all safety procedures, you know, going in.

47:49There's no reason, there's no way to really tell what to do because every house is different. You really got to have to use your judgment and use all your training. That's where your training really comes in at, you know. So let's get into the entrepreneur aspect of it because that's earn your leisure. That's for people who they want to know how to become, you know, HVAC tech, but I'm sure they They probably want to know how to own a company, how to navigate that. So what's the, okay. So you got your HVAC certification. You got, you know, you got in with a company. You worked a couple of years as a, as a worker.

48:22You got your feet wet. You saved up some money. Now you want to become an entrepreneur. What do you have to do to become an entrepreneur? Like what's the first step for that? What's the licensing? What's, what's, how do you become a company? This is, this is very good question because I've done this for so many people, um, to help them start businesses. Okay, what I recommend is this. If you don't have much money and you want to get things going, the first thing you could do is go to your municipality. For us, it was in White Plains, and you could go and get either an LLC or a sole proprietorship.

48:57A sole proprietorship is a lot easier sometimes if you don't have the money for the insurances for the LLC. Get your sole proprietorship. You go to that building. You pick out your company name. You got to pick out like five different names. They're going to put it in the computer, see if the name's available. You pay literally it's$35 to get your business license. This is why I don't understand people sometimes. But you pay your$35. You get your business name. They stamp it. Now you take that business name license and you bring that to the bank. The bank takes that. You open up a bank account with your business name.

49:34Sometimes the bank will give you your EIN number. Sometimes you could apply for that. Once you get your business name and you get your bank account, from there you just need general liability insurance, which is not really that much. You get, I mean, a million-dollar policy or a$2 million policy. You could pay maybe a couple hundred dollars a month, and you'll need an auto policy if you have a van. From there, the main problem is getting the work. That's where the hidden mystery, the gray area is for everyone. You know, because people can almost buy a van and get this process started, but it's getting the work.

50:18That's the whole real ball of wax. So that you have to do everything. You've got to pay for leads. You've got I'm a minority business owner. Most of my partners are female, so they're double minority business owners. I've used government contracting. I've had I've done all the military bases in New York. I had a great government contract for a couple of years. Those are great. If you get a government contract, that's a great way. You've got to look for developers, real estate developers, people like that, big whales who are building in New York City or anywhere in your area. Look for those type of people.

50:54Other contractors you can link up with. Dell PCs with Intel inside are built for the moments that matter, for the moments you plan and the ones you don't. Built for the busy days that turn into all-night study sessions, The moment you're working from a cafe and realize every outlet's taken. The times you deepen your flow. And the absolute last thing you need is an auto update throwing off your momentum. That's why Dell builds tech that adapts to the way you actually work. Built with long-lasting battery so you're not scrambling for the closest outlet. And built an intelligence that makes updates around your schedule, not in the middle of it.

51:32They don't build tech for tech's sake. They build it for you. Find technology built for the way you work at Dell.com slash Dell PCs. Built for you. If your best finance people are doing expense reports, chasing receipts, or spending time on month-end close, it's time to get Brex AF, a Gentic finance that eliminates that work before it starts. Learn more at Brex.com slash AF. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for$15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today.

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53:12Remember, Wasabi is up to 80 % less than market competition and doesn't charge a cent for businesses to access their own data. Wasabi, another championship story. Check them out for free at wasabi.com. Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage, proud partner of iHeart Podcast Network. Now there's so many AI things with generating leads. But what I did, this is very important, what I did. I realized this was going to happen a while back when I was paying for leads and trying to figure out how to get business. So what I did was I started businesses for all of my friends and people that were serious. So in case my business didn't do good and they were better at other things in business than me, if their companies are doing good, now I get work from the community that I built within my own community.

54:07Like my friend called me today. Shout out to Marcus from Platinum Kids. He called me today. He said, Vince, I need help. I literally have over 10 installs that I cannot do. So I was like, okay, I'll do one install a day for you. Now, this is a friend who I started a company for, whose company is just growing so big that now he's giving back work to me. So I figured out that this is the best way for me instead of paying for leads or doing other things. I get jobs from all my techs who I started companies for, who I trained. So we kind of have built our own community within our community to help generate work for each other.

54:47so that's one thing that I would tell people to start doing you know building with your friends in your community because everyone has a different type of luck and everyone has a different situation and then they could bring it back to the table you know so COVID I believe really woke up a lot of people in that realizing when the world stopped I was still working I never stopped working a day through COVID you know people would leave the money on the floor but I would still pick it up You know, so it's just a wonderful thing. So now I have a community of people where, hey, Vince, I got a job here.

55:24I got a job here. I'm calling people. Hey, you go do this, do that. So we're all kind of working together. I think that's the best way to build it. But you have to use every avenue, leads, minority businesses, government contracts, go door to door. See, one thing about me was my process was different because I spent 10 years in sales before I became HVAC tech. So I had mastered the sales game. I took all the sales training from all the companies I worked for. I let that all develop in me. you know and i was the number one sales rep at mostly all my companies so i i had a great rapport with customers i knew how to talk to people i could go into a racist house and by the time i come out we're best friends so i knew how to take rejection and and you know channel all these things to make them positive so that kind of helped me out too so anybody with a sales background would be great in HVAC because you're selling all day long.

