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Eric's Podcast
Welcome to Eric's Podcast – a journey through faith, life, and the lessons that shape us. Join Eric as he shares personal stories, reflections, shares insights that inspire hope and encourages. Whether you're navigating life's challenges or seeking motivation this podcast offers a blend of authenticity, inspiration, and thought-provoking conversations.
New episodes drop every week! Don't forget to like, subscribe, and hit the notification bell to stay connected on this journey of faith and discovery. Let’s walk this path together.
Eric's Podcast
S2 # 11 Generational Wealth: Building Communities Through Real Estate
What does generational wealth really mean, and is it truly accessible to everyone? Tara Zalewski demolishes the myth that creating lasting financial security requires extraordinary resources or privilege. With raw honesty and practical wisdom, she reveals how simple steps toward homeownership can transform families who've never owned property into legacy builders.
The path from renter to homeowner isn't nearly as complicated as most believe. "Everyone I've worked with has literally been months away from qualifying," Tara explains, walking through the exact process – from meeting with lenders to understanding available grants (like PNC's $15,000 program) that can dramatically reduce upfront costs. Her step-by-step guidance demystifies a process that keeps too many families trapped in the rental cycle.
Tara's own journey from cell phone store owner to real estate entrepreneur offers a masterclass in following your passion, even when the timing seems imperfect. After delaying her real estate dreams for eight years, she candidly shares how she finally broke through her self-imposed limitations. When contractor problems threatened her early house-flipping ventures, she didn't just complain – she and her brother started their own construction company, even helping their employees establish their own LLCs along the way.
As a single mother balancing entrepreneurship with raising two children, Tara offers refreshingly honest insights about the myth of work-life balance. "Sometimes there is no balance... sometimes you have to go all in on one area because you are trying to build something." Her perspective challenges conventional guilt-inducing narratives while providing practical approaches to including children in your entrepreneurial journey.
Most powerfully, Tara reveals how she's now teaching high school students the financial principles they'll never learn in traditional education – passive income strategies, credit management, and entrepreneurial thinking. "Schools teach you that you shouldn't fail," she notes, identifying how our educational system often instills "a fear to not even try."
Ready to break through what's holding you back? Listen now and discover why it's never too late to create wealth that transcends generations.
Eric's Podcast.
Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to another episode of the Eric's podcast. I'm your host, eric, and today I am joined by Tara, who has 15 years of experience as a serial entrepreneur. She uses real estate to rejuvenate communities and also has created a program to teach kids entrepreneurship. Thank you so much for joining me. Welcome.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me, so Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1:So what have you been up to this week?
Speaker 2:This week I've actually been on a few podcasts Today I have two said and I've also been to a couple of properties doing walkthroughs, because we actually just acquired another property this week so we started demo on it and I do a walkthrough with my brother, who's my partner, and I kind of do the designing end of it right. So I go through with him and let him know what I want done and what I feel is best, and then he actually handles the operations side of making whatever vision I have happen. And then, other than that, I actually have a lot of meetings this week because we're leading to figure out how we're going to move forward thoroughly with educating the Key Sport area on passive income, generational wealth, all those things. We're actