SPEAKER_01: 0:12

Welcome back to another episode of The Burn. I am Ben Newman, and you know how we do this every single week. We're gonna bring you a story of an athlete, an entertainer, an entrepreneur, a business owner, a celebrity, somebody who has helped us understand that why and purpose is not enough. It's that underlying burn that ignites your why and purpose and causes you to show up on the days you don't feel like it, and especially after you win. One of the things that makes our opportunities on the burn so special is when I have the opportunity to build amazing, deep, meaningful relationships with people in a coaching capacity. But then they end up becoming part of your life. And then you have the opportunity to win together and to grow together and to have our family spend time together and to have a real deep, meaningful relationship. And I think today in our burn episode with JD Crowell, that's what you guys are gonna feel. That this is far deeper than a coaching relationship. This is a deep, lifelong relationship of growth, challenge, staying uncomfortable, being driven by the burn, being driven by intentional focus, and two individuals that enjoy spending time together to push and challenge each other. And that's the reality of coaching sometimes. And I can share with you, and I'm gonna give a little bit more of an introduction here to set the table before I welcome JD, but JD joined our standard elite mastermind group. Now, JD and I had known each other 10 plus years ago through a relationship with the same uh insurance company that we both represented at one point in time. And then we were reconnected, and he had reached out to me. And he reaches out to me, and I started to learn all of the amazing things that he was doing. He comes and joins our group. And actually, he, and you guys know a mastermind group for me is 15 people, right? A lot of people have masterminds, it's 300 people. That's an event, it's not a mastermind. In our mastermind, it is deep relationships, similar to our round table. It's only 50 members. But JD brought this element of I think we can be closer in this group. And he challenged all of us to lean in even more in our relationships. So even though you listening may not be part of our standard elite mastermind group, I want to encourage you, lesson number one from JD, and I'm giving it to you from what I learned from him, lean in more in your relationships. And it's amazing what you will find. JD is an example for us of what great discipline in your life means. Now, today for me was my 2,414th straight day doing the unrequired. Many of those unrequired workouts I've had the opportunity to do with JD, which is always fun. JD, as a result of our coaching work, he has started a string. He now has worked out twice a day for 343 straight days, coming up on one year. Most people haven't worked out one time. Some people aren't working out enough. They haven't worked out in a long time. And he's worked out twice for 343 straight days. 563 straight days without alcohol. Many people will look at the things JD does professionally, running an amazing family of companies, most notably Responsive Capital Ventures, which you're going to learn a lot about, an organization that our family trusts for our growth. But Responsive Capital has become a brand in and of itself with multiple entities generating$30 million of revenue, 50 employees, and a real estate portfolio of 150 million. But you know what's most impressive about JD? JD's a husband and a dad before anything else. And I can attest to the truth of that from the conversations that we have and having spent time with his beautiful family. He's a builder by trade, and he's one of those individuals today where this is very important. He actually runs a business day to day. He just doesn't have a good marketing team that puts together great highlight reels that makes it look like he's running a business. He is a real life operator. He is a real life family man and he is a friend. JD Crowell, welcome to the burn.

SPEAKER_00: 5:00

Ben, uh, I'm so happy to be here. I I don't even know what to say. Um, that was amazing. I think we should probably just end the show on that note, right?

SPEAKER_01: 5:11

If uh if we could take us back to some of what makes you who you are, because there's there's so many unique things that are amazing about your story that are gonna help everybody listening in terms of the importance of staying in a niche, understanding verticals, being a great teammate, not just a leader, not being a great owner, being a great teammate. But where did a lot of this come from for you? Take us back to childhood, take us to the stories, take us to the burn, take us to your story.

