Trade-Offs
Tipping Scales and Multiplying Chips
When it comes to weighing out on scales, I started mastering that game at 15 so don’t temp me with breaking out a good story for the appropriate audience.
Now truthfully, I’ve had to make some challenging trade-offs in my young adult life, either via massive career change and/or relocating 1,000+ miles away in any direction so let’s dive into the rational behind why I did what I did when I did it.
Remaining Anonymous and disclosing details can be challenging so it’s easiest to make shit up with names / locations. Only the experiences and the thought (or lack of) behind certain decisions will be truthful. I’ll start with the less gut-wrenching and more recent event, which is career focused, and maybe do the separate, more personal one in a separate post since that ones dark-er.
A few years back while living and working for a full service real estate company in Arizona, I had been in a discussion with an investor via my role there who granted me the opportunity to earn a commission by assisting him in marketing a property he had remodeled for sale. Through my efforts, I was able to get it sold and as a result, he invited me to work full time for him remotely, which based on my expense load then, I could accept the commission only position and find a way to get more income through his business. From there, we did a double closing that was a huge fucking mess and the reasons for that are plentiful. At the time I was working with a couple ‘friends’ who made music and earlier in my life I made a great friend, Julius, who went on to do some dope shit later on, such as engineering music for Wiz Khalifa, Sean Kingston, and some other notable talents. Through my relationship ‘managing’ these friends, I lined up a weeks long session in NYC to get a project done, which I had done well in advance of 30 days, all at my expense with anticipations of retribution. Nonetheless, a week prior, the owner operator of the company says he intends to drive from Minneapolis to NYC to meet me face to face and because his family lives that way. Sure, I’m cool with that, I also have family there and that’s who my friends and I are staying with so whatever. My friends and I arrive at the airport, get picked up by my cousin, and proceed to leave her house shortly after arrival to go and score some 🌳.
Naturally, it’s what you do to lock in and make great music. Anyway, Owner-Operator, Moses, arrives in his Ford Super Duty the same day and decides that the appropriate thing to do is pick me up right away. He’s attended by Tyrone, who is about 5 years younger than me and lives with Moses & also helps with the construction side. Moses basically takes me away from my friends and leaves them with my family the whole day, super considerate and appropriate, considering I planned this trip to be taking place with him nowhere near me. He takes me to meet his family and enjoy some food, this guy turns out to only be about 6 years older than me and about 6 inches shorter than me, two things I was not necessarily anticipating. His behavior was absurd and this is just the first 24 hrs. Given our schedules for the studio and our time in the city, I had some flexibility but that was just me, my friends were stuck with limited external resources to the city and my family, I felt horrible about that.
Well the excitement only escalates. He decides that he’d like to meet my friends/take them out on the town, which my friends were hesitant but whatever, basically we go out with one of Moses friends and he takes us to a club in Brooklyn, where one of my buddies is the only white person in the club 😆😆 anyway, we get bottles of Hennessy and Dusse and crush those till about 2AM, we leave and find a drive through jack in the box, where shit goes south. Moses isn’t a good man off substances and for some reason, he drank a lil and was ordering food for everyone, I don’t eat that shit so I order nothing and Moses, trying to get on my health virtues, does the same. After ordering food for my friends and Tyrone, we park and they start eating and Moses starts acting like a dick. This continues till he throws my friends taco out the window in some show of dominance and he takes us all home. My friends weren’t stoked and I had to cover his ass a bit the best I could, which made me look foolish for being associated with him. SOME HOW, we end up going out ANOTHER NIGHT with Moses, except this time, things get even muddier.
Moses shows up with Ecstasy, proceeding to offer it to me, my friends, and Tyrone. I believe I was the only one to turn down the offering. Shortly after, we try and make our way to a club, which had a dress code that some of us did not meet and led to a disagreement between Moses / Door Man and Attempts of Bribery (A charge he had been booked for back in Minneapolis, in addition to public intoxication 😅). After failed attempts, and the onsets of the intakes of Ecstasy for my friends, we proceed to the next destination.
When we make it to the next spot, he offers more E, which is of course taken / consumed. We move into the club and shots are being bought and passed around, I’m set on sobriety so I’m casually observing all the activities in the club through a clear lens.
Obviously, my friends and Tyrone are having a good time and Moses is sort of doing the same thing I am, except +/- a shot or three of Tequila. Everyone’s sort of dancing and I’m just chilling at a table people watching. Unbeknownst to me, Mose’s local friend had been open with my buddies, as they rode with him to this next spot, about who Moses really is or was before, back in the high school days before he went on to play D1 College Football. This gets shared with me later in the evening and it’s no surprise given the behavior he’s been on.
The days continue, we’re starting to head to the studio via Lyfts and recording with Julius, which is the best part of the whole trip, I love being in those environments. After pretty much each session, however, I’m leaving my friend’s with Julius, who was gracious in taking them around NYC to some spots they wanted to check out.
Now all of a sudden, I’m on my way to Atlantic City with Moses, His family, and Tyrone - I’ve got my last $180 in my wallet. We sit down and Tyrone can’t gamble so he’s sort of floating around our table, while we begin playing blackjack. Minimum bet is $20, I put down $20 and get wiped out first hand. First time playing live blackjack and I’m not about to take money from Moses to gamble. I throw down my $160 and get to playing, occasionally doubling down / splitting per the table advise. I’m able to take my $160 → $450 then I walk away. This is basically where things really go south.
First Night in Atlantic and we cruise back to NYC at about 4 AM and now my friends have to get a lyft to the studio and I am no where to be apart of it that day. I’m beginning to gather a temper about the situation, not to mention this day that I’m stuck with Moses, he decides to buy about 300 pills of ecstasy . . . I’m really losing patience and can’t wait for this dude to leave town. Especially since we’re now going back to Atlantic City, and I’m in the same fkn clothes.. Seriously. I decide to sit down at a random table, play one hand, double my $20 into $40 so now I’m at $470. I continue to observe his brother who is in a whole different bracket, he’s over here betting my whole wallet a hand. Going ape shit. Basically this night, Moses, Tyrone, and I are just floating around the casino, since Moses and Tyrone took some and under pressure from Moses, I put one in my mouth and drank some water. (under my tongue, spit it out when he took his attention off me).
We’re in the super duty for hours this night, his mom drove with his brother and Grandma. Tyrone, Moses, and I in the Duty (important for next paragraph). In this time, we’re talking MAJOR PLAYs, Commercial Development, and doing massive deals. I have great resources for these concepts but Moses isn’t aware of this and I’m conservative so I don’t flex, just listen. I’m getting excited by the income possibilities and the opportunity to be the director of all of these operations. In wearing the same clothes as yesterday, I was wearing a hat that was the branding for my Artist Friend, featuring an ‘MW’ - his initials and they sort of merged, good design so I didn’t mind wearing the baseball cap. Anyway, He proceeds to go ahead, during these very business progressive, but under the influence discussions, rip the hat off my head and spit into it. Chucking it into the bushes below us in the parking garage. Although he’s 6 inches shorter than me, he was a D1 College LB and got some biceps, looking like:
I’m not about to get in a fist fight though I was more pissed than I had been in YEARS, I was keeping cool. He proceeds to tell me how these ‘friends’ are making music to get rich quick and they have no real goals in life and how I should focus all my energy on his business, blah blah blah. FK YOU. AFTER THAT. FUCK YOU.
We go back inside the casino, his mom and grandma want to stay and gamble till lunch it seems like, so his older brother gives them his keys but prior to all this, he goes all in . . . $1,000+ on one-hand, after losing 5 in a row and getting heated
Now in the Super Duty, on the expressways heading home, chilling in the back with Moses as his older brother drives and Tyrone is in the passenger seat . . Moses suddenly, due to his intake of substances, has to shit. Luckily, we’re getting to being about 20 min from his brothers loft but his brother refuses to stop anywhere so Moses is just squirming in the back seat in agony trying not to shit his pants while Tyrone, his brother, and I are just cracking up, making fun of the whole situation with all four windows down to get rid of the wretched smell 😆😆😆😆
We make it back, whether he slightly shit has pants or not, I’m not sure. He definitely showered right after we got there though so i’ll take the answer is embedded there.
During these atrocities, I’m working a double closing back in Minneapolis that he got from an out of state wholesaler that is going south fast, as for some reason, title disclosed that we were double closing the deal and the wholesaler was pressing me about all kinds of shit, from what we’re making to promises he made to owner, etc. whatever, I got enough going on to be arguing with you dude. I’m simultaneously under contract on a duplex in my local market at this time, in my personal name, and am still locating a buyer, so none of the shit going on that I’ve written about is helping me get shit done, including my work as a manager in being present to make sure the records sound good.
By the stroke of grace, he leaves that day, following the shit my pants incident. Without more on Moses, but more on Tyrone, he’s a great kid, the youngest of all of us that gathered. Via his fake ID, he garnered access to each location we attended. He’s in the welding trade back where he grew up and I love the guy, would do anything for him to this day. Maybe that’s the way you are when you see yourself in someone else’s circumstances, how they grew up, what they went through, and how good of a heart they can carry, even with some of his own faults haunting him, as they do me, having a tough time from 9-18 personally, it’s easy to have love for the underdog.
I’m now free to go to the studio, we critique all the records the last couple daze and I stand behind them being the best records they’ve come out with, maybe that’s a result of the excellence of Julius or the group collaboration in getting things dialed in before our time together was cut. We went on to visit with a friends mom who was staying at a beautiful property with ocean views, enjoying a dinner she catered, attended by another mutual engineer friend and the finest herbs to beseech our backwoods.
We rounded out the trip really well, getting back home, I sold the duplex shortly after (which due to the chaos in my life and my focus on my new relationship with my beautiful girlfriend) and earned a $5k commission, by grossly underpricing the assets potential. I likely could’ve extracted $20k and still left $40k+ on the table for end buyer with market conditions then, but I just wanted to successfully close that so I didn’t care. Sold it to my old boss who’s company ignited my interest in Real Estate and pushed me into a rabbit hole, he re-listed as is a week later $149k from what he paid LoL. Also, got the double closing done and had money coming in off that, all was good, for the moment. Until I went to Minneapolis. . .
Really not Minneapolis vibes, more Chicago, since he was pressing me to move there and go full time. I wasn’t opposed but I was also falling in love back home and well, trade-offs to come. Between rolling around the city, seeing dilapidated neighborhoods, touring the condemned apartment building he had me underwrite previously, and hitting the gym / hanging day in and out with dude, after the nightmare he caused me in NYC, I was seeing cracks in the boat. Especially with how he treated Tyrone on the day to day and how he would treat me, his ““Chief Operations Officer””. Something weird was going on and it wasn’t the time/place to start doing my diligence that I had been neglecting during the summer.
Leaving his market, I felt like to live there, I’d need to carry daily, especially driving for dollars. I don’t mind that and could see the light at the end of the tunnel once operations were operating. After touring his houses that were sitting mid-rehab and hearing the reasons why work wasn’t getting done (his sudden trip to NYC starting to click more) and dealing with some of his outbursts, I was finally at the airport returning home with a check in my hand for the double closing. Basically my reason for the trip was to figure out if I could find a way to overlook the behavior and see myself living in the market or commuting to/from home to participate in his business.
Thankfully Tyrone had my best interests at heart, he explained to me how after our departure, Moses continued drinking and popping E the drive home, forcing him to drive most of the way back. After they got back, the bender continued and he spent days in bed, not doing anything productive (as he and Moses lived together then). Massive red flag. After getting back home, and knowing that he has a 50% partner that is a successful female agent in the market, and not meeting her face-to-face after our various email / phone interactions, it was obvious to me that either A) i’m too good looking to be introduced to this woman who he’s having cheat on her husband with him or B) there’s some weird tension between them at the moment. She was able to salvage her marriage which bless her, being an immigrant from the middle east and establishing a top 5 reputation in residential sales in that market, she deserved none of this treatment but continuing this story;
After being home, and immediately being introduced to a below-market MF opportunity that we could net $1M by double-closing and/or assigning (not within Moses experience then to work a deal like this where we weren’t planning to take ownership but contract control on a 50+ unit deal and I’m green then but I’m ready to get to work).
