In this episode of the M&A Launchpad Podcast, hosts Feras Moussa and Casey Minshew are joined by Brett Swarts, founder of Capital Gains Tax Solutions and an expert in sophisticated tax planning strategies. Brett dives deep into the mechanics of the Deferred Sales Trust (DST), breaking down how it empowers entrepreneurs and investors to preserve their wealth, defer taxes, and generate truly passive income.
The conversation covers why traditional exit strategies often fall short, the importance of legacy and mission in financial planning, and how the largest wealth transfer in history is creating unprecedented opportunities for proactive entrepreneurs. If you’re preparing for an exit or looking to create long-term financial freedom, this is a must-listen.
In this podcast episode, we discuss:
- Why tax planning should be at the forefront of every entrepreneur’s strategy
- The Deferred Sales Trust (DST) explained—how it works and who it’s for
- How to create passive income streams through advanced tax structures
- Why legacy planning starts with understanding your family’s mission and values
- The biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make when exiting their business
- How DSTs can be used for real estate, businesses, crypto, and more
- Building a team of experts to navigate complex transactions
- The government’s role in wealth transfer and how to plan accordingly
- Why the time to plan your exit is before you sell
Guest Contact Info:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brett-swarts/
Website: https://capitalgainstaxsolutions.com/meet-brett/
Additional Resources:
Sponsored by O’Connell Advisory Group – Work with a trusted Quality of Earnings and Financial Diligence partner who focuses solely on business acquisitions.
Visit: https://www.oconnelladvisorygroup.com
🎧 Watch more interviews and episodes on YouTube: /@malaunchpad
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�� Have a question or want to work with us? Reach out to Casey and Ben: info@equity-launchpad.com
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Transcript
00:00 All right, on today’s episode, we interviewed Brett Schwarz where we really deep dived into what do people need to think about with tax planning
00:07 and more specifically, right, how does a deferred sales trust work? What are the
00:12 powers of it? And again, just the content of things to think about while doing it. It’s a very very powerful tool
00:18 and not enough people use it nor do they understand it. And so Casey, what was your takeaways? You know, people that are listening to
00:23 our podcast, we’ve been getting a lot of feedback and things. We try to bring the a lot of different things around M&A,
00:29 right? At the end of the day, many of you are looking to buy that first business. You’re not even thinking about
00:34 what happens when I exit or get down the road or any of these things. But you got to start thinking about it. You got to
00:40 start understanding that there are vehicles there to help you create wealth. And this podcast really dove
00:46 into one of my favorite things really is talking about taxes and deferred sales trust and all of these different
00:51 vehicles. And it’s been years of reading this stuff, right, and thoughting about it. So as Brett did an outstanding job
00:58 of just diving into a way to create a vehicle that could be your funding
01:04 source for the rest of your life, passive income, all of these things using a diverse sales trust. Pretty powerful. No, it’s very powerful way to save taxes
01:10 and you get some other benefits like, you know, the asset protection which you kind of highlighted. And so again, you know, it’s not always the sexiest topic,
01:17 but man, is it a valuable topic and this is one of those episodes where 30 45 minute time investment, you will make
01:22 millions of dollars done correctly. So definitely listen to this one.
01:29 Welcome to the M&A Launchpad podcast with your host Casey and Ferris with Equity Launchpad. On this podcast, you
01:34 will gain insights on acquiring, investing in, and selling profitable businesses in the lower to middle market. Whether you’re a business owner,
01:40 investor, or spying entrepreneur, at Equity Launchpad, we will provide you with the knowledge, guidance, and capital to navigate the world of mergers
01:46 and acquisitions. Hey there, this is Casey with the M&A Launchpad podcast. want to let you know
01:53 about October 25th. Put it on your calendar. This is a do not missed one day event. There’s going to be
01:59 incredible headliners, but really at the end of the day, you’re going to get a chance to talk to people that have made
02:05 acquisitions, learn from some of the challenges that they’ve made because this is definitely a challenging process. But more importantly, there’s
02:12 going to be people there that can help you and support you along the way from great vendors, quality of earnings, how
02:18 to run the due diligence process, and how do I get financed, how do I raise capital, how do I structure all of these
02:24 things. October 25th in Chicago, we’re going to be gathering. It’s going to be hundreds of people that are all focused,
02:31 like-minded people. And man, everyone that’s come has given us incredible feedback. So, mark your calendar.
02:37 October 25th in Chicago. We look forward to seeing you. Hey Brett, welcome to the show.
02:42 Ferris Casey, grateful to be here. Thanks for having me. Likewise. Likewise. And so for our listeners, you want to maybe share a
02:48 little bit, Brett, about kind of what you do and what your background is? Yeah, we exist to unlock capital gains and multiply freedom and impact, which
02:54 means we build capital gains tax exit plans for the purpose-driven entrepreneur or investor who’s tired of
02:59 the old old uh, you know, 1031 exchanges or restrictive ways that really restrict people from being an entrepreneur. Um,
03:06 which I think has been great for your listeners. Quick background. I grew up in the Bay Area of California. My mom and dad at a young age building houses
03:13 and owning and renting properties. I was absorbing and observing all of this and
03:18 uh working on the job site with them and fell in love with real estate and to be kind of an entrepreneur. And fast forward my brother and I the first to
03:24 graduate from college. He was the first I was the second on both sides of the family and we started to work with our minds at a place called Marcus and
03:31 Milichap where we help people buy and sell multi family properties until the 2000 Yeah. And the 2008 crash hit and
03:37 things hit the fan and we saw friends, family, and clients with half or all their wealth mainly due to not having,
03:42 you know, debt flow, tax flow, and cash flow mindset and and plan in place. And we we learned the hard way that it’s not
03:48 always uh the best uh um approach to use a 1031 exchange. Um, fast forward, my
03:55 wife and I, five kids, um, after lots of financial hardships and challenges during that time. Um, um, focus like a
04:01 laser on um, not only building our family but also helping entrepreneurs exit in a place where they can build
04:07 their mission, vision, vision, family values and compound their wealth. Um, I I have a mentor. He says, “You’re most
04:13 uniquely positioned to serve the person you once were.” And it’s kind of like who I was, but also who who I am as an
04:19 entrepreneur and figuring out ways with wealth, mostly with real estate and building teams to execute and like a a
04:26 fractional family office approach to give more flexibility and freedom to to the entrepreneur. So that’s a little bit
04:32 of the background. Played basketball in college. Uh yeah, five kids, married 16 years, four girls and a boy, and live in
04:38 Florida now. Moved from California just about three years ago. And you know, grateful grateful to be here in Florida,
04:44 man. Great to have you. You know, that’s that’s exciting stuff. And and you know, I’ve always I had a mentor tell me it’s not how much money you make, it’s how
04:51 much money you keep, right? And so, one of my most I love the tax conversation.