56:27That's really what you're doing, no matter how great of a tech you are. I just wanted to follow up with that because what you just said at the end, that was what I was thinking about the whole time as far as sales. Because everything that you said reminded me a lot of me being a financial advisor. Exactly. We used to call it a circle of influence. So we would work with accountants and lawyers because their clients needed financial services. So like you, your circle of influence will be a general contractor, right? Because as they build a home, they're going to need to refer the work. And then, like you said, the door to door, we used to call that like cold calling, where you just randomly call a business or just walk into a business or cold, cold canvassing was actually walking into a business.

57:12Yeah. Door knocking. Yeah. Yeah. And then referrals. But that's brilliant as far as what you said. Building a funnel. You know. So it all connects. It all connects. But that's something that I think any business, but especially it sounds like in this business, for sure, you don't just do one thing and say, I'm going to do this to get leads. Right. Like you got to do everything. Facebook ads, Instagram ads, whatever. Even your truck being written up. And let me tell you guys something, too. Instagram is so great because, look, I got my Westchester Community College job from somebody that saw me on Instagram and said, hey, bro, I see how you're teaching these kids.

57:51out here you'd be perfect for this job i went there got the job i get so many jobs from texts that call me every day hey vince can you come help me with this job i go there they pay me so it's just like you got to really just put yourself out there and show people what you do and they will slowly gravitate to you i get a lot a lot of work from social media um you know and it it builds a brotherhood and a friendship you know i have so many people when i started posting hvac posts really i gained i had 2 000 followers i gained 5 000 followers in like a month and a half two months literally like every day i was just getting like 300 500 followers so i saw the algorithm and what was happening i was putting up a post i would get like a couple hundred thousand views on it or something like that so i was like wow people are really interested and HVAC, and there's a very, very big community.

58:47I have two business partners right now that are females. They both have their EPA and they run the offices. One's in Florida, one's down here. They have never went back to work for about three years now. They've been living off of this. So even for females, if you are a female and you want a supplemental income, you don't have to do the work, but you can run the office and have everything else set up. because most guys need a back office. They're not good with it. Most blue collar guys doing age track, they always have either their wife or someone in the back office doing the work or the business is really in their name a lot of the times, you know?

59:29So there's a lot of females that you can work from home. You don't have to quit your regular day job. All you need is a computer and a phone. Just do the scheduling and do the billing. And that's it. Have the guys go out and do the work and you will make a large profit. I mean, you're bringing up a, I mean, that's a system, right? Like that's everybody all in. Something we know a bit about. I'm wondering when you talked about the truck, number one, how expensive is it to get the truck? Because I'm starting the business. And when I show up, what are the tools that I need, right? Like I'm not just showing up to the job with the empty van.

1:00:06I see my electrician comes, my HVAC team, their truck is loaded with things. I'm like, how do they know exactly what to get and what should be inside that truck? Yeah, well, I mean, I'm definitely, I can't, I can say I'm a tool fanatic. Like, I like to buy everything that makes the job easier. Now, for HVAC, hand tools can be very expensive tool bags. I mean, I use Vito ProPak. They're out of Connecticut. They're a great company, great bags. Those bags go from$200 to$600 just for a tool bag. Like, you know, good hand tools, you're going to spend maybe a grand or two on just good hand tools. But good gauges are going now from$600 to$1 ,500 for gauges.

1:00:50We were doing a lot of soldering and a lot of brazing in the past, but now everyone's using ProPress. You know, you'll see that going on now. Probably for some of your homes and things, you know, they're using ProPress, which cuts out the time and a lot of material. you just like like you guys could put in a water heater so easily you just put a pipe in a coupling you put a machine on it you press it it's done it's sealed so they're making things so much easier now where you know you have to have these tools to me i would say the average truck probably has about I mean, as HVAC tech, you probably got about$20 ,000 or$30 ,000 worth of tools could be on your truck at any time.

1:01:34A plumber could have anywhere from 60 grand worth of tools on up in their truck at any time. You know, so you definitely need your tools. And that's what goes into the whole job when you're charging. It's your truck has to carry the tools to the job. You got to get to the job. you know so all that plays a factor in what's you're being charged to at the end of the day so yeah talk about talk about the seasonality of of your job okay for entrepreneurs like this this yeah maybe like the summer is a great season for this summer the summer is the time baby the summer will make you think that you're like the richest man on earth but it will end i mean but summer is so great i mean just as a small contractor not even a major company this is a small contractor you could easily do like 80 90 grand in the summer you know just 100 grand in the summer which if you don't want to then you don't have to work in the winter you know you can budget yourself out it's all how you want to live but the summer is the absolute best time for an hvac tech and the reason why is we sell freon freon is like the dream it's like the gold the gold you guys were finding on the streets that that's the gold r22 is a freon that that's been phased out that freon you could sell anywhere from two to three hundred dollars per pound so we're selling gas every day per pound and it's the most beautiful thing like your air conditioning system you're going to need five or six pounds of freon in it so even if i fix it then you still have to pay for the freon if you need gas that's another thousand dollars right there so it's imagine going to every house and they need freon it's like a thousand dollars every house two thousand dollars it's just unbelievable you know um r410a was another freon that was new that's about 150 maybe 200 per pound The new gases out now, like for you guys' homes and stuff, would be R32 or R454B.

1:03:49Those are the two newest gases out now. What we were using in the past was R22, which has been out for the last 20 or 30 years. We were using that. That got phased out because they said it had too much chlorine in it, and that was depleting the ozone faster. So we went from R22 to R410A now to R32 and R454B. But the gas, okay, I mean, just this week alone, I probably made like$3 ,000 or$4 ,000 just off of Freon. Okay, I'll put it into perspective. A can of 410A costs about$200,$250, let's say. That's for a 30-pound can. And if you're selling one pound for$200 or$150, I mean, it's like the golden era is back.

1:04:44It's like the gold rush in the summer. It's literally you cannot stop making money. Sometimes I almost feel guilty sometimes. Like me and my brother, we used to have a contest every day to see who could get to five grand the fastest. And then as soon as we get to five grand, we'd chill out for the day. you know by that time it's about 10 o 'clock at night but you know or eight o 'clock at night so it's just the summertime is just the best if you're going to get into this trade and you want to make money you start in the summertime and i guarantee you you'll never turn back winter is a little bit harder um you can make a lot of money in the winter don't despite the winter oil we make a lot of money with oil gas forced air heating boilers it's a lot of money you know but the summertime for me, it just seems like people just cannot live without AC when it's hot.

1:05:39When it's cold, people kind of tend to try to get warmer. They'll snuggle up. They'll get an extra blanket. They'll live for a day or two. But a lot of people who have health conditions, a lot of elderly people, I just worked for a lady yesterday. She had a heart condition and there's no way she could live without air conditioning. There's just no way. So, you know, You know, you're wanted. It's a great trade. You're respected. You take pride in fixing things. As a young black person or anyone of color, it's a respectful job. You could feed your family with it. I mean, it has just brought so much joy to my life that I'm just overwhelmed.

1:06:18I try to just bring as much forth to everyone that I can with it because it can change your life. If you just hone in on one thing for one time, I guarantee you, it'll change your life. You definitely are an essential worker. Dell PCs with Intel inside are built for the moments that matter. For the moments you plan and the ones you don't. Built for the busy days that turn into all-night study sessions. The moment you're working from a cafe and realize every outlet's taken. The times you deepen your flow. And the absolute last thing you need is an auto update throwing off your momentum. That's why Dell builds tech that adapts to the way you actually work.

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1:09:04wasabi hot cloud storage proud partner of iheart podcast network you talk about the amount of income that you can make the five thousand dollar race with you and your brother i wonder as an entrepreneur how are you managing money right like you've been doing this for a while now how have you when you get money for the first time it's okay but you've been doing it for a while how has that process been for you well you know what that's a very good question because for a while coming from where i came from with the streets and then going into the business world i always thought it was just the fact of just stacking money you know just stack up as much money as you can and this and that until you guys really came around we didn't really know about like financing and investing when rashad first came to my house the reason why we went with rashad because we were just blown away like he was just so meticulous and on point And to be honest with Shah, I didn't understand a lot of what she was saying, but my wife understood the mutuals.

1:10:05But we were just so blown away. We were like, how is this guy so young and just so militant? And like, I mean, you were just so on point that it was just like razor sharp. So, you know, that's just one credit to you. But what was the question you were saying? How are you managing money? Oh, yeah. So we didn't really know. I didn't really know how to manage money. This is one thing that I'm kind of upset about because I got kind of house stuck, you know, three, four thousand dollar mortgage, kids, college businesses. is I was just so happy to just to be maintaining on a certain level that I never really got into that point of investing.

1:10:49And then we didn't know how we didn't know, hey, you know, if you take 20 grand and put it here, it's going to matriculate and it's going to, we didn't, I didn't see that concept. So I didn't really manage a lot of money well, but I lived a good life and I went through, I learned now, you know, on what to do. But if you're in this trade, like I know a lot of plumbers and guys are in this trade that are doing very well in the stock market because they're able to just do a job for 30 grand and just shove that in the market and then make it back tomorrow or make it back next week. So it doesn't really hurt.

1:11:23So for guys in this trade, it is good, you know, once you understand it, to do a lot of investing because you can make the money so fast. You can make it right back. how organized you got to be though like i'm thinking now the first deal you got was cash how often i mean i'm pretty sure now it's billing and it's it's electronics and payment processing yeah having that but how important is having a structure well you gotta have your team you know you gotta have a good accountant you gotta have your back office you know i'm not that computer literate so i really depend on my back office a lot and you start to realize things like like When I got my first military contract, I was psyched up, oh, five grand, 10 grand a week, 20.

1:12:06But then when the taxes came on it, I realized, oh, I might have been paying these guys too much. I could have cut back because nobody sees that part at the end as taxes. So you got to really stay organized. You got to have a focused team. You can't do everything yourself once you get to a certain point. You've got to really pay to put the right people in, you know, in areas to help you. And, you know, I used to I think I used to use ADP for payroll sometimes. It's good to I think they're a good company that used to organize our payroll for us. I mean, I remember even TT was there helping us a few times.

1:12:46You know, office was crazy, you know, so you got to have a good office crew. You got to have people that are smarter than you, you know, around you to really handle a lot of this business for you because, you know, you're out in the field. It's hard to manage both. You really can't do both. Be in the field and be doing everything. No matter what programs you get or things to help you, you need an actual person that, you know, you can guide through, you know, help you guide you through the process, you know. So I'm glad you mentioned about the women because, you know, I'm building a home right now and my whole painting crew is women.

1:13:23And I was talking to the boss yesterday. She's a woman. And yeah, definitely pay attention to detail for sure. But usually you wouldn't expect that from laborers. You wouldn't expect to see female laborers. So I'm glad you said that because there is a space in these trades for women. And that brings me to my question as far as one of the most, I guess the most important thing is hiring employees. Right. so how do you go about hiring employees are they seasonal workers is it like per job like are you have them year round like how's that well to be honest with you guys this is what happens in the hvac trade um because i've been hiring people from about 28 years old till i'm 52 now so i mean i've been hiring firing all walks of life black white asian grown men young men so what i've learned is this um they're going to it's hard with hvac because when you hire somebody you have to almost really look into their soul as far as integrity because when you're going from every house making a couple thousand dollars at every house you go to it's very hard for another person to look at that and a technician to look at that and then that's when the resentment comes in and that's when the problems start.

1:14:41So me personally, at this stage in the game, I don't like to hire anybody really over 25 years old. I hire guys from 18 to 25 because a guy from 18 to 25 making$1 ,000 to $2 ,000 a week, they're on top of the world. But once you get to 30 and into your 40s and you start having real life bills, mortgages, kids, could be getting married, divorced, whatever it is, that's when you really need to start making your own money as far as whatever you feel you deserve. Because I can only pay you but so much, and you're going to watch me make so much, and it's not going to make much sense to you after a while.

1:15:23And then that resentment starts to go into the work, and then you're not as nice to customers. It starts to just bleed out into the situation. So I like to stay between that range because a lot of grown men in certain things, you have your grown man problems, but I can't solve them all from my company. I can just pay you what I can. I can't make all your problems go away. So I noticed that the resentment comes in if we're the same age and you're working for me. And, you know, it's very hard that I've learned. A lot of people can't really, you know, take it to just stay in their position, stay in their lane and grow as you can.

1:16:03You know, so I like to stay in that range. But you got to look for guys. I mean, I've been through it all. I have guys that were coming on time and just BS all day. I would have guys that would come in late, but they were some of my hardest workers. You know, you just got to kind of look at people and look at their integrity and see, like, are they loyal? Are they honest? You know, I'd just rather have a loyal and honest person. If you got to collect$3 ,000 in cash and you have my truck van, my keys, my company card, like, I have to be able to trust you with a wide variety of things. We have to almost be a family.

1:16:39I don't like to just hire workers. Once you're working for me, you're in my family. You're coming to Thanksgiving dinner. You're there at Christmas. This is a family thing. So I've seen many different techniques and things with hiring people and friends, strangers. You know, some people want to just come to work just for that day, just to make some money. They're not really into the job. You have those types that just need to just make some money. You have some types that are coming just to infiltrate, to figure out how are you getting jobs, you know, and then they'll work for you for a little while and then, you know, you won't see them again.

1:17:15And, you know, so there's all different types. You just have to really look at a person and just see, you know, sometimes you'll hire a person and they have too much problems in their life, too much desperation or, you know, they always got an excuse. You know, let me ask you this, because this is something that's relevant to the times that we're in, because even I'm building a home. None of my workers are American. The workers that you see that you're hiring or you see from the hiring pool, what's the percentage of them? That's actually great question. I say right now, because, you know, this trade for a while was locked down with Irish, Italian and Germans.

1:17:50They had it on lock. So right now, the Caribbean people are heavy, heavy in the trades right now. And they're unstoppable and they're really great. Latinos and Hispanic people. You got to understand all the immigrants are already coming to America with the trades. sheet rocking i mean they've been doing this since 12 years old 13 years old so electrical you know they've been doing it for so long that they're just no see they're bred with hard work you know over here even though we're hard workers we don't really understand hard life you know so people that can endure a hard life waking up having to go and to the river to get water or do this or that and they endure that life and they come here they look at our hard work as like it's kind of a joke to them you know what i mean because the tools and the things that they have to do their work with we're just so far advanced it's just like we're you know so i see that the immigrants are really um they're going hard with it you know they're really their work ethic is just so great you know they don't want to take breaks they want to get the job done You see the progress going on, but definitely Caribbean people, men and women, Latinos, just everyone right now into the trades.

1:19:18What about black people in America? Black? What's the percentage you think? In the trade right now? Yeah. There's a large group of black. I would say percentage-wise in the trade right now, there's probably about 30 or 40 percent, you know, 50 percent coming in. There's a lot of black and people of color in the trade. It's just that a lot of people aren't going to the ownership position. You know, they're just stick really, you know, they want to get in the union, work for the union for 20 years and get off easy or this or that. no one thinks that they could do the ownership position because of them being an h-vac tech or being black i never looked at it like that because see i was so used to doing big deals with the the ginsburg brothers and developers and things for my sales jobs that you know i never had that fear a lot of people have fear of owning a company because they're going to be looked at as less than or I can't go charge someone$50 ,000.

1:20:26They're going to look at me like I'm just some... But I've never had that perspective, so that never bothered me. But there's a lot of people that... The market is flooded right now. If you go into the supply houses and the companies, now you're seeing more and more and more Black and Latino people in there now, more than ever. Like if this was 1960s or 70s, we wouldn't even, you know, there wasn't really much out there. Into the 70s, 80s, a few people were here, but no one was owning companies. I can't think of one black company owner in Westchester. Well, now there's all self, Baru. He's a contractor.

1:21:09But that's just up until lately. Like growing up, there wasn't anyone. one but now there are a lot more people coming into the contracting and plumbing there's a lot of black plumbers that are emerging now a lot of black plumbers and they're doing very well and you know hvac as well a lot of electricians too now you know because that's what it is the plumbing and the electrician license is a big license it's a little bit bigger than the hvac situation that's why they walk around like they're the big dogs in the room and you can't tell them nothing and And they say it goes. And I know because they have the license.

1:21:47They went to school for a certain amount of time and they pay like three or four grand just to take that test, you know, depending on what type of plumber or electrician you are. So they're kind of like the heavyweights. But, yeah, for the most part, I, to be honest, I mean, I love my I'm not, you know, I love my race and everything. but i haven't had too many black uh just regular american employees just really you know one in few you know it's just something i don't know if it's the work ethic or how they were brought up but okay my guy now i took him from 18 he already had the mentality of a 30 year old the way that he was brought up i give him the truck he's not joy riding he has a company car he doesn't spend any extra money.

1:22:31He comes to work on time every day. He's helping out his family. He's helping out everyone. He already has the mentality. He doesn't go out. He doesn't drink. He doesn't smoke. He doesn't do anything. He doesn't want to party. He has the mentality of like a grown man, you know, at 18, 20, you know, years old. So it's all where you, you know, your mentality is in your perspective, I think with it, but a lot of people of color are coming into the trade and, you know, a lot not a lot of people are happy about it but we're here now you know and it's nothing you can really do about it now you know everyone's in the game now it's like fair game right now you when you speak i hear the experience when you're talking about guys who were joyriding when you were talking about the idea of hiring uh from a certain age demographic there's a lot of experiences there talk about some of the things that you've seen that you want people to avoid so they don't make the same mistakes right like your experiences don't have to be relived what are some of the things to avoid if you're in this space um you know when you're hiring someone um definitely uh if you get those guys that aren't humble and they're telling you yeah i could do everything i can i'm the best this the best of that be very careful with that until you've actually seen them do something.

1:23:51You know, that's a lot of mistakes that I made. You know, I used to talk to guys and they used to tell me how great they were and I never really saw anything and I used to go off of that. So definitely if someone is telling you how great they are, you know, try to see a couple of jobs or a couple of things. I think just sometimes over-investing into certain employees or certain things and then they're having hidden agendas or things like that. You know, I would say, you know, just things like that. I mean, I've done so many different tricks within the company to get money. I mean, I can tell you a story.

1:24:33Once I had a tech and he had a girlfriend. He was African-American tech. He had a white female girlfriend and she had no job. And I hired her. and I did a marketing scheme. What I did was I sent her out there with him and I told her, I said, listen, every house you go to, tell them that your father owns the company. And then I ran a contest every week to see who would sell the most maintenances. Every week she brought in$3 ,500 every week from just telling, going to a house and saying, my father owns the company, this tech is here to fix your job. She sold 30, I ran a contest contest every week.

1:25:15I had a bottle of champagne. I had money, three trucks on the road. Nobody could ever beat her. And she had no HVAC experience, you know? So sometimes you got to mix it up. Sometimes you got to do different things, you know? You don't have to run around like I'm the boss, I'm the owner, you know? Like me, I never do that. I never tell anyone that I own the company. Sometimes customers are like, you know, you're just working too much. Like, you sure you own the company? I'm like, you think I'd be out here if I own the company? Like, you know so i always play the humble role i always try to um just stay in that worker's position and stay humble but you can mix it up you can do different things like you don't have to be the face of your company you can make somebody else project that image for you and you know you could still be in the background like me and my brother we would have it set up in our phones i would have his number as my boss in my phone and he would put me in his so whenever they would say hey call your boss i would just call my brother he would pick up and then he would already know what to tell the customer so you know we never acted like we were the bosses of anything you know and you'll never get a tip so but that's insightful especially with the um sending a white girl to the to the jobs that's just a lot of 500 every week and to the point where the the guys were like vince we can't beat her like i think they beat her one time you know and that was a great way for me to pay the payroll because my payroll was like five grand a week or more so if if i put a contest up for them to just sell maintenances whoever sells the most maintenances gets a big surprise that helped me just to pay payroll too so that was a good method of just trying to make payroll every week which i took pride in always making payroll every week you know so that was So very important to me.

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1:29:49And here's why. Innovation. From Wasabi's AI-enabled intelligent media storage, Wasabi Air, to the industry's only cloud storage service with triple protection against cyber criminals, data deletion, and ransomware, the world's top companies trust Wasabi. Remember, Wasabi is up to 80 % less than market competition and doesn't charge a cent for businesses to access their own data. Wasabi, another championship story. Check them out for free at wasabi.com. Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage, proud partner of iHeart Podcast Network. Talk about government contracts. You say you, like, explain that process of, like, what you went through, what you had to do, you know, the RFP.

1:30:34Talk about that whole thing. Well, okay. the government contract to be honest came at a point in my life where I was really going through a lot uh family wise and just financially wise and to be honest with you I really came to a point where I just got on my knees and I just prayed to God I was like God please like help me find a way like I don't know what to do anymore like you know and to believe it or not a couple days later I got a phone call from a weird number and it was a company that um had the contract for all the military bases in new york in brooklyn new jersey everywhere and they asked me they said hey um would you think about doing the maintenance for us and i was like yeah and there was like how many units they were like well it's like 1100 units we'll give you like i think it was like 160 per unit and i just like jumped on it from there and that lasted for a couple of years um it was great money and then from there i looked into getting my cage number i got um everything certified federally the cage number what is that cage is like um it's like a number that can give you access to like uh government uh contracts and things like that um you know i got my minority business license with um that also helped um and um i just started i i would have my office just go through every certification for government contracting federal contracting um on the city level and we just started going through everything um i mean i got con edison certifications con edison certified so the more certifications and things really help but government contracts are so good because they really pay on time.

1:32:27Like Uncle Sam pays on time. Every week, that money's there, like guaranteed. So that was a really good way of, it helped to uplift me back up. Just making like a couple, like a hundred thousand or so just off of maintenance. We weren't fixing anything. We were just doing maintenance. And that's another big thing is that maintenance is a big part of the industry. You don't have to fix anything to actually make money. We make money off of maintenance every single day. You know, I just did a condenser cleaning yesterday for$400, you know, to wash and clean the condenser. You know, that was great money.

1:33:04You know, so maintenance is something that, I mean, you have to do in your home. You have to do periodically to keep your equipment up. So, like, especially for you guys, like, maintenance is going to be a really big key to preventative maintenance for you to stop a lot of uncostly costs. You have to do preventative maintenance, changing filters, washing units, whether it's winter or AC, it plays a very vital part. That could save you a lot. So I made a lot of money off of maintenance contracts with them. I didn't really have anything. Okay, another great thing to get with the government contracts is your 8A certification.

1:33:44certification if you can get your 8a certification which i'm just a couple tax forms away from that is when the government gives you contracts for no bidding you will get i think it's two or four million dollar contracts automatically so if anyone out there is listening if you can get your 8a certification for hvac that's when you're on your way is that is the eight that's the minority business no that's the minority business is the mb uh mmbe and then you have the minority women's minority business no the a certification is a is a government uh certification that certifies you to get these big government jobs but it's no bidding it's no bidding like oh you got to put in a bid they'll award you a contract for a certain amount of millions three or four million dollars and it's whether you could do the work or not you know so you have to put in a lot of paperwork so this is another thing guys why you have to have a back office and you have to have females involved you have to have someone that can do paperwork i have people that do extensive paperwork that i just cannot fill out you know and once you have someone that can master these these paperwork then you can get in they're trying to stop you with the paperwork you know They're like, okay, you have a chance of an 8A government contract, but you got to do this much paperwork.

1:35:11But if you get it done, then you're in the game. So it's just really doing that paperwork sometimes, sending in your tax forms, sending in all your stuff that you have to give them and staying on top of it. And it will work. I mean, the other day I got a job from the minority business website. A guy called me up. He said, I only want to deal with black businesses. And I went to Brooklyn. I did a big job for him. You know, it was cool. So these things do work. You have to, one thing that they say in sales is if you throw enough shit against the wall, something's going to stick. So you have to just put yourself out there.

1:35:47Like you got to plaster yourself in your neighborhood. Like right now, my neighborhood in Greenberg, I should have my entire neighborhood on lock. Like literally. But I didn't really market my neighborhood because I was trying to go to so many bigger affluent areas. you know the scars dales the jerseys the big areas you know because that's really where we make most of our monies in the more fluent uh areas where you don't really have too much problems but had i concentrated on my residential middle class area here i probably could have did a lot better to which i still am i still am going to do that but you know it's just a great time for the trade man it's just great man if you're a female male you know it's it's the time if you're looking for a second career if you're looking to retire and you just want to get into the trade and just work on your own you know do one job a day two jobs a day you're still going to make what you were going to make for the week on a regular i actually this uh vince obviously going through the home building process and purchasing a lot of the the equipment that goes inside that home What are some of the best systems?

1:36:57Example, we were trying to figure out the water heater situation. I called one of my boys. He's like, Navion is a great company, so we went with that for the water heater. What are some of the best systems that you're seeing that you recommend? You have Navion and you have Renai. This is what I've learned over time and a lot of time in the industry. I've installed all of them, Train, Carrier, Goodman, all the brands. Now, Carrier started the air conditioning business pretty much. That was like the only company at the time. So Carrier is very big. The high-end brands are Carrier, Train, Lenox. Lenox is very big.

1:37:41And all these companies are right here in Westchester, too, in Elmsford. But what I noticed is this. a lot of the high-end brands you could buy which is great but if a tech comes to your house and doesn't really have those parts they're going to be hard to source they're going to be very expensive and you're going to pay double um a regular brand like a goodman which is american made brand it's a very strong brand it's all how the equipment is installed and how it's maintained You know, you don't want to go too low and sometimes you don't have to go too high. It's almost like clothing, like sneakers.

1:38:22It's almost like Nike Reebok. And they're all sneakers and you can wear them and get to the same places. But what do you feel really comfortable in? You know, I mean, you know, it's really hard. I would say to stick with a good mid-level brand and just take care of your equipment. But if you come to me and I say, well, Rashad, Troy, this is the carrier setup for you guys. Carrier is the top brand. They're the top level. This is the price for that. And I say, well, this is Goodman. It's the same size, the same tonnage, the same BTUs. It's just a different name. And the parts are on the higher-end brands.

1:39:04they're definitely going to cost you more and they may not have them readily on your truck you want to get a brand that everyone is comfortable with and parts are easily ready available and they're able to source you know a lot of customers go into really high-tech german boilers uh badaris boilers and very high tech stuff and the more high tech you get is the more chances for things to go wrong if you're going to buy a washing machine right now it's better you buy a washing machine with all that computer stuff out of there and get you the one with the turn knob and the knobs that turn and that one's going to last you longer than the ones with all the computers in them.

1:39:45So, okay, before we, I got, this is an important question. How do you know how to price? Cause even for me, like, you know, we bid different contractors and a lot of times, honestly, it's like, who has the best price in full transparency? Like it'll be like somebody putting in glass. And it's like, if this one person is$7 ,000 cheaper than the other person, that's the determining factor of who I'm going to use. But that doesn't necessarily always mean that that's the best. So I know as a business owner, you don't want to race to the bottom, but you also don't want to price yourself outright because there's always going to be somebody that's going to be cheaper.

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1:43:20Well, there's so many deciding factors. You almost got to be able to read your customer right away. You've got to be able to read the whole situation. You've got to be able to read the room very, very quickly.

1:43:35Me, personally, I mean, normally we charge$1.35 an hour to show up for the hour. Um, my pricing, uh, let me see, like, let's say it's a water heater, right? And it's a water heater job. Water heater costs 1200 bucks or a thousand dollars. And you're saying, I like, I want to charge you now to do this water heater job. I want to charge you 2 ,500 or close to three grand, you know? And you're like, well, Vince, I can get it for two grand. I think at that point, once I talk to you and I explain to you the situation and I give you the knowledge and the education part side of me where you see that you're getting a vast amount of information and knowledge to where you just start to get so interested in trusting me that I don't think my price is really going to matter.

1:44:40at her at that point um but uh like certain things i stand on like just because at this point like let's say a boiler cleaning if you say clean this for 200 i may not do that anymore because i know that for 400 and 600 you're gonna get the full deal you know you kind of almost get what you pay for in this trade but i do stand on my okay prime example you just asked that i finally met my first big whale a developer recently i finally met my first big guy and um he asked me to give him a bid for a big swanky manhattan apartment in the village it's not even an apartment they own the whole floor like every apartment owns their own floor third floor owns one person owns the whole third floor another person so um he asked me to give him a bid he had seven bids.

1:45:35I gave him a bid on two water-cooled units. I gave him a bid for$46 ,000. He called me back. This guy's been in the business for 40-something years, big Russian developer, big guy. He builds billions in Times Square, everything. He said, Vince, I'm going to tell you something. He said, I've been doing this for a long time. He said, I had seven bids. Everybody came in at 58 ,000, 57 ,000, 56. You came in at 46 ,000. He said, there was another bid that came in for 41 ,000. I said, why didn't you go with the bid for 41 ,000? And he said, personally, I could look at people and I could tell whether you know what you're doing or you don't know what you're doing.

1:46:15He said, the bid for 41 ,000 came in, they were cheaper than you. But he said, I don't trust in my heart that they really know what they're doing. He said, I would rather pay you more because I just trust and know that you're going to do the right thing. So that's when I learned really the art of value selling. You could sell yourself to a point where it doesn't matter anymore of what the price is or what everything is. People want to be involved with you and they know that you're gonna see the project through. So that taught me a valuable lesson just recently that you can't be too high and you can't be too low, but you've got to also sell yourself with that price.

1:46:59So the guy with the glass who's 7 ,000, you've got to go with your heart reaction. He may not have given you that feel that he's really there, but the guy for 9 ,000, you might see their setup and be like, nah, you know, they look official and they seem right. And, you know, I, you know, but when you're just concentrating on just trying to get the cheapest thing, then you're going to get the cheapest thing, you know, so that even taught me a lesson recently. So I'm glad I came in just at the right price. And moreover, he saw the value in me, you know, so I think once you really sell yourself as a person and what you can do and you're talking the right things, you're able to connect with people.

1:47:43So, you know, one thing I used to always get teased at growing up in high school was the way that I talked because I talked very proper. And growing up around a lot of my friends and stuff, I used to always get teased. But it has helped me out in the business world to pronunciate and enunciate and to talk with a proper, you know, vernacular. Yeah, vernacular, you know. So, you know, that has helped me a lot, too, also. When I call customers on the phone, when I get to the house, they're like, are you the same guy that's on the phone? And I'm like, yeah, you know, it's me. They're like, you sound, you know.

1:48:24But I think that I think everything plays a part. How you look, how you act, your walk, your talk, your sweat. Customers can smell fear, you know, and once they smell that fear, you're over with. So you have to have that, you know, that aura about you, that, you know, that savoir faire, you know, that. A little swag. Gotta have that swag with you. Well, Vince, man, greatly appreciated. I think that this was an extremely insightful conversation. You know, it's one of these things, like I said, it was long overdue as far as for us to have a conversation with somebody in the trades. and I'm glad that we was able to have the conversation.