I begin drafting the LOI and we go back-forth on that, till we strike a deal. I then draft the contract and get that executed. Underwrote the deal across avg. market rents for that area, utilities, the whole 9 - a great presentation from me. Now I am engaging potential buyers with my proforma and discussing my conclusions, either via 4 way calls with Moses and the buyers I lined up, or 1-1 with my buyer. They liked the deal, could see the upside and we were essentially negotiating price at this point, except Moses wanted $1M, nothing less… Super sticky - about this same time, I’m discovering he is mid-litigation with his partner in the business that we’re utilizing for the contract we’re under 😡. I’m nearly livid by this discovery, which came via MY BUYER, and obviously at this point, I’m not moving to Minneapolis. Learning a lot of lessons at god speed now.
It’s becoming clear to pull this off in any capacity within 45 days, I’m going to have to find a way to make a fast break and dunk this ball, except Moses wants all the profit. He starts talking about commission agreement, which I understand that we need something in writing if we’re going to get this done. To my shock, he wants to pay me a beautiful agent’s commission - 3%. Whoopty fkn DOO! Let me just deny that DocuSign and move my Queen into position.
You see, when you’ve been working with a fella and every check has been to your name, without anything in writing up to this point, you CANNOT be taken advantage of if you have nothing to lose and shit, at 24, I really don’t, especially when I’m the one running the baton the whole distance. Thanks for touring the site, taking some pics, and putting up the EMD but I did ALL the admin shit + lining up a buyer ready to make an offer. The ball was in my court more than yours so what does anyone, well me, do?
Clear Decisiveness
Drafting conclusions, you’re in litigation, I’m doing most of the work that gets us a profit, I don’t want my name attached much more to your firm - I go ahead and form my consulting LLC and draft a new agreement as a counter to the 3%.
If x then I get x%, if X is X, then I get X%. Basically, If I find the buyer and they close I get 50% of the commissions, which in this case, I was using all of my very own resources I was paying out of pocket for to put eyes in front of the deal, I hardly knew WTF he was doing day-to-day.
I was so through with the guy and ready to withdraw after the unwillingness to negotiate the deal, and him bringing in some random NOOB residential agent who had never closed anything to participate in the deal / help me find buyers under my advisement, shit was getting out of hand and I was in a stalemate with my agreement in his inbox and days passing with a neglect to be honorable that I just blocked dudes number and dropped out of the deal completely.
I later heard from noob, who is a good fella and we discussed cars more than real estate, that he had rejected other offers that would’ve resulted in a $450k net and ultimately lost his EMD.
Having nothing to lose had to do more with seeing my girlfriend as a candidate for a ring and she had bad gut feelings about him early on, as we spent a lot of time together & Moses loved to be an inconvenience, talking to me 2-6 hrs a day sometimes.
Of course the trade off of falling off of the deal was that I would also be falling out of Real Estate for the moment. There were a few too many pieces flying around at that time and I had to allocate my commissions that summer to certain items so the reality that it would take some time for me to get back in was present, but I wanted to get my girlfriend moved in to my place and start stress testing the 💍.
By declining to be associated with real estate for a moment, I ironically went and worked front desk at a local hotel, which was a great experience in learning the daily ops, especially since my manager liked me and he had been managing hotels for decades. It took some time till I found an opportunity to work in real estate again and having worked with debt brokers when I was doing residential fix and flip loans for direct lender, I started looking for positions in CRE finance. Stumbled across several brokerages and gained opportunity with one after a few interviews, only to later depart / backpedal to the realization that I can best trust me in business, outside of my select confidants, and the only way to Valhalla is through me.
Hope you all enjoyed, welcome to Droolcre.com → the latest addition to me firing from the hip on any given day / hr. Stay Blessed and Get Ready for More 💹💹💹🇺🇸