From Corporate Chains to Financial Freedom: The Entrepreneurial Journey of Investor and Mentor Patrick Franz

Transcript

In this episode, we chat with Patrick Franz. Patrick is a mortgage note investor, a mentor, a mortgage note fund manager, and he's seen explosive growth in the last five years, professionally financially health wise relationship wise. And, you know, for anybody who's got, who is in sales or has tried different ventures and entrepreneurship and it hasn't worked out. This episode is for you. Patrick had all kinds of quote, unquote failures in the past and, things that looked extremely promising from, you know, from an ideas standpoint and even execution standpoint, and then all of a sudden, the deal falls through. Or he's starting to produce in sales, and then the company closes. And this episode is a lot about saying yes to an opportunity and to going all in. Just surrounding yourself with great people and changing your mindset to serving others, changing your mindset to learning about finance and how money flows and getting, an appreciation for financial education and the importance of money in our lives. And In the last five years, Patrick has seen explosive growth, in in so many different areas of life. This is he's a high energy, well spoken, fantastic guest, and he does drop a ton of knowledge, has some great book recommendations at the end. And so he's also got a lot of practical things to offer that you're gonna hear toward the end of the show more about you know, mentorship, note investing, and how you can take ownership of your own financial future. He gets into different things that they offer toward the end. So you're gonna wanna listen all the way through. Patrick, was fantastic to to spend some time with, and I you're gonna appreciate this one.

Speaker 1

Welcome to the from adversity to abundance podcast. Are you an entrepreneur or aspiring entrepreneur, then this show is for you. Each week, we bring you in full stories of real people who have overcome painful human adversity to create a life of abundance. You are not alone in your struggle. Join us, and you will experience the power of true stories and gain practical knowledge from founders who have turned poverty into prosperity and weakness into wealth. This podcast will encourage you through your health relationship, and financial challenges so you can become the hero in your quest for freedom. Take owner ship of the life you were destined to live. Turn your adversity into abundance.

Speaker 0

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Speaker 2

Super pumped, man. Glad to be on your show. Thank for having me on here as a guest, and I can't wait to, hopefully bless your listeners and audience with some some good nuggets today. Maybe help them go from whatever they're having in their lives, as adversity to maybe going from that to abundance.

Speaker 0

Absolutely. I love that. For the listener, Patrick, is a family man, an entrepreneur, a mentor. We're gonna get into it more later, but He's got his hands in a lot of different things, a professional investor. And he and I run we we cross paths in in node investing. I know you got a lot of lot of other things going on as well, Patrick. So for the listener out there, what are you up to today?

Speaker 2

You know, really up to today, man. I'm managing now businesses. I'm financially free. I'm hanging out with my family, my four and a half year old daughter. I'm playing golf twice a week at the country club and, and enjoying life, finally. That's what I'm doing today.

Speaker 0

That's fantastic. That's awesome. So that sounds like abundance. We know we know you have some bad days here in of course. Right? But but sounds like you've really gotten intentional and you're able to live your best life right now. I don't think it's always been that way, though. So let's jump back the the show, as you know, from adversity to abundance. We're we're not here to you know, push on too many pain points, make anybody cry on the show. If it happens, it happens. But but, you know, we're here to walk through some rough periods that you've been through and draw out some lessons and really to inspire the listener, let them know that, hey, life is you're gonna go through hard times. We've all been through hard times. We're all gonna go through more hard times, whether that's relationship, financial, health, etcetera. But Patrick your story is different than anyone else's, and that's what we're here to to learn from today. So take us back where do you wanna start?

Speaker 2

Well, let me just say I'm here to help people understand that they can break themselves free of financial slavery within a few short years no matter where you're at, who you are, what your circumstances are. And that's where I'm going out into the world now as me serving others to help people understand that and to show them ways they can get it done. Right? That's awesome. Because, you know, not to say it's a struggle or it's adversity to, have a job, a JOB, and and have that forty, forty plan working for you, which is the forty hours a week for forty years kind of a thing. But if if you haven't woken up to it yet, it is a bit of financial slavery. And I'm not saying it's horrible, but, everybody who works forty hours a week for forty years of their life gives up their life and their time for a little bit of money, is is is is up against them adversity. In my opinion. And, you know, and we will go that way, Jamie, with with all things because I believe that as we discussed a little bit earlier before we started the show, I think that the financial portion of someone's life is not the end all be all, and it's not the most important thing. I'll tell you what, when you talk about, financial life combined with your personal health, fitness, and spirit, also then with your relationships with other people, and what you can do to serve others, it all kinda goes together, man.

Speaker 0

Hundred percent. Couldn't agree more. It's it's critical. I I it's and that look, that's why the show is aimed at entrepreneurs and taking control of your financial life and your financial future. And not not abdicating that to whether that's your employer or your the the your money manager or somebody else, but taking ownership of your situation, and that really often does start with your financial situation because it absolutely is all tied together. I mean, money is, you know, we don't have to get too too religious, but money is absolutely all through the Bible as one example. Right? It's it's critical. It's not something to ignore. It's absolutely imperative that people understand the importance of money. We don't wanna worship money. Right? But it's It's hugely important, and very powerful can be used for good or bad. That's that's my, I'll get out my get off of my soapbox, but that's that's my view.

Speaker 2

You're still right though, Jamie. I mean, look, you know, you've if you're struggling, if you're struggling financially to a four put food on your table, then you're not gonna go down and feed the homeless. K? That's that's it. You you you can't afford to buy enough food for them either. Okay? So, you know, it's it's, first of all, taking care of yourself, your mindset, your health, and those things, but it's the development of yourself to understand that there's a new way And if you're if you're looking at adversity financially, trust me. Within thirty six months, forty eight months from today, you can be completely financially free. I promise you can. I've done it. My partner did it. I've seen people do it. It's achievable. It's not crazy. Right? How about health? If you're overweight, if you have health problems, if you have high cholesterol, diabetes, any of these things. It's all been proven that it is you can reverse this. Okay? In a few short years, you can become healthy and you can become abundant in that manner. And also the same way of breaking outside your comfort zone, getting around different circles of people, being willing to build new relationships, is amazing at how the opportunity for abundance, whether it be health, spiritual, or financial tend to open up.

Speaker 0

Absolutely. Couldn't agree more. That's awesome. So I know we're gonna get into more more lessons and and more specifics about how you were able to reach abundance and overcome adversity. But let's talk more about the adversity that you did go through. What did that pain paint us a picture, give us some context, and maybe right before you hit your first real low point financially, what did things look like?

Speaker 2

Well, if anybody can relate, my father was a college professor, San Diego State University. My mother was a gymnastics coach. Great parents. I grew up in the most loving family. We were not broke. So I didn't have to struggle for food and necessity, but also my family had zero financial intelligence never made any investments and worked their entire lives until they were old enough to be, you know, too old to enjoy life anymore. Right? You you're too old to go rock climbing and snow skiing, but you finally get time to do it. Alright? And that was that was my family. And so I really grew up in an athletic and competitive, environment. No financial intelligence or real financial lessons in as we go through elementary school and junior high, high school, and even college, they don't teach real financial intelligence to people. They teach us how to go out into the workforce and be an ant in the ant farm, of course. Right?

Speaker 0

Okay.

Speaker 2

And so not to say that that was adversity, but I'll I'll tell you what. I kind of had this little notion inside me. I don't know if other people listening can can relate, but you kinda knew that doing six hours of homework after he already went to school for six hours was kind of a a weird dynamic. Right?

Speaker 0

Sure. Yeah.

Speaker 2

Kinda knew when you got your first job and maybe your boss was a jerk and you were getting paid measly amount of money, but you were busting your rear end eight hours a day, like a busser or a server or you know, like I was, uh-uh, at my younger years, you you kinda got it. You were like, dang, this is not the cool life that I really think I should live in.

Speaker 0

It feels bad.

Speaker 2

It feels bad inside you. Right? It feels bad inside you. Right?

Speaker 0

Absolutely.

Speaker 2

And so I felt like that. And so I got my first job when I was fifteen years old in nineteen ninety four. As a salesperson because I thought that would be fun, at least more fun than going and working as a cashier, bus and tables. So I I got a job as a telemarketer selling bumper stickers, and that was my first real lesson in, I guess, entrepreneurial endeavors because

Speaker 0

Yeah.

Speaker 2

It was it was a straight commission. Right? Yeah. Sure. But that that's just at least spawn to me that I I saw people that could do something that was a little more fun. And you could make a little bit more money than is you were just working as a cashier.

Speaker 0

Yeah. You you you eat what you kill and you you, you know, you're theoretically, at least your your effort is directly rewarded by pay. Right? So your your performance leads to a higher pay. You have more control of the results. A settlement.

Speaker 2

Of course, my sister shut her telemarketing company down because she was she was done when I did it. So and so you go into these younger years, and here's what I'll tell you. All of us should do this. It's a good experience. It it hopefully builds your character, but I worked as a busser at a fish restaurant. Oh, that was a nice that was a fun one. I worked as a lumber handler in a lumber yard throwing concrete sacks and and and, you know, beams and things like that loading trucks. You know, worked as a waiter TGI Fridays, man, I won the flare. I had the button.

Speaker 0

Nice.

Speaker 2

But you know what I'm saying? And those are those are what I call those odd jobs that you're doing to get yourself through high school college years and those kinds

Speaker 0

of things. Absolutely.

Speaker 2

What I hate to see is somebody who's fifty two. No offense. If he's fifty two and he's working as a waiter at TGI Fridays right now, he missed something.

Speaker 0

Absolutely.

Speaker 2

And and it wasn't it's not our fault. I want people to understand that. Some of this adversity we all feel and some of this adversity we're going through It's not purposeful. We just don't know what we don't know, and it was never taught to us. And that's the unfortunate part. Sure. So what happened was, Jamie, is that, After those odd jobs, man, I I thought I was nineteen years old, and I thought I'm gonna be rich. So so I went down And I I had my father buy me my first suit. I didn't own a suit. I had my dad take me to Nordstrom's rack and buy me my first suit for three hundred bucks. I remember. It's navy blue. And and I said, dad, I'm gonna go interview down in La Jolla, California where the guys drive the ferraris, and I'm gonna go get a job as a salesperson. I'm gonna be rich. You'll see. Well, I went down and worked hard in a boiler room for some startup dot com companies that were raising funds back then in those old days in La Jolla. Owners really were driving Ferraris. Okay? But I found out that, you know, it it was people that were getting wealthy off of the backs of others, maybe that were getting ruined at the same time. You know, we're willing to step over other people or, investors would lose, but they'd still win kind of a notion. And I learned the wrong, the wrong way things could be done, and how good people could lose money very simply making bad investments. And I learned this at nineteen. Now listen, I made pretty good money in the boiler room, of course. I was young. I didn't know any better. And what happened with that company? I I was doing well there. It went under. It went under my Yeah.

Speaker 0

There's a theme here. There's a theme here.

Speaker 2

There's a theme here. And I'm getting to people, and I guess the theme and the the point of this, and I'll finish up. But the point of the at the end of this, the point is trust me, don't give up, guys. I reach I I achieved financial freedom more spiritual freedom, better health, and better relationships now at forty three years old. And only in the last four years of my life has it occurred And I'm just going through. You want some adversity. Let's let's go down this road. Yeah. In ninety nine, I was selling venture capital down in La Jolla. Right? That company went under.

Speaker 0

Mhmm.

Speaker 2

In two thousand and one, I got a job selling home remodeling because, again, I thought sales was the way to go.

Speaker 0

Sure.

Speaker 2

But what I didn't realize is in the sales business to make the money, you are working more than eight hours a day. So, you know, people think I wanna go do sales. It's gonna be an easy route to big money. Oh, man. The follow ups, the straight commissions, stress, and all this. And working literally leaving my house at eight o'clock in the morning. Right? And not coming home till ten thirty at night. And I ran appointments all day driving around and going and trying to sell things to people. And it's like, look, you're you're chasing after that better money. Right? Shoot. I might as I might have been making double the yearly income that my buddy was who was working down at the rest drop. Right? Mhmm. So I'm doing better. But, man, I gotta tell you working eight o'clock in the morning, eight thirty in the morning to ten PM, and not having any life is where you see adversity.

Speaker 0

Absolutely. No. And I do think sales is a is a fantastic training ground, really, for any entrepreneur. And I think, obviously, sales is critical. Just sales as a general category. Right? If you're gonna run a business, you gotta have some kind of sales department or or person doing sales. Right? And and learning how to get rejected and how to, you know, how to look at the big picture if if if the deal falls through. And, I I think it's critical. It it's a great skill to learn. But and there's always a but. Right? But you're absolutely right. It's it's still a job that, you know, you're you're how much more were you making per hour than the person who was working that forty hours, maybe a little bit, maybe a little bit. I don't know. But, it's very inconsistent too. My my father was a real estate agent still is technically for, you know, he's been a real estate agent for, I don't know, decades. Right?

Speaker 2

Yep.

Speaker 0

And we had some good times growing up with his with him doing well. And then we had some really challenging times, and that's all sales. I mean, it's very market dependent. It's that you you had companies closed down. You had no control over that. I mean, so you still don't really have control or abundance, you know, in that at least in those sales jobs, it sounds like. So, walk us through the next few years after after that. What happened?

Speaker 2

Well, I mean, you're trying to and and the point to that is this. Yeah. It might have been been making good money, but it's okay. You have to chase after the next deal always. So I was always having to take my time and energy for the next commission. Right? And ten hours a day, six days a week as a young guy. Come on. When are you golfing? When are and when he had dated, when he did. It was like, come on, man. Okay. But but you were I was young enough. I didn't get that lesson. Now in two thousand five, I decided, young and full of, full of cockiness and energy, of course. Thank goodness. But Listen, this sales stuff is great, but I need to get rich because I'm sick of working ten hours a day and chasing commissions. I need to figure out a way to get rich. So I literally did what most people wouldn't do, and I tell you that you should. If you have an idea, if you have something that you think would help the world, if you think that you you have what it takes, half halfway surround yourself with some people that see your vision and go for it. What I did was I had an invention idea. Have we all had one of those? Yeah. I asked. Yeah. Absolutely. We're all been in the garage. Well, if I invented that man, I'd be rich. Okay? Well, I was one of the people that went, you know what? Then I'm gonna invent it and get rich. Okay? And it was called the auto finder, Jamie. I have it here in my office. I I show you the box, but but, you know, I thought people could use an auto finding device to find their car in parking lots, like at the sports arena of the state. And you you forget what aisle you parked in. You wander around aimlessly. So I created a car alarm key fob that would find your car for you in parking lot.

Speaker 0

Okay.

Speaker 2

Got three or four patents in my name, amazingly so. We raised about three point one million dollars. We made the product in Xin Jin China, I manufactured a product. We could sell at retail, and the idea was to get it licensed with auto manufacturers. Because, boy, if my auto car alarm KeyFob technology would be licensed to GM and BMW and these guys. Oh, man. I'm upset. I'm upset. Well, let me tell you something, Jamie. Let me tell you something, man. Two thousand seven, after I had gone to general motors to Detroit and visited their facility and showing them a demonstration of my proof of concept, I had a big package this thick come across back then, a fax machine come across that was that was the contract that they wanted to have my technology in the general motors manufacturing line by two thousand and fourteen, I believe it was. K?

Speaker 0

Nine years late.

Speaker 2

Now this is a big thing from General Motors in of course, we're just a couple of guys in a small company and we're trying to get big here. And I send this to my attorney, and he's reviewing it. It's gonna take a month or two for him to go through word for word. And come back with counters in their contractors. So so here here, Jamie, I'm I'm gonna make it, man. I have an invention. I've got patents on it. It works. I'm finding cars and parking lots from a key fob. I go to GM. I show them that it works. It's like it's like a shark tank dream. Right?

Speaker 0

Sure.

Speaker 2

It's a shark tank. Yeah. Sure. And GM sends me a I can says we'd like to work with you and we'd like to put your technology. How are you, man? Hallelujah?

Speaker 0

Yeah. Absolutely. No. Yeah.

Speaker 2

That's awesome. I'll tell you this. I'll tell you this, bro. Two to three weeks later, I'm sitting at my desk. My fax machine goes off randomly, and I yelled partner in the next office next door. Hey. You ain't expecting a fax? No. We're not. I pulled the paper out, Jamie. Guess what it says? And guess what happened to the economy right then?

Speaker 0

Oh, yeah. Sure. Two thousand eight.

Speaker 2

It says due to economic failure and crisis. General Motors is no longer no longer accepting new technologies into their

Speaker 0

wow.

Speaker 2

Manufacturing platforms. We're sorry to inform you that, you know, GM needed a bailout. Wow. GM needed a government bailout. Yeah.

Speaker 0

All all of yeah. All of Detroit, all the all the manufacturers were got hit really hard. Absolutely. Squished. Squished. Done.

Speaker 2

Yeah. Done. Done. And we were in debt, and we had financing. We owed to investors and all this other stuff. And I had to let that we go in two thousand eleven, and and it, you know, we did a stop trade and backed that company into a a shell. And I was I was done, man. I spent years and years of my life and was this close to financial success and it all went to nothing. Wow. And I was right back to, well, what do I do now?

Speaker 0

Yeah. Because that's wow. That is I mean, that's very real. Like, we had, you know, I I had a couple of ideas, like, a couple of friends and I would work on, like, You know, the we had a the nine slice pizza cutter. We were like, well, what if you have three buddies and and one person only gets one slice and the other two guys get three slices. That this, you know, nine slice pizza cutter. This is gonna take off. Of course, we never really followed through. We we've had some meetings and things And we had some other ideas.

Speaker 2

This is my retail. This is this is the retail ready product right here that was on shelves in stores right here.

Speaker 0

Wow. That is

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker 0

I I'm not gonna lie. I didn't think you were you were, you know, I didn't think it was good to go that far. This is, like, super real. Like, and you raised three point one million dollars, you said? Yep. Yeah.

Speaker 2

And and and it was there. It was there, man. It was there. I was in Sky Mall. I was in I'm all catalog and

Speaker 0

and first

Speaker 2

week catalog and all the little gadget catalogs. And we were there, man, and and, you know, look, could I could I predict that the economy was gonna melt down and that GM was gonna need a bailout. And all of a sudden, my contract was gonna be squished like it was never never there. Yeah. So that hurt a little bit. And, you know, after that, it was like, well, damn. Do I give up being an entrepreneur now? Right? You get all this depression and all this, man. We were right there. I guess it's just not meant for me.

Speaker 0

Right. Absolutely. Yeah. Talk talk about that just that, you know, how long were you in that down period and and mentally or, you know, when what what's going through your mind and how did you how did you rebound?

Speaker 2

Dude, I'll tell you. It was like that hit me. And then I was, of course, grew up being an extreme athlete. I was still an athlete, but a little older. Right? And body's not as good as it was. And I was playing in adult indoor soccer.

Speaker 0

Okay.

Speaker 2

Right about this same time. Yep. And and I tore my ACL. And so when you compound, like, the depression and the failure, and and you feel not only bad for yourself. Like, you failed and all this and now it was right there. But, Dan, we're and then my my investors, man, I felt bad for all the people that believed in my product believed in me and the Moshe Then I busted my leg and I had a pretty gnarly surgery with, like, six month recovery time. And I literally took about a year and a half off just to sit in a hole Okay. You do recovery on my leg, get to walking good again. And just try to figure out. Right? You're you're going okay. You you feel lost. You're blanks now. Like, thought I had everything going and now there's nothing going.

Speaker 0

Sure. It's like your whole the the definition of your identity is is just rocked at that point because you you don't really even know who you are at that point. So what how old were you? And and, you know, what what else was going on in your life at that that year and a half what what give us a little more context.

Speaker 2

You know what, man? Literally, I was on disability. I was on pain pills. I was going through knee therapy. I was, you know, back then poker was, you know, poker was really popular back then. I was playing a lot of poker and just literally just trying to forget about the losses and about my pain and about you know, everything and figure out where where I find myself. Where do I wanna go next? Right?

Speaker 0

Yeah.

Speaker 2

And I'll and I'll tell you tell you what, maybe somebody can relate to this. You don't wanna know why I didn't have any place where I thought I could go because I was had lost any type of confidence and any type of drive. And so in that case, I just wanted to do enough to survive now. Like, what I just got let me go get another job. Let me go do sales again, which is exactly what happened. Which is exactly what happened. After I got through knee therapy and all that, man, I went back to, outside sales again, just like,

Speaker 0

Speaker 2

had never left it. And I did that for a bit, man, and I'll tell you what happened is that, I was at a dinner with somebody one time, and I was now back into the work in ten hours a day, six days a week, running leads, you know, always busy, can't go on a vacation, can't had no life, man, but I was back to making an okay income. So I I felt good. Right?

Speaker 0

Sure.

Speaker 2

And this this gentleman said to me, hey, Patrick, you know, you you've always been a hustler. You've always been trying. You've, you know, you're you're not lazy. That's one thing. Right. You know, you're always trying something. And you've been defeated several times. But now you're back to working ten hours a day, six days a week. And Sure. He he said to me something no one's ever said to me. He said, How long do you wanna continue to waste fifty hours per week of your life? To make a hundred and twenty grand a year. No one had ever said something like that.

Speaker 0

Yeah.

Speaker 2

Everybody always said, hey, you're you're a good entrepreneur. You're always hustling. Good try. Man, you're you're doing great. He was like, dude. Yeah. That seems like you're doing great, but he got the underlying notion that

Speaker 0

Right. He saw the big picture. I was a slave. I went

Speaker 2

back to slavery.

Speaker 0

Right. Now I will say. I mean, you maybe you have a different take, but I don't think there's anything wrong with doing what you have to do in the moment or in the situation to to, you know, to go back to sales. Go back to what you're good at. Go back to what you know. Nothing wrong with hustling. To get your get your feet under you and and get, you know, get moving. But but it but to your point, how long are you gonna do that for? And to his point. Right?

Speaker 2

What a what a great fallback. Okay. I mean, they say, you know, they they don't always say if you got a a a science degree from college that you'll always have a great job. But they always do say if you learn how to be a good salesperson, you'll never be with that one. Right? So, yeah, great great fallback. But again, you know, and and and it's nothing wrong with that.

Speaker 0

Right.

Speaker 2

From Corporate Chains to Financial Freedom: The Entrepreneurial Journey of Investor and Mentor Patrick Franz

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