1:49:07You did a great job for E-Bow University. So that was like the testing ground to see, like, you know, for the big show. Called up to the big leagues. I got the report. Like, nah, you made it. Well, I didn't come dressed for the drip report, but, you know. No, no, you actually dressed exactly how you, that's actually, if you would have asked me, that's how, because that's what we're portraying, right? Like, you got your uniform on, that's smart. So you actually dressed, I was actually just thinking that like you, you dressed exactly how you were supposed to dress for the conversation because that's the conversation that we're having.

1:49:40Right. And there's millions of people that's trying to figure it out. That might not have went to college that's struggling as Toronto. And it's like, there's opportunities out here. And like I said, this isn't just us saying it is billionaires and corporations. They're saying like in, in the age of AI, one thing that's still going to be here and still going to be thriving is trades. There was a huge report with Dario, who's the CEO of Anthropic, and they asked him the skills that his company are not going to erode, and HVAC was one of them, plumbing was one of them, nursing was one of them. These are in high demand professions that are going to pay well.

1:50:23A lot of the ones that are going to be disrupted and interrupted were high degree professionals, lawyers, some doctors, some health professionals. So this is spot on. And the fact that we know somebody that's from our neighborhood, this is not like, oh, I can't see it. We've seen it happen in our neighborhood. So kudos to you. Thank you so much, man. I appreciate that. And I'll just, you know, I actually, so I had this whole thing planned out because I wanted to see how you did on UI University. Just because somebody is good at what they do, that's what I learned. That doesn't mean they can communicate what they do.

1:50:54Yeah. And that's the two different things. and there's nothing wrong with that. Everybody's not made to actually communicate publicly. That's fine. But it's always great when you can communicate publicly. So I wanted to see what you did on EY University. You passed that test. And then that was like the gateway to earn your leisure. But I did save a spot. If you're interested, this year for InvestFest, definitely want to have a conversation about the trades. So if you're interested, you know, we'd love to have you out there. I'm there. Oh, man. interesting i was just going to ask you i was just going to say you know invest fest needs a little blue collar action you know absolutely we don't want to scare away the blue collar guys because you know they think you know it's big business but you know we're here you know we need to have them feel comfortable especially in atlanta man i mean all the h-fac guys and the trade guys that are out there, carpenters, just construction guys, everybody, like, you know, they would like to feel a little bit warm there too, you know?

1:52:00Not the big stage. Not the big stage, but, you know, if we can get on any, you know, little small stages, that's a, you know. No small stages. There's no small stages here. There's only big stages. And that's why it's important. So what I'm saying is now is like, once they see this episode and they see you, I just hope you're prepared for nonstop questioning because people are going to be so inquisitive because now they see somebody that looks like them, especially us in West Indies. Yeah. We need to see somebody that's doing it at a high level, man. So again, super proud of you. I would love to be there, man.

1:52:31Just let me know. I'll be there. And I would love to talk to them and I would love to inspire the next person because someone's going to get inspired and someone's going to do it. Someone's going to say, okay, I'm going to follow the process and get it done. And if they need help, I'm here. You know, I'm in the helping process of my stage with my career. It's not that much. So, you know, I just want to see somebody else do it. You know, somebody else like the black sheep of the family, the people who've been in jail or drug abuse or you've had that checkered past. I want those people to just hone in and just say, I'm going to show everybody I'm going to be that person that's going to break the mold.

1:53:12And, you know, I'm going to show them that I could do it. I could buy a house. I could do. I could live that American dream. I know it's there for everybody. It's just finding that path to the income. What's your Instagram? What's the website? What's all of that information? My Instagram is Vincent underscore Taylor underscore HVAC services. You'll see me under basically Vincent Taylor HVAC services. I'm on there on Instagram. um that's pretty much mostly what i use um i don't really use too much websites or anything but i'm on instagram mostly um you can see me on facebook too as well and what if somebody wants to hire you like what's the area that you cover um well i'm licensed for um new jersey um and westchester um i also have some licensing in connecticut i pretty much cover everywhere um that, you know, I can go to to help you or if you have licenses for that area.

1:54:13Tri-state, tri-state area. Yeah, tri-state area, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, Westchester, you know, tri-state area. We got to make sure you lock down Greenberg now. Do you want me to tell the Halloween story or no? Oh, man, Rashad, this guy, can we have a positive no? I don't know what happened with that Halloween thing, but bro. It's all good. Some things you can't let go. It's all love, man. It's all love. It's all good. It's all good. Glad to see you doing great. And you know what? I want to say congratulations on the green jackets. It was actually two. So Troy, I'm telling you this, Rashad. There's a Jamaican saying, good friends are better than pocket money and you got a good friend right there so you know definitely kudos I still got a jeans jacket but I'm trying to get the green jacket I'm going to get the green jacket what you got the jeans jacket in oh the jeans jacket is just a blue collar jacket you know I'm still blue collar but I'm getting there alright perfect I'm going to get my green I appreciate it man Definitely insightful conversation.

1:55:30I'm glad that, you know, we had the conversation. And yeah, man, see you at InvestFest. Definitely. All right, bro. Appreciate you. All right, guys. Well. Another one. That's been real. Okay. We'll see you guys next week. Peace. If your best finance people are doing expense reports, chasing receipts, or spending time on month-end close, It's time to get Brex AF, a gentic finance that eliminates that work before it starts. Learn more at brex.com slash AF. When Kohler, global design leader in luxurious kitchen and bath products, asked me to be their ambassador for timeless, elegant, durable cast iron, I said, I'm in.

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