SPEAKER_00: 5:44

Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, for me, I think what's important for the audience to understand, I'm no different than folks listening to this podcast, right? And so uh Midwestern, Midwesterner, uh, was born and raised in Indiana and very blue collar, grew up with very humble beginnings, both my wife and I did. And so, you know, for me, what you see, the who I am today, this has been built, right? Like I wasn't I wasn't necessarily God could give me some unique gifts for sure, but I had to take advantage of those unique gifts and and work on it and develop it over many decades. And so I always tell folks, if I can do it, anyone can do it. Um, and it, you know, for me, it was going back to you know, those roots in Indiana, learned work ethic at a very young age. If anyone that's grown up, grew up in the Midwest understands. Like if your parents were farmers, you farmed, if they owned a business, you're probably working in the business at a very young age. No different for me. So just being exposed to that early on, I think that that is something I attest to uh and attribute to a lot of my success. It's it's it was core values that were instilled in me at a very young age that has definitely served me well over the years of developing myself. And so, you know, growing up in that environment, Indiana is a great place to be raised. Um, but I've always been gifted. God had given me a unique gift of being a visionary, even at a young age. I was always thinking and looking at things a little bit differently than most people. And so I think that's also important to note. I don't believe that everyone should go and be an entrepreneur. I don't think everyone's built to do it, you know, and but I think God had given me that that blessing. And so at a very young age, most kids are playing with Legos or playing video games. I wanted to build business. And so I was able to do some of that in automotive space, uh, chasing down old antiques and classics. That was my first, you know, first kind of real business, if you will, outside of lemonade stands and so forth. Uh, but when eBay came on, I was able to chase down these old antiques and classics. I could see what they're bringing. I put them on eBay, it was always pretty tech savvy. Uh, made some, made thousands, tens of thousands of dollars doing that. And so uh parlayed that into my first official business, uh, which was in the automotive industry, where I uh later grew and uh grew and uh scaled that business to to eight figures, um, got into subprime lending. Next thing you know, I'm selling that business for my first exit, which got me uh down to Charleston uh nearly 10 years ago. Um so always been good with numbers, uh had that vision, if you will. And um, yeah, I think it's just uh I think I think for me it's always just been a uh it's it's always been a pursuit of becoming the best version of myself, you know. So reinvesting myself, coaching with you, um, those are things that I care deeply about.

SPEAKER_01: 8:25

This episode of The Burn is brought to you by our dear friends and partners at Q Logics. Now, you know I don't co-sign things I don't believe in, and I believe in John Chiarando and the team at Q Logics. He's built multiple nine-figure businesses, real integrity, real character, the kind of guy you want in your corner. But here's what happened: all that expertise, all that knowledge, it was just his. Locked in his head, his decisions, his team, you couldn't access it. So John created Q-Logics. He basically said, How do I make everything I've built available to people who actually need it? Here's what that looks like. Q Logics helps you see the blind spots in your business, the gaps you don't even know you have. You don't know what you don't know. They're your tour guide through that. Q Logics helps you build systems that make your business work better or they ask better questions so you're approaching it in the most effective way. And Q Logics has access to a network of businesses and resources, real connections, real synergies that can accelerate what you're building. If any of that resonates, go to Q-Logics, L-O-G-I-X.com forward slash Ben. Fill out a form. Their team will research your situation personally, then they'll tell you straight can they actually help? Thank you to our friends and partners at Q Logics. Make sure you find out more about Q Logics and your opportunity to win more with them today. And you also care deeply about, you know, your people. You know, one of the things, once again, before we get to the connection and the power of remembering those Midwestern roots, all the way to really the investments and the core of the business is in the Midwest. And so I want to challenge people first. Are you staying connected to your story? You know, I always love saying, what does your story tell you about you? And the power of your story, it tells you so much about yourself, but you lean into it, you own it, you know that's who you are. You know, living in Charleston, there's still these amazing Midwestern values. Although you've introduced me to so many dear friends, the the Kelly Garretts and amazing individuals that are in Charleston. And so there's just amazing people, Donovan Ryder, just these incredible people. So there's wonderful people in Charleston, but your Midwestern roots, they've just so tight for you. But there's also these values that you stand on. That as an owner, you've made them part of your messaging. And I'm typically not a big, I'm just gonna I'm gonna tell everybody I'm not a big guy on acronyms. I'm not like a big acronym guy, but I love the stable core values that you all live by. So I think it's important that we all have core values. If you like acronyms, go ahead with acronyms. I actually love this acronym, maybe one of my favorite acronyms, even though I don't like acronyms normally, but stable stands for show up and own it, take action, always growing, be real, lead with humility and excellence in everything. Why has that been so important for you in being a leader, being a business owner? You know, many people they'll bring on uh, you know, a few employees and grow a business. I don't think many people realize getting to 50 employees at the amount of revenue, the assets in the portfolio, those are huge, significant numbers that people dream of. Why is like messaging and core values? Why is that so important to you?

SPEAKER_00: 11:50

Yeah, so you know, I think it sends back to, you know, it starts individually, right? And as a leader, I'm always looking at it myself, like what can I do to become the best version of myself and lead by example? And so core values are are obviously near and dear to me. The core values that we've developed with our organization are things that I care deeply about and our team cares deeply about. But it's it for us, the core values ensure that we never drift away from our identity. Right. And and I'll say that one the core values are there for a reason. This isn't a marketing, this isn't a marketing tool. A lot of companies use it for marketing. We use it to run our business and to hold ourselves accountable to our DNA. And so everything that we do from hiring and firing to making business decisions are all centered and look through those lenses of those core values. And um, you know, for our organization, you know, I got to give credit to Josh Koznik. He's an EOS coach, been good friends with then as well. He helped us clarify that uh a little over a year ago. So these are not even that, you know, we've always had those core values, but we didn't really stamp them until about a year, a little over a year ago. When we did that, it we grew, we had the the most growth last year in our organization. And that's not by that's that's not, I'm not surprised at all by that. Because we put in the work, we got clarity around who are we, who do we, who do we strive to be? And everything that we do from a decision perspective is put through that lens of those core values so much that we when we give shout outs, we're we're not just saying, hey, Joe did such a great job with this, you know, renovating this unit. Um we we illustrate that shout out through a the lens of a core value. And so uh we take it to the 10th degree, if you will, as it pertains to the importance of those core values. So it's not just something that sits in your employee handbook, but everyone, all the way down to a cleaner, to the C-suite, to the marketing team, everyone understands what those core values are and why they're important. And that has single-handedly been one of the most transformational things that we've implemented in our business.

SPEAKER_01: 14:03

I love it. And I love you tying in Josh. Josh, we actually have a recording set for the burn, which is long overdue. He's gonna be coming on in the next couple of weeks as well. So everybody stay tuned for that. And I'm glad that you brought that up because Josh and I have been friends for over 20 years, and this is kind of a great segue into kind of staying in your niche and doing the things that you're great at. Is Josh is one of the top EOS coaches in the world. And a lot of people don't realize, you know, you could read Geno Wickman in the book Traction and you hear EOS, and it's really this popular, you know, um popular theme of coaching today. But I mean, you got to be trained, you got to be certified, and there's an actual process for this. Josh is one of the best in the world. That's why we leverage to Josh those EOS opportunities. That's why when you called, like, could I drive different levels of accountability and discipline? Yes, we do that, but he's like the expert in coming in, doing that, building those core values. So stay tuned for that interview for Josh. If anybody needs a connection to Josh, reach out to JD, reach out to myself, and we can uh we can make that happen. Now, before we actually do, because it is the perfect segue for staying in a niche and me saying, even for me, I stay in my niche, I leverage away. I do have to say core values, messaging, discipline, Indiana football, the Hoosiers, right? I just I gotta let get I I gotta allow you to get your plug here, even though I work for another Nebraska Corn Oscars on October the 10th. We're gonna play Indiana in Nebraska in Lincoln. We're probably gonna have to get you there uh for that game wearing uh wearing a big N rather than an I, which probably probably won't happen, but it'll be the candy stripes. I'll be wearing the candy stripes. But I the this this I want to give you an opportunity to speak to because we've had so many conversations about it. Wasn't it amazing for you to see? Now I got to spend five years with Sabin in Alabama. I didn't get to work with Signetti. I got to work with Pete Golding and some of the other coaches that that were part of the magical run where everybody said all these coaches came from the Saban tree. But how unique for you to see some of your beliefs, discipline, uh, consistency of messaging show up in what Kurt Signetti did to turn around what many people don't realize is the most losing football team in the history of college football, and in 24 months turn them into champions based upon messaging and culture and so many things you believe. How exciting was that for you? I gotta let you have your Hoosier moment.

SPEAKER_00: 16:33

I mean, it we didn't have a football team two years ago, right? So, like that that's what people need to understand. Like, people didn't even think that we had a football team. So uh it goes back to, you know, again, it goes back to the core values, it goes back to the messages, it goes back to blocking and tackling, it goes back to belief, you know, and and something that Kurt Signetti had said early on, the first day that he he got, you know, got hired for the job that flew him in, he comes in there. Walking in, he said it felt like the place had died. You know, he's like, There's there's dust on the walls, and people were saying, like, hey, you know, we you know, the how Kurt was speaking, people were already dismissing him and saying, Yeah, that's not gonna happen here. He immediately got those people out. He's like, get these people out of here, right? And so so much goodness, I could talk for days on the Indiana transformation, but you know, there is no surprise that they've had the success that they've had with the type of leader that they have there. Um, it starts from the top.

SPEAKER_01: 17:32

I love it. And and starting from the top with you and consistency of growth, um, all the way to recognizing opportunities, awareness, intentional focus, things that we talk about. When I think of the responsive companies, the umbrella company, and you think of responsive asset management, responsive home buyers, responsive capital ventures, all of the entities, they really all do fit in a vertical. And I think a lot of times, and this is really, really important for the listeners, JD's about to share a very, very powerful lesson, and I'm gonna highlight a couple of really important things. Many people get excited, or you start to make some money, and you start to have opportunities that are actually outside of your expertise. But the creative entrepreneurial mind that you have, JD, it's easy to go, hey, I'm gonna go build this over here, right? Or people get excited. Something looks shiny on the other side of town, and you have really stayed inside of a vertical, stayed the course all the way to what I was blown away by was your team's discipline to say, we acquire, build, maintain, service, own, we've built this portfolio in the state of Indiana that you loved, even though you don't live anymore, in a certain radius in the state of Indiana, in a niche of real estate within those zip codes in Indiana, and you do not deviate. Even if somebody goes, we've got the most amazing property in Phoenix, come buy this in Phoenix, and you're like, hey, Phoenix sounds nice, Phoenix is beautiful, dirty, like you have stayed in that niche. Why has that been important? How important is it from your perspective to stay in a niche when something's working? I always like saying, if you walk into the kitchen and Christy for Addison and Hayes is making the best chocolate chip cookies in the world, you ain't screwing up mama's recipe, right? So it's like so many people want to screw up the chocolate chip cookie recipe by throwing in something that doesn't belong. Why has it been so important? Baking chocolate chip cookies, running a business. Why is it important to stay in the niche, build inside your verticals, but have that laser focus?

SPEAKER_00: 19:50

Yeah, so so I'll I'll leave with this. Um, I've had to learn this lesson the hard way. And I think many entrepreneurs can relate to this. We're all guilty of it. We like shiny objects. It's just how we're wired, right? Um, so after realizing um trying to chase 10 different things at the same time doesn't really net you the results that you you would like to have. Learning that the hard way, both with time and money, of course, losing money through that. Um I learned that those lessons the hard way. And what what I what I say to my team all the time is clarity drives action. Action drives execution. Execution gets you results. You can't, with you trying to spread yourself so thin, you can't ever build the confidence you need to get clear on what where you want to go, and then more importantly, to drive the action, right? And so for us, because we're so dialed in to the tenth degree of what we're doing, crystal crystallizing what that looks like, we can move exponentially faster because we know exactly where you know what we do good, what where we're where we're good, where we're not good, where we struggle, where we win, where our strengths are. By having a that SWAT SWOT analysis performed, it just allows us to move at speeds that most competitors can't even come close to matching us on. So now you now you create a competitive advantage, right? Because when you start to compound that, now you're getting date large data sets to come in. So now we're making basing our decisions not just off of intuition or gut, we're actually basing it off of data because we can source large amounts of data faster because we're doing the same thing over and over and over and over again. So it's a it's a constant feedback loop. And so we're looking at that process constantly, like, what can we do to get a little bit better? Regardless of the outcome, there's always something to learn, right? And so being able to get more data in gives us more clarity of where we're strong, where we're weak, where we need to improve, what we need to tweak. And so that amount of reps, the volume of reps, when you stay, you know, that linear focus just puts you in a league of your own, right? And so uh we could have gone 10 layers deeper into our criteria, and that's the truth. Like that's how dialed in our playbook is. We say no a hundred times before we say yes, right? And so that's just something that, you know, again, I had to learn the very hard way. Um, so I wasn't always good at this in terms of like dialing in, but after experiencing what doesn't work, I was like, all right, I gotta figure this out. And then, you know, the thing is success leaves clues. You go to the Nick Sabans, you go to the Warren Buffett's, you go to these people that have had they're they're they're masters at their craft. They were always really good about staying in their lane, right? And so that's just something that you know I started to recognize, started to implement. Once you start to implement that further, you get more success, it builds more confidence, it gives you more momentum, and the rest is history.

SPEAKER_01: 22:50

I love it. This is really why I was attracted to really just through coaching, right? Through working on you and challenging you and pushing you and and targeting additional growth for you as a leader. It's why I came to you and asked the question. You know, tell me more about what it would look like for Amy and I to actually be a part of what you guys are doing, which I think is a really welcoming opportunity with responsive capital ventures. Now, I do want to say this before I share this. I have to preface so I can be protected here. I am no longer a financial advisor. Okay. I sold my practice in 2012. I turned off my investment licenses, I turned off my insurance licenses so that I would not have a conflict of interest in my work. So do not contact me for advice on anything that JD does. But I will say this if you are interested, after I share what I'm about to share, in learning more about JD's work, about responsive capital ventures, he is no pun intended, one of the most responsive individuals. So we're gonna make it very easy for you to reach out to JD. I think you'll enjoy a conversation. It's for specific individuals looking for specific things when it comes to investing. But I want to share my perspective. I just want to share my perspective because I think it's important. Knowing what I know, having been a former financial advisor, you reach a point through discipline of saving money where you fill buckets. So everybody listening, whether you're just starting to save money, and if that's the case, a conversation with JD is not for you. Okay. Then you reach a point by being very disciplined over long periods of time. Many of you have heard me say long obedience in the same direction with aggressive patients. You start to fill some of the traditional buckets that are used for investing, and you reach a point in time where you start to say, I need to have some alternative ways to look at things. I need to look at tax mitigation, I need to look at ways that I can have different efficiencies, different opportunities, different safeties with my money, different risk with my money. And that's where Amy and I and our portfolio from saving money for long periods of time. When I learned about your due diligence, when I learned about your intentional focus, and I'll share a big mistake Amy and I made. Next thing you know, we've got this real estate portfolio, which did not work. That portfolio did not work. And we started, there's a deck that I needed to put on one of the rental properties for 10 grand. I never stepped on the deck. It was like wasting money. I share all that to say we had an opportunity through responsive capital ventures to now participate in owning real estate again through targeted, intentional focused, researched, data-driven ownership of real estate. Small piece for us, right? I may own just a couple of bedrooms or some sinks and some toilets in these massive buildings, but the point is you've given us an opportunity. Why is it important when people reach a certain point to really lock in the way that you have a niche in your business to investing in things that allow you to maximize tax advantages, but also allow you to maximize and to learn about the non-traditional investments that can really grow wealth?

SPEAKER_00: 26:24

Yeah, uh, happy to delve into that. And I will uh lead with as well that, you know, this isn't for everyone. You know, not everyone should invest in real estate. You know, I think there's a ton of different vehicles out there that are applicable to different people for different reasons, right? And so I think that's important for people to understand. Not everyone should be doing this. Where we tend to do, for us in particular, and and where we best serve individuals, if when they have reached the point in their career where they're really dialed in and they're they're they've mastered what they what what they're good at, right? If they're in the mortgage business, if they own a plumbing company or whatever it may be, it doesn't really matter, but they they're starting to amass the level of success where they they've created good problems, meaning they've they're maximizing all the normal stuff that you should be doing, the savings and you know, money in your savings account every year. You you got cash, proper cash reserves, you're putting money away in your retirement accounts, and you still have spillover. I call it spillover, but you still have discretionary income to deploy. Those are the individuals that we tend to best serve because they now have what we call good problems. And so they may be, you know, faced with six, seven, sometimes eight-figure tax bills. And, you know, it doesn't matter. Ben we're not Ben and I were just talking about this, it doesn't matter how much you make, it's how much you keep. And so it's really hard to get ahead in life if you're giving up 40, 50% of the money that you're making. And so if there's someone uh listening to this that is experiencing those good type of problems where now they're stroking six, seven-figure checks to the IRS for taxes, that's that's great. You you you you've reached a pinnacle that most people will never reach, which is which is a good spot to be in. But it becomes exponentially more difficult to to keep your money as you start to accumulate. And so that's where we can come alongside folks and really help them. And then the other thing I would note is, you know, we're not for everyone. And I tell folks, when we, you know, we don't we get we turn people down all the time that want to participate with us, we're not always a good fit for people. And the folks that we tend to do the the best work with have realized or we help them realize that real estate is not passive. Anyone that tells you that is lying to you. I promise you, they they are a guru, they're selling you something. They got a course or a program to sell you. I don't sell any of that. Um, I tell you the truth because I've done it and I'm continuing to do it. I'm an operator. It can be passive if you're truly in a passive seat. But you know, most people uh they get distracted and they're gonna what like what Ben had done early on is where he went and purchased his own property on his own. And now he's fielding property management calls, clogged toilets, roof needs replaced. Here we are, Ben's super successful. And then next thing you know, he's over here dealing with this real estate investment that's not you know paying his bills yet by any means. And so we we tend to do better with folks that realize that in order to do anything at a meaningful level requires an immense level of investment, both from a time and money perspective, but it requires intentional focus. Everything that we started this conversation on. And so if you're finding that you're you're really getting your stride in what where you're at and what you're doing, we would we would love to talk with you. We feel like we can do we can do a lot of good good work with those people.

SPEAKER_01: 29:38

JD, thank thank you for uh your example. Thank you for your diligence, thank you for your consistent commitment to you and to your team, which impacts so many individuals like our family, to so many individuals that watch your example and how you show up, and most especially to your family. Uh, you know, I admire the the balance of your life, the time you spend with your kids, the time that you spend with Christy, always wanting to be inclusive of family. I for everybody to realize the example that you guys put in your personal life. So thank you for being that example. And to everybody listening, I hope you realize that JD has remained a consistent example of what happens when you stay connected to your burn. That entrepreneurial spirit from a lemonade stand to an automotive business to those first real estate endeavors to where you are now. It is that long obedience in the same direction with aggressive patience. So thank you for your discipline. Thank you for staying connected to your burn. And thank you for joining us on the burn.

SPEAKER_00: 30:39

Yeah. Thank you, Ben.

SPEAKER_01: 30:41

To each and every single one of you listening, this is what I love, right? It's the deep relationships that go beyond coaching. It's iron sharpens iron. Lean in on your relationships. Lean in on your opportunities to live to your standards. Lean in on your opportunities to live to your core values. Lean into your opportunities to stay and have the discipline to be in the verticals, to be in the niche over long periods of time to drive success that J.D. Crowell is an example of. I love every single week the opportunity to bring you stories of the burn, recognizing why and purpose is not enough. It's that burn that ignites the why and purpose and causes us to show up on the days we don't feel like it, and especially after we win. This has been The Burn, and we'll see you next week.