04:56 We talk about it when we structure a deal. You know, how are we putting it in the most advantageous structure using
05:03 section 1202 on a CC corp to be able, you know, to avoid capital gains on the exits. I mean, these are very important
05:09 conversations because, you know, most of our listeners are thinking about, hey, I’ve bought my first business or I’m
05:15 about to buy my first business. This is like this is years down the road. But there is also that planning and thinking
05:21 and educating yourself to know like, hey, when I do get to that moment, someone does tap me on the shoulder, I get an exit, I’m going to keep most of
05:28 my money or I’m going to have a strategy for it. Yeah. And and maybe just to add too, right, tax planning is not the sexiest
05:34 topic, but it’s definitely one of the highest ROI topics, right? And so a lot of times it’s about making certain
05:41 decisions that are kind of I don’t want to say easy, but straightforward to do early on. They’re hard to do later, and
05:47 so it’s about getting a strategy, executing it. And so Brett, maybe, you know, with that said, do you want to
05:52 just give people some some examples, right, of just some of the common mistakes you see people do? And and maybe to add to that, I mean, what
05:58 should someone start doing today? Yeah. The biggest mistake people make is they’re not really really clear on their family mission, vision, values. And
06:04 that’s where I was, right? You know, building my business, building my family, and had a lot of mission, vision, mission, vision, values for my
06:10 company and the wealth plan, but didn’t have the family mission, vision, values for my independent family, right? And so
06:15 my kids, oldest is 14, youngest is six. About about a year ago, a year and a half ago, I got to meet with a
06:21 billionaire, uh, one of the first billionaires I got to meet, got to be on my podcast, which was really cool. His name is David Green and he has given
06:27 more away. Um he’s the founder of Hobby Lobby than maybe anyone in the history of the world, right? So he he he is a
06:33 very generous um person. He’s a great steward of his wealth. And so we started our podcast called Bill to Billions so
06:38 you can give more or all of it away to help MVPs. And so I was sitting down meeting with David and also his
06:44 attorney. I took another workshop. I focus like a laser on mission, vision, values of the family before you do
06:49 anything really. Because if it’s not centered on that, I believe we’ve all been given a certain calling and a work
06:54 to do in our lives. But if we’re not clear on our family mission, vision, values, it’s very difficult to to to live out that calling in a way that
07:01 we’re your steward of that wealth, the family wealth, the the financial wealth, but the relational wealth, the emotional
07:07 wealth, the spiritual wealth, and having a clear vision for that. And so this is so so big. And so when I sit down with
07:13 entrepreneurs or people about to exit, I always start with that like what matters most to you. uh what matters to you is
07:19 important but what matters to you the most and most of the time it is the family it is the legacy right it is
07:25 those things but the question is how are we planning in in lie of that okay and and that’s where we start and so getting
07:31 really clear on that and then now also of course defining the problem of the tax there’s about 100 trillion it’s
07:37 going to transfer in the next 15 years the largest wealth trans history of the planet 50% of all that is tied to high-end commercial real estate high-end
07:43 primary homes and private equity which is businesses so this is the largest wealth transfer in the history of the
07:49 planet. We have an opportunity, everyone who’s listening to this, to help um ourselves, our families, the people that
07:55 we serve, um build capital gains tax and death tax or state tax plans so that the
08:01 uh the freedom and the capital and the flow of the capital can be stewarded within our families or to the to the
08:07 causes we believe in most and things are going to change the world in a positive way versus being in the hands of the government, right? And so our calling is
08:13 to help that purpose-driven entrepreneur accomplish that. And I think at the end of the day, you have these different
08:19 strategies. The question is, do you have a team, right? Hire the who, don’t be the how. How can you build a team to can
08:26 execute? And here’s the key, have a strategy that’s proven, legal, and flexible. And that’s really hard to
08:33 find, right? And most strategies out there are are either either proven, but they’re not very flexible, right? Um and
08:40 and it’s hard was one of those. Yeah, 1031. We could talk about that and dive into all the other things here. Yeah,
08:46 I mean I agree. And you know the beautiful thing about the world right now, especially I mean again you just have the tax law pass again, right?
08:51 Whenever you get 100% bonus depreciation, it really does make 1031 a lot less useful.
08:57 I’ll tell you just a conversation I had in my house. You know, my son wants a new my son’s due for a new vehicle. He’s driving my dad’s really old car and he’s
09:04 been a he’s been a trooper, right? And he’s like, “It’s time for a new my wife’s like it’s time for a new car.”
09:09 But in 20 I’m waiting to 26 because I’ll buy it through my company um my truck,
09:15 right? And I’ll I’ll drive it for a period of time and then I’ll hand it to them and and we have these conversations and it’s funny even though it’s a small
09:21 tax conversation, but like the family, my my wife and son, they don’t get it. They don’t get it that I need to drive
09:26 the truck for a while. It’s a hand me off. It’s, you know, it’s all these things. I’m like, “Guys, these are the rules. I didn’t create them, but we got
09:33 to take advantage of the plan.” And so I’m thinking about that for 26. And then what do you do in 27 because I have
09:39 another child that has a car. So it’s all these like conversations you have, but you’ve got to do it before you get
09:45 there. Otherwise, you’re staring at your face. You’re at the dealership. You buy the car and you didn’t make the plan. And and it’s the same thing with your
09:51 business. It’s the same thing with your real estate. It’s it’s And I’ll add one thing, too. And you know, one of the phrases that I really
09:56 like, it’s by um I forget his last name, Tom. He’s got the book taxfree wealth, but you know his whole pitch is, hey,
10:02 you are actually being more patriotic by reducing your tax obligation because you’re doing the things the government
10:07 wants you to do, right? Whatever that means. And so you’re, you know, you’re following the rules as Brett you mentioned, right? You’re doing those
10:12 things and you’re getting that benefit. And some people think you’re being less patriotic because you’re paying less taxes, but you’re actually doing what
10:18 you want, you know, what the government wanted you to do. And so it’s an important lens to kind of look at it from.
10:25 100%. And I think a lot other mistake people make is they don’t build what’s called a truly passive income plan as
10:30 well. Like they’re so they they get so caught as entrepreneurs, we all do, we fall in this mistake where where we’re
10:35 we’re making big money on our company or our business or our real estate, you know, but do we have truly passive
10:40 income, right? Kind of Tom Wright, Robert Kiasaki, that whole, you know, get that four, right? Yeah.
10:46 That Yeah, that fourth quadrant, right? How do you get into that fourth quadrant? And so that’s where your money trades for time. And so part of the
10:52 other mistake is people don’t get really clear on what your truly passive income number is. And so for example, is it 10,
10:58 20, 30, 40, 50,000 a month? What is it for you and your family, right? Pick a number and you know, I think a lot of
11:04 entrepreneurs, we get diluted, we get diluted results because we have diluted focus, okay? And we chase seven
11:10 different instream income streams all at once. And instead, if if we have a large exit, we can accelerate this opportunity
11:17 to to get truly passive income coming in. And and this is the beauty of what
11:22 we offer at the Deferred Sales Trust. We’re going to talk about here in a minute. It gives people the ability to be an entrepreneur or to be passive, to
11:29 be diversified, um or to be, you know, go in on another another business opportunity, a real estate opportunity.
11:35 And so this truly passive income number we believe is to your freedom and impact as compounding interest is to your
11:40 money. Um, you know, once you’re in the Dave Ramsey plan and you get, you know, you get debt free and you got your budget, you got the, you know, the
11:46 general things. Now, when you’re making one, 10, 15, going to $100 million, this is a whole another level of how do you
11:52 build and sustain and be great stewards with the wealth. And so I think this truly passive income plan is is is
11:58 income mindset and focus is really key and it’s one of the biggest mistakes people make. Um and and because they
12:06 don’t free up their time when they when they post the exit and and and sometimes in the 1031 exchange the the challenge
12:12 is is you have 50 problems but now you have a 100 problems but you have 100 tenants, right? You just keep you keep
12:17 chasing that but you’re like okay if I had something where it just showed up and I call it Kenny Chestny on the beach guys. You’re just chanting your guitar.
12:23 You’re you’re playing the guitar and the money is just showing up. 10, 20, 30, $40,000 a month. You don’t have to think about it. And now you’re like, okay,
12:30 this is this is nice. And so the exercise for people is to say, what is your passive income right now? You know,
12:35 are you is 80 or 90% of your wealth inside of your business or real estate, right? And if you were to exit and you
12:40 could free up 80 to 90% of your time and replace 100% of your income, how would
12:46 that help you compound your family mission, vision, value? Because we all have great intentions with building that
12:52 with our families, especially when we have young kids. But the challenge is we’re it can be so caught up in our time of our company which of course when it
12:58 comes to you guys coming too when you’re helping people scale and get the right team members in place and the culture and the technology and all of that.
13:04 That’s a part of it. But some of it sometimes it means sometimes especially for like the hard driving guys hard to get out of it. You have to exit and then
13:10 like really really have a plan for your filling your time, right? Versus getting
13:15 pulled in back at work, right? U my dad they called him the beaver because he’s such a hard worker growing up and I got
13:20 I got that trait. Super hard worker. And um it’s hard sometimes, right, to
13:25 separate, you know, work and life balance and all of those things. And so those are just a couple of things I have
13:30 in mind. I I know I wanted to just share that real fast cuz that was kind of on my heart. It’s beautiful. And and and I know we’re going to get into the diverse cell trust
13:36 conversation. Um I was introduced to it. I was I was actually representing a business for sale and I was helping a
13:43 pharmacy here in Houston get an exit. And I’m not a business broker, but I do the financing. I know the deal side. So
13:49 I took it on to help a friend. We took it down the road. What he did was is the the the guy ended up 100% seller
13:56 financing, but they took proceeds that the guy brought down to to closing the down payment. They moved that into a
14:02 deferred sales trust. They then created that vehicle where he was getting the cash flow every month coming into the
14:08 vehicle. And I mean, it was one of the most beautiful, wellthoughtout things I’d ever seen to take not a huge exit,
14:15 but to extend out for the family based on their goals and what they wanted to be able to give them cash flow all the
14:21 way through their retirement. And man, I was just blown away with the with with that strategy. So, when I heard you were
14:27 coming on here, I was pumped because I think so many people need to understand like these vehicles are there and they’re created there and they can
14:34 really generate that passive income because I’ve seen it and I’ve talked to the guy in the last couple years. He’s so excited. It’s the cash flow is coming
14:40 in and it’s working. Yeah. And and maybe let’s get to the brass tax of it all, right, Brett? So, you know, maybe the two question just
14:45 for the listeners, right? What is a deferred cell trust, right? DST, which is different than Delaware trust, right?
14:53 Um, you know, cuz people that are listening, there are two different things and it is kind of confusing sometimes for people. So, Brett, what is
14:58 that? And then maybe the other side of that too is whenever you talk about passive income, right, what kinds of things are you talking about? Are you
15:04 talking about people buying annuities? Are you talking about people buying bonds? Are you talking about something else? Right. Mhm. Perfect. Yeah. We’ll start with the
15:10 What is a deferred sales trust? A deferred sales trust is a structured installment sale. Installment sales is
15:16 kind of what u Casey just said, right? Um where you can do seller financing for
15:21 a buyer. In this scenario, um with that scenario referring to, they did a they did a little bit of a both, you know,
15:26 where he financed the the the buyer, but he also financed the trust. you know, he sold his position um of the down payment
15:32 to the trust and then he probably had the um installment payments go into the trust which means he’s basically it’s
15:38 kind of two installment sales in one and it extends the flexibility not only of the capital but also of the payment
15:43 because most installment sales last 3 to 5 years there’s no prepayment penalty. Interest rates are maybe 5 to 7% and
15:50 it’s not necessarily great for the seller. Well, it is maybe for 3 to 5 years but then they have to pay the tax. With this deferred sales trust, we can
15:56 have it in 10 year increments and typically every 10 years we’re for 10, renew for 10, keep it pushing it and you can kids can step into your shoes and
16:01 keep it going. And so it’s a very flexible strategy which I’ll kind of combine with where we invest the funds.
16:08 Typically it’s back into real estate, debt, equity, passive or active deals,
16:13 other uh startup companies or other business ventures the entrepreneur has. Yes, we also build in a team um to
16:19 diversify into securities based upon their risk tolerance. Um, I’m a trustee is my role. And so the way I approach
16:26 this business is my my unique skill set as a real estate investment advisor. That’s my unique skill set with my
16:32 background. But then we bring in the financial adviser who’s good at securities, right? And then we have the tax attorney on our team and we have the
16:38 CPAs and they may already have some of those on their team. But a lot of times we’re just saying, hey, what’s your family office or fractional family
16:44 office looking like right now? either a do we need to get A+ players replacing your maybe you know uh B players or B
16:52 you already have A+ players in certain spots how do we fill in and and bring the strategy which basically compounds
16:58 the freedom of the capital and the freedom of your time and that’s really the key uh to understanding um the
17:05 deferred sales trust it’s one of the most flexible tax deferral strategies that you’ve never heard of the deferred
17:12 sales trust is a manufacturing installment set which you can invest into any asset of any anytime. There’s no timing restrictions. Um it really
17:18 depends on where and how they like to invest Ferris on that. You know, some people more want to do S&P 500, you
17:23 know, 50%, some people want to do 50%, you know, private equity real estate debt. But before we Yeah. You’re going really
17:30 fast. Let’s give an example. Yeah. Because an installment sale is so a lot of people don’t even know what that is, right?
17:35 Yeah. So, let’s just make let’s use an example really quick. I’m selling my business. I’m selling it to Casey. Yeah. Right. And let’s say I’m selling it for
17:41 $20 million. And let’s say I started it from scratch. So, it’s all profit. Okay. All right. case it go from there. Yeah. So, I’m going to have to bring a
17:47 down payment to close on that transaction. Okay. And then the way I understand it, Brett, and correct me if
17:52 I’m wrong, it’s not a We’re not doing a seller note here, right? This is not a seller note. It’s an installment sale.
17:60 A seller note is an installment sale. So, yeah, let me walk you through it. Right. So, Casey’s puts $5 million down
18:05 on a We’ll make it a $10 million to make it seem simple. Okay. Make it 11 million. Okay. $11 million sale. Free
18:12 and clear. Ferris becomes the bank lender for Casey, right? The lender. He’s
18:18 lending him six million. Casey’s bringing a $5 million down payment. Okay. Now, now Ferris is only
18:24 going to pay tax on what he receives in the given year. So, he’ll pay tax on the 5 million in this scenario. And then the
18:30 other 6 million is in a deferral state. It’s an installment. So, he’s going to get it back in installments as Casey pays in slowly over time. He’ll pay tax
18:36 slowly over time. Right? Now, let’s do another scenario. Uh Casey brings a dollar down payment. Now in the
18:42 traditional deal, Ferris would never do that because he’s like he’s got no skin in the game. You know, maybe do it for Casey because he knows him, right? But
18:48 most people he wouldn’t do it for and the reason is because there’s not a lot of skin in the game and you know Casey might blow up the business and and or
18:54 you know make the value go way down and now Ferris has got to foreclose and pick up all the pieces. And that’s part of
18:59 the biggest challenge is on a traditional installment sale. The worst nightmare for an entrepreneur, what we
19:05 have found is two years later, just when they think they’re free of everything, right? just when the burden is listed off their back, all of a sudden the
19:11 payments don’t start up, stop stop showing up, and now they’re going to have to foreclose and sue Casey and all
19:16 this stuff and take the business back and pick it all back up. The worst is to do an installment sale, we believe, if
19:22 you have the deferred sales trust. And here’s why. In this scenario, the difference is we say, “Hey, Casey, we’re
19:28 not going to finance you. In fact, go get a loan from a bank. Bring all cash.
19:34 We don’t care. Okay? But we’re not going to finance you. We’re going to ask you to please come with cash, but we’re
19:39 going to ask you to cooperate with this trust structure where this trust is going to jump in right in between you
19:45 guys to to for the for for Ferris and you, Casey, and it’s going to buy the
19:50 asset from Casey from Ferris for $1 million. Okay? And it’s going but it’s
19:56 going to do with a zero down payment. Okay? And it’s going to immediately turn around and sell it to Casey for $11
20:03 million. So check it out. If the trust bought and s sold for the same price, 11 million 11
20:08 million, how much gain does it have, guys? Zero. Zero, right? And if Ferris hasn’t
20:14 received a dollar at closing, he’s in 100% deferral state. And we’ll talk
20:19 about why he would do that here in a second. But in Casey’s situation, he got the business, he’s he’s gone, and he’s
20:25 got everything like he thought he would get and he’s he’s out of the picture. The best part about this is this 11 million can hit Charles Schwab. Okay.
20:32 And based upon how and where Ferris wants to invest it and as a trustee I have to approve of this as well. Um we
20:37 invest the funds. The trust invests the funds. We write an interest rate on the note typically 8 n 10% kind of that
20:44 range and we go make money on the 11 million
20:49 and then we pay back ferris slowly over time. Okay. And this is the beauty. Most
20:55 of our clients will live off a portion of the interest. Okay. They don’t need to live off all of the interest. Most of
21:01 our clients will never dip into the principal. They can kick the principal down, you know, to their next generation
21:06 and keep it going. And they live off this truly passive income cash flow.
21:11 Okay. I haven’t heard it that way. That is incredible. Okay. Now, here’s the next best piece. Ferris is an entrepreneur. Ferris, how
21:17 old are you? I’m 30 what? 38. He’s 38. Okay. He’s got a lot a lot of a lot of juice, you know, left in there,
21:23 right? A lot of juice a lot of juice in the lemon here or the or the the lime. he’s going to want to go start another business, go buy and invest in real
21:29 estate, do a deal with with with Casey, do a deal with somebody else, whatever. Guess what? The trust becomes a silent
21:35 joint venture partner that owes Casey, it owes Ferris the money. Okay, so watch
21:42 this guys and this is the best piece. And if it wasn’t for this piece, I would not even be here. Okay, because I’m an
21:48 entrepreneur and you guys are entrepreneurs and we don’t like to be boxed in, right? And if I have to be boxed in with some of these other
21:55 strategies that put me in a box to only go into securities or only go into life insurance and I’m like, “Guys, that’s the most boring thing I’ve ever heard
22:01 of. You’re going to guarantee me 5% or whatever. I might get a death benefit.” Like, okay, that’s there’s a piece of that, but that’s pretty boring to me. I
22:08 want to go make 10, 20, 30, 50, 100%. I want to go make, you know, 500% on a business that I create. The beauty of
22:14 this trust, it now becomes a silent joint venture partner that put put up
22:19 the capital for the down payment for that real estate project for that new business venture. I’ll give you some case studies. We had a client sold a $3
22:26 million business billboard company um billboard company business, right? Sold
22:32 that, deferred all the tax and and he’s doing fix and flips houses, right? Another client sold couple million
22:38 dollar business and then he need funds to build 28 multifamily units in Tennessee. did that. Uh we have another
22:45 client who sold $5 million of Bitcoin um after they bought it for 50,000 it went
22:50 to 50 million and then they used four of the 5 million for a startup for a online like a Khan Academy educational um for
22:57 kids right that was the startup capital all tax deferred guys all tax deferred
23:03 and they’re running the business just like if they would have you know started a business the next day and had to get
23:09 $4 million from somebody else right and they have to give up all of the ownership equity or maybe control of the
23:14 business. This trust tax deferred funds their business venture, right? And then
23:20 when you exit, you can roll those proceeds back into the trust for part promisary note number two and keep rolling this. And so this is what we
23:26 call a cash flow, tax flow, and debt flow mindset. Most entrepreneurs in the
23:32 problem is they’re advisers. They’re just focused on cash flow, right? And they don’t know how to connect all three. And they don’t know how to do it
23:38 in a way that’s so efficient and so flexible. So, this is part of why most people haven’t either heard of this or don’t know how to do it because they
23:44 don’t have they don’t have this mindset and they and they make these mistakes. They think they have to be put in these small boxes for things like the CRTs or
23:52 things like um 1031 exchanges, right? Um and they’re more commonly known, but they’re they’re much more restrictive
23:58 than what we have here with the deferred sales trust. So, so let me give you a scenario with us. So, Ben Ben Iron Ferris, we’re three
24:04 partners here at Equity Launchpad. Okay. We make an acquisition and we get to a
24:09 point where we’re ready to sell. Okay. Can the partnership create a DST instead
24:17 of an individual and be able to maximize that from the sale? Is that possible or
24:22 is it an individual type of a structure? Um, so it it all depends, but let me
24:29 give you a couple examples. Okay, first of all, there’s never like a a co-mingle DST with multiple families, right? So
24:35 each of you would have your own trust that only does business with you and your spouse if you’re married, right?
24:41 I’ll give you an example. We did a $13 million exit for a car wash business in San Diego. Okay? There was actually four
24:47 partners. One was like a small partner, so he just paid his tax, so he was out. The other three had substantial interest, right? Millions of dollars,
24:53 right? And and so on each exit, we set up three trust to do business with each of the family, those families, right?
24:60 And they each got an installment sale. And this is the beauty. You can customize the risk tolerance, the cash
25:06 flow needs, the investments to each family. You don’t have to all go in it all together, right? And that’s the
25:12 challenge with the 1031 exchange. The whole entity must move, which typically means all of the investors all must go
25:18 into this next property all together. You’re illquid, not diversified, right? Doesn’t even work for a business, right?
25:24 So that that’s that’s not great. And so this is the beauty. Yeah. You can see now now I say it all depends. I want to
25:29 know do you own it as a CC corpor a JV LLC tax as a partnership usually corps usually corps
25:36 yeah we can help on all of them I would say if you are doing some planning the
25:42 the one of the tips here for everybody is the most flexible easy strategy with
25:48 the deferred sales trust and probably most of any other exit is if you can keep it as a joint venture LLC tax as a
25:55 partnership that would be like totally simple Easy, great, gold, and each one
26:01 can go their own ways. That’s usually the hold co. Okay. So, the hold code strategies that are holding the assets, right? You use that.
26:08 So, under the CC Corp, you’ve got section 1202. And those rules have gotten really nice. So, you know,
26:13 if you got if you got that, then that seems that seems really good. So, our tax attorneys, no cost, no obligation, and our team will go through and do like
26:19 an X-ray, an MRI of your of your whole setup, right? No cost obligation. And we’ll show and and what would work, what
26:24 we might adjust. But yeah, we’ve done it with C corps, got S corps, LLC’s, multiple partners. They just each of
26:31 them have a little bit different. We have a one we have a 1.0 and a 2.0 version real quick. By the way, the 2.0
26:36 is for estate tax challenges that you have, right? So, if you’re selling something over 30 million married with a
26:41 new tax bill that just got passed, you need to be aware that your state tax limitations is 30 million for a married couple, 15 million single. And so, we
26:48 want to get it outside the taxable state because the stepped up basis doesn’t solve for that. Okay? So, we have a 2.0
26:54 0 version that can solve for that. Sometimes we also get caught Casey and Ferris on just like the cap gains tax.
26:59 That’s the tiger by the tail. The big one is the estate tax. If you ever see the show Yellowstone, that’s the entire,
27:04 you know, premise of the show. Billion dollar land, you know, and Bett’s like, “Dad, Kevin Caution, you
27:10 got to sell the land.” And he’s like, “No, I’m never selling the land.” Like, “Dad, if they kill you, they’re going to take the land anyways because of the
27:15 death tax.” He’s like, “I’m never selling the land.” And that’s when I get up there and I yell, “Kevin, you got to
27:20 use a DST 2.0 0 and you got to call me and we’ll solve all of your problems. Now, Kevin would have to have sold the
27:26 land, guys, to a third party buyer before he died, but at least we would have eliminated the billion dollars
27:32 outside of his taxable estate. And here’s the best part. No charity, no life insurance, and no gifting required.
27:39 There’s no one and no strategy that I know of that’s proven with the close to 30-year track record, thousands of
27:45 transactions, billions and billions of assets sold using it and and over about three and a half about three dozen audits, all no change audits
27:53 that has that. And so this is the this is really the unique thing that we bring to the table. It’s we’re not guessing on
27:58 this. We have that track record, we have the team, we have the process and we solve especially that debt tax in a way
28:04 that no one else can touch. Question. So, you know, putting a different lens on it for people, right?
28:09 Because the profits are basically held in the DST, does that have to go on your PFS, your balance sheet? You know, can
28:16 if you, let’s say someone did have to file for bankruptcy later, is that accessible or not, right, to a trustee
28:21 to kind of take over? Oh, good question. So, first of all, you have asset protection automatically built in, right? You are selling it to a
28:28 third party trust, at least for the 1.0, that you you don’t own and it’s outside it’s outside of creditor. Yes. So you
28:34 have asset protections, it’s owed to you, right? And so they could get a judgment fair to answer your question on
28:39 on like, you know, the cash flow that’s coming to you, right? The promisary note can be adjusted and so you may or may not have cash flow in that given year,
28:46 right? Or it might be delayed for a couple years, right? So there’s some cool flexibilities within the 1.0 version. Um it the promisary note is an
28:53 asset that you have you put inside of your living trust and it is a part of your your net worth, right? The
28:58 promisary note, but it’s it’s over there set to pay you at a certain, you know, a scheduled time. and and so and every
29:05 it’s typically a 10ear balloon payment and every 10 years you renew for 10 years. We can also make eight or five or
29:10 lower if you want. Um again interest rates are like 8 to 10%. Um so that I think that answers your question there.
29:16 Yeah I mean it’s ultimate but credit creditors are usually looking for liquid cash. They don’t want to wait 10 years to get it and so again it’s just and I I
29:23 I knew the answer and I kind of said that just to get people to start thinking about there’s value in having this other entity. Right. So maybe let’s
29:29 go through just you mentioned the Bitcoin example. Let’s just I think that’s actually a good simple one to explain to people, right? Let’s let’s go
29:34 explain that one more time just to make sure our listeners understand it, right? So let’s say Casey spent $1,000 buying
29:40 Bitcoin and then that same Bitcoin, he can sell it today for a million, right? Scenario one, he sells it for
29:48 essentially $999,000 of capital gains tax. 30% of that goes
29:53 to the government. He’s pocketing $650,000. Right. Mhm. Scenario one. Scenario two, using the
29:59 DST, what he should do, right, because Bitcoin is very liquid, there’s a lot of buyers, right? What he really should do
30:05 is put the basically sell the Bitcoin to a DST, right? And he gives himself, you
30:11 know, let’s just say again, a 10% 10-year note, right? So, he’s getting paid out $100,000 a year from the DSC.
30:18 The DST takes that Bitcoin and immediately liquidates it. So, they can have the actual cash on hand, right? And
30:24 now DST has the liquidity there. or they can go it can go be reinvested into whatever else, right? Maybe Casey’s
30:30 going to sell his Bitcoin and go hop into something else, right? He’s going to go buy a piece of real estate or whatever. DST is buying the real estate.
30:35 It’s holding all that and it’s paying out the 10%. And Casey’s basically getting $100,000 a year of income that
30:41 he then pays taxes on and hopefully he’s doing other smart things to reduce his tax obligation on that. Right? That’s in
30:47 a nutshell how it works. Right, Brett? Yeah, you nailed it. Yeah, I see. All right. So, there you go. So, it’s
30:52 it’s a good way to just again not get a big pop in one year. And you know again there’s you know tax there’s a thousand
30:57 ways to do tax strategy and it’s it’s to the listeners it’s really important to talk to different people right and you
31:05 know they need to all it really people hate the answer of it depends but it really does depend on your situation so
31:10 you know I have a lot of real estate so I have a ton you know I have negative income so then do I care for some of these do I not when should I care right
31:17 it’s very different than it could be what Casey’s situation you got it and then the other thing is you can partner with the trust and get
31:23 additional upside beond 8 to 10% on the note. And so let me just walk you through that. Right? So the five five million of Bitcoin was sold. They would
31:29 have paid like about 1.65 million of tax. And so we deferred all of that. And then they put 4 million into a startup
31:36 company. And let’s just say that company turns into a a $10 million venture, right? Well, um we do like an 8020 and a
31:43 preferred return and the that 80% goes to the to the sweat equity, you know, um
31:49 entrepreneur. Even though they put up no money into that, right? the trust put up the the the four million, but the trust still
31:56 owes them the money, right? And so it’s it’s a wash there on the four million that comes back, but on the six million
32:01 upside after the preferred return, what’s crazy, what’s cool is you get 80% goes to the entrepreneur, 20% to the
32:08 trust, or if they purchase an option, they could get 98% of it. So what does all this mean? That’s a lot of numbers.
32:13 What I’m saying is as an entrepreneur, you can still go hit home runs and get additional, you know, extra bites of the
32:20 apple. In this scenario, the government’s giving you an interest free loan that you would have paid, but that
32:25 can be used to go, it’s like the ultimate SBA financing, right? You would have paid 1.6 my million in tax, but
32:31 they say, “Hey, just put in the deferred sales trust. It’ll be zero interest rate on that as long as you keep this 5
32:36 million in the trust and you don’t take it and you can move it in and out of business ventures. You can move it out of real estate ventures, stock market,
32:43 crypto, business, you know, all that. All tax deferred until you take payment. and and in the meantime go start a
32:49 business and go make that thing a huge success and then you exit that you can get promisary note number two and so
32:55 this is the tax a different DST right same DST multiple promisary notes so it’s even simpler but in your example
33:02 though sorry let me rewind in your example you said that so let’s say I’m that entrepreneur I’m going to do a JV
33:07 with my DST where I’m getting 80% of the upside yes right you put no money in no money in the
33:13 trust put in no money in correct so I start whatever company. You know, I use the $4 million to go buy office
33:20 equipment and start a company. I sell it and there’s $6 million of profit. I get 80% of that six, right?
33:26 Whatever that math is, you know, it’s $5 million. Now, I have a $5 million tax consequence, do I not?
33:32 Or promise, you can either pay that or do promisary note number two. And you stack promisary notes. And same thing if
33:38 you had a Bitcoin exit, a real estate exit, a business exit, a primary home exit, a a jet exit, you know, whatever.
33:44 all these different assets that you’re exiting. We can do it for public stock, private stock, artwork, collectibles, Bitcoin, crypto. We’re the first to ever
33:51 do it with Bitcoin. Um, and I think the first to ever do it with crypto. Um, but yeah, and so that’s the beauty. And then
33:57 so you think about back to the family mission vision values and simplifying your estate plan, right? This is so
34:03 beautiful, right? You have one trust, maybe two depending on your net worth, and every single exit will go into one
34:10 or two of these trust. Um, and then you just get promisary notes to back and
34:15 then the kids can step into your shoes on the 1.0 and the 2.0. They actually are the beneficiaries and um, it’s
34:22 outside the taxable estate on that one. So that’s it. And you don’t need all that other stuff. I mean, you’ll have
34:28 your living trust to show kind of how you want, you know, things to happen for your kids or however you want to do that. You can still give to charity, but
34:34 you don’t have to give it to charity. You know, one of the things you said, you know, and and I’ve and I’ve got little strategies that I’ve been working
34:41 on for years, just reading, but you got to have a team. The truth of the matter is this is highly sophisticated stuff that needs to
34:47 be filed correctly, documented correctly, managed correctly. More money, more problems. If all of a sudden, because a trust has
34:54 a not the deferred sales trust, but a living trust has a 40% tax, right? If you hold cash at the end of the year.
34:60 So, you’ve got to know how to the there’s just all of this. And I and I take it, Brett, that’s where your team
35:05 comes in, right? That’s where you guys go, hey, we orchestrate and we help you guys manage this all of these burdens,
35:12 you know, that because they are they’re they’re things you got to deal with and it’s and it’s a lot. Yeah. So, two things on that. Number
35:18 one, on the deferred sales side, for your guys’ perspective, it’s so simple. You get a $1099 for the interest you
35:23 received in the given year. And on the year of sale, you report you report your sales and installment sale on one page
35:29 with your CPA. So simple. on our side. You’re right. We’re doing all of the compliance, you know, you know, the EIN,
35:36 the the tax return for the trust, the P&L for the trust. Uh we have thirdparty groups doing all all of, you know, tax
35:42 CPA groups doing all that. And but it’s you can shut down your C corp, shut down your S corp, like you shut all that. You
35:48 get all of that out, right? And just like declutter your your entrepreneur life, right? And you’re just like, give
35:54 me truly passive income and give me flexibility with my capital. Man, I’d love to sell real estate high
35:59 and buy it low when the market shifts, but it’s going to take a couple years. Um, man, I I’d love to start this new
36:05 business venture with half of my proceeds from my real estate sale, and the other half I like to go back into real estate. By the way, sometimes we’re
36:10 doing a buy fractured 1031 exchange. We’re doing a partial 1031 exchange, and a partial deferred sales trust.
36:16 Sometimes we’re doing a Delaware statuto trust, deferred sales trust, and a regular 1031. had a client out of out of
36:21 a Texas student just had a $6 million exit and did a a partial deal in South South Carolina, partial into a Delaware,
36:28 partial into the deferred sales trust. So, it’s not always just, you know, hammer nail one-izefits-all. You’re
36:34 right. You want a team, Casey, right? That can give you capital gains tax solutions plural with an s, right? To
36:41 show you how and where that your options might best fit what you’re looking to accomplish. And um that’s yeah, that’s
36:48 really the name of the game. and the deferred sales trust. I just found it just gives so much of what people want.
36:53 I want to ask you one last question before we wrap. When is he got his wheels going? When is a DST not valuable? Not not the
37:01 right choice. Yeah. There’s three times, right? Number one, if you think your tax team, you
37:06 know, and you guys are really smart and I’m sure you guys have a lot of great people, right? Like they’re just like,
37:12 man, we don’t know about it. Or they do know about it, but they’re like, I don’t know if I’d do it. And part of why they because they haven’t done a thousand
37:18 transactions in 30 years, right? So, just like I got I play basketball in college. I blew out my ACL. I signed my scholarship. I’m all excited. Sign it
37:25 there. My mom’s smiling. My coach is smiling. Two weeks later, I blow my ACL, right? I show up to that doctor and he
37:31 goes, “Yeah, I I was a He’s a family doctor.” But he’s like, “Yeah, but I, you know, I I uh I did, you know,
37:37 sports, you know, you know, specialty.” He does the little knee test. You guys ever get that knee test where they grab your knee and you’re sitting there like,
37:42 “Oh my gosh.” And like he’s like, “Oh yeah, your ACL is good.” I’m like, “Okay, cool.” I’m like, “Great. I’ll be back in a couple weeks.” I’m all
37:48 excited. You know, I want to believe him. My brother’s like, “Hey, go back to him on your next visit. Tell him you
37:53 want to get your MRI. Don’t let him skip the MRI. I’ve had horror stories of a friend who did it and she blew her knee
37:58 out.” Boom. So, I come back to the doctor. I’m like, “Doctor, I know you’re probably going to think this is you asking a lot, but I really like to get
38:04 the MRI.” And he’s like, “You’re wasting your time.” As he’s writing up the script, you’re going to drive down there and all this D. He’s just like totally
38:11 like convinced I don’t have a blown ACL. Two weeks later, the results come back. Guess what? Hey Brett, sorry to say you
38:18 got a blown ACL. Right? So, this is a classic example of somebody who is not a specialist in ACL surgeries who is
38:25 giving his very strong opinion based upon his experience with this thing. And that’s the challenge we find is number
38:31 one, your team most likely is going to say no because there’s zero upside for them to say yes to something they
38:37 haven’t done, right? Guess what? They they also have an alternative. Hey Casey, just do that bonus depreciation.
38:43 We got 100% there. Okay, by the way, you might do it for a portion of that. Hey, just do the 1031 exchange. It’s tried and true. They’re just really busy with
38:49 what they’re doing and they want to just kind of like push that to the side. If they say yes to something they’ve never
38:55 done or not really familiar with, they have next to zero upside. If it goes great, it’s they’re really not the hero.
39:01 But if it goes bad, but guess what? They’re the person. So sometimes you need to replace that team member. And you’re not replacing it with just
39:07 somebody who’s trying this. Thousands and thousands and thousands of transactions, billions and billions and
39:13 billions of assets, you know, um, over three dozen no change audits. I believe my business partner is the smartest
39:18 person I’ve ever met. He’s a genius. He’s a tax attorney, CPA, former M&A attorney for Fortune 100 companies.
39:24 Okay, here’s the reality. You get in a room with him and me and you spend 30 minutes or an hour with your tax people,
39:30 nine out of 10 will join us. Okay, so that’s number one. So let’s get over that. Let’s imagine it’s legal. Okay, by the way, we provide lifetime audit
39:35 defense where they the law firm does. And so if you get audit, no, no additional charge. Number two is trustee. Okay, you got to trust the
39:42 trustee. So who is that? That’s our company. We’re a thirdparty unrelated trustee. Now, here’s that kind of sounds
39:47 kind of scary sometimes, but guess what? If you’ve done a 1031 exchange, guess what? You sent your funds to a thirdparty unrelated company for a
39:55 period of time. They controlled the funds and they had to follow rules. Guess what? We’re kind of like a long-term 1031 company just for you.
40:02 Okay. kind of like, right? And yeah, you you have 24/7 access to view the funds online. Nothing less than your approval
40:08 or signature. You are a creditor or you’re a lender. We work together as a team. We can work with your financial advisors to if you want to do that. We
40:15 have ours, man. It’s a whole ecosystem here to keep the transparency and accountability. So, that’s number two.
40:20 Number three is fees. Okay? We charge about 1 and a half to 2% on the AUM
40:26 under management. Now, typically we can return 8 n 10% compounding net of fees. Okay? Um, but that being said, you’ve
40:33 got to understand how to make the DST an investment and not an expense. You’re not just deferring capital gains tax.
40:39 You’re also deferring income tax to the extent you don’t take in the given year. Kind of like an IRA. Really powerful
40:44 stuff. You’re also able to eliminate estate tax if we have a big enough deal in the 2.0. You’re also able to
40:50 establish, guess what, a new depreciation schedule. If you go buy a piece of property when you partner with
40:55 the trust. Wow, isn’t that cool? You can sell like a hundred million of Bitcoin that has no depreciation and go buy
40:60 let’s say $300 million worth of real estate that has depreciation. Wow, isn’t that cool? Yeah, that’s really cool,
41:06 right? Versus having to wait for a stepped up basis. And then the last one is if you can diversify and increase your cash on cash return, you can unlock
41:14 hopefully your family mission vision values in a whole another way. We always say don’t trade what’s profitable for
41:21 what’s priceless, right? And if you have a chance to exit at a high multiple and a chance to defer your tax, steward your
41:27 wealth, compound compound your freedom and and and uh and and the capital, man, why wouldn’t you hire the team, right?
41:33 What’s the worst thing could happen? Guess what? They charge you 10% on um on penalty and you pay the tax. Guess what?
41:40 We’re going to go make that 10%. Right? They typically audit happens in year two. What’s the audit window? It’s
41:45 typically three years except for California is four. So you start to actually look at these things and you go, what are you really risking here?
41:52 you’re risking if you just pay the tax and lay down like the government’s going to go waste it away in about 10 seconds with their 37 trillion of debt right on
41:59 our side. We say, “Why don’t you steward the capital? Let us help you do it and let’s pass on a legacy that’s going to
42:04 um you’re never going to regret.” I love it, man. Awesome. This is this is the good stuff
42:09 right here because again, it’s not what you make, it’s what you keep. And uh that’s really good, man. Real quick,
42:15 just uh before we jump to our rocket round, talk to you wrote a book, right? So, we did. So talk to us real quick
42:21 about the book because yeah it’s called building a capital gains tax exit plan. We have Kevin Harrington from Shark Tank in the book
42:27 which is pretty cool. We have Tony Robbins CPA in the book and it’s it’s all about unlocking your ideal wealth
42:32 plan for when selling assets of any kind for yourself or your clients. Um and really unlocking you know more of that
42:39 family mission vision values and stewardship of the capital. It’s my story from really zero to knowing about
42:45 all this. I am I am a real estate broker by trade, a real estate, you know, common developer, you know, by growing
42:52 up with my parents. I am a common entrepreneur, real estate guy. Like this is I did not study to be a tax CPA and I
42:59 try to make it really simple what these really smart guys do. I’m kind of that bridge between all of this. I just
43:04 happen to have the 10,000 hours in this whole world of 1031s, Delaware statue trust, deferred sales trust. So yeah,
43:09 check out the book. You can go to Amazon or go to capital gains taxolution.com to to to get the book. Is there an audio
43:14 version by any chance yet? Uh, so we’re working on that right now. Uh, yeah. So, not yet. Not yet. He’s
43:20 waiting for the chat GBTs to get a little bit better on the audio quality. Right. Exactly. Because I, you know, I I I’m a big reader, but you know, I spend
43:26 so much time in the car driving from, you know, project to project. I I listen to a lot of my stuff.
43:32 We got a YouTube channel that’s got it’s pretty epic. You know, if you go to Capital Gains Tax Solutions YouTube channel, um, we’ve got all the client
43:38 testimonials, the how-to videos. I’m jumping all over, man. I love this stuff. So, it’s pretty incredible. Awesome. Cool. We’ll go ahead and move
43:45 on to our rockaround where we ask our guests the same three questions. So, first question, what do you like to do in your free time?
43:51 Uh, so, uh, two main things. When I’m not with working, I’m with my family, my daughters, my son. When I’m not hanging
43:58 with them, um, well, we do the two for one. So, we do jiu-jitsu. Um, all the kids do jiu-jitsu, so do I. So, um, when
44:05 they’re practicing, I’m practicing in another room. Um, so that’s a big piece of of the fun stuff with the family. And
44:11 then uh basketball, you know, basketball grew up. It’s it’s my uh passion, one of my passions, my top passion in life for
44:17 for sports or activities. So I was just playing this morning. I was just shooting doing a shooting workout and
44:22 and then I’ll play any kind of pickup game that I can. So those are my two two
44:27 main kind of uh fun things to do. Yeah, I used to play basketball in college. I mean, not not at the
44:32 professional level, just you know, pickup games, but uh Kevin Durant went to my college and I got to play with him once and I always thought I was good at
44:38 defense and you play a guy like that and even though he’s tall, scrawny, and lengthy and he is still leagues better.
44:43 So, he’s got the 10,000 hours that I’d never had. So, absolutely. Next question. Um, what’s
44:48 your most memorable moment in your business journey? You know, I think it was it was likely
44:53 um it was a couple moments, but I I would say the one that really sticks out to me was the 2008 crash, right, where
45:02 friends, family, clients, client were losing half or all their wealth, and a lot of people were saying, “Get out of
45:07 the real estate business, you know, go get a real job at the bank kind of thing. Get the salary and the safety.”
45:13 And my wife and I are u you know, married at this point now and and the baby’s on the way. And you had a we had
45:19 a decision to make, right? And do you do you kind of give up on the entrepreneur dream here? Um or do you figure out a
45:26 way uh we call it the honey badger mentality to just do whatever it take. And that’s what we did. We said, “Okay, we’re going to move with my brother to a
45:32 small condo. We’re going to sacrifice. We’re going I’m going to get a job at Cheesecake Factory and sell avocado egg
45:37 rolls and cheesecake.” Um and by day worked at Marcus and Milichap and still cold call and help my clients with the
45:43 banks and and hold them to their properties. And so it was a two-year journey. Yeah, I walk in the Cheesecake Factory and the guy says, “You’re way
45:48 overqualified. You have two degrees in a minor. You play basketball on college on scholarship. You’re a Marcus and Milchap. You’re just going to quit when
45:53 you close a deal in a couple months.” I said, “Tell you what, sir. I have a baby on the way. I commit no matter what. I’ll be here for two years. I’m going to
45:59 work by day there and I’ll come here nights and weekends.” And so I did that for 70 hours a week, 67 hours a week for
46:04 two straight years. And uh two years in one day, I was able to retire from the Cheesecake Factory. And it was a
46:11 beautiful moment because I kept the entrepreneur dream alive and I was able to commit keep my commitment to the
46:16 Cheesecake Factory and I was able to learn and be humbled a lot, right? I mean, I was at that point I was embarrassed and didn’t tell anyone about
46:22 it cuz I was embarrassed of that. But now looking back, it’s my proudest moment because it really defined like what was meaningful for my wife and I.
46:28 what was and it really defined what was my passion and calling in life because when you’re not making money you know selling real estate or selling tax
46:35 deferral services like and you just keep loving it and growing and doing it then you know maybe it’s really meant for you
46:41 and so I kept pushing and you know fast forward you know we’re very successful now but um that was probably the most
46:47 memorable one when I walked in the Cheesecake Factory retired forever from it and uh and the rest is history I
46:53 guess you can say story man I love it well most important question then I mean because you know Cheesecake Factory has a big menu what’s the Best item on the
46:59 menu. Avocado egg rolls, dude. And that sauce, man. Avocado are good. I wish they made it
47:04 without the red onions. Oh, yeah. Hold the red onions. You can do that. Yeah. That’s awesome. All right, last
47:10 question. Favorite tool or resource. I mean, I can chat GPT and AI at this point. It’s hard to pass up. I could
47:17 like literally click the button and say, “Hey, help me to download, you know, this client meeting in my mind all of
47:23 the all of the details. Help me write an email. Help me write the notes.” and and just download it there and then edit it
47:28 a little bit. I mean, it it saves me 90% of my communication time on follow-up. Like, it’s just absolutely amazing. If
47:35 you’re not using that feature, start using the feature immediately. I jumped on it a couple weeks ago. It’s
47:40 been like starting to use it for other other than just rewriting an email or a post. It’s like literally like talking to it, help me think through this
47:47 and wow. Wow. It’s shocking. Yeah. I get a lot less calls from Casey now. You know, I’m usually the person he
47:52 bounces ideas off. Now, it’s chat. He He knows me now. Then he comes to me and he’s a lot more
47:57 sharper. He’s already like figured out the thing and so now I’m trying to catch up. Um, awesome Brett. Well, how can
48:02 listeners get a hold of you? Yeah, you can go to brettworts.com if you want to follow all my social media
48:07 stuff and kind of the the family journey and all that kind of thing and and that also gets access to the book and our in
48:12 our and our um our our company. We have two podcasts. One’s called Build It to Billions and then we have the Capital
48:18 Gains Tax Solutions podcast and YouTube channels. And then last, if you have a live deal, it needs to be at least a million dollar net proceeds, million
48:24 dollar gain. needs to be big enough. You can go apply for a nocost consultation by going to capital gains
48:30 taxsolutions.com. That’s capital gains taxsolutions.com. All right. Outstanding, man. Brett, thank you very
48:37 much for being here today. That was excellent. Thank you very much. Thank you for listening to the M&A Launchpad podcast. If you’ve enjoyed
48:44 today’s podcast and would like to support us, please leave us a rating and a review after you listen. If you’re looking for guidance on your next
48:50 business acquisition or sale, capital to support your next business transaction, or to invest in a private equity
48:56 opportunity, visit equityaunchpad.com to learn more and to connect with our team. If you know of an individual who would
49:02 be a great guest for the show, head over to equityaunchpad.com/nominate
49:07 where you’ll have the chance to refer yourself or someone else to be a guest on our show. I’m Casey Mchu and I look
49:12 forward to talking with you next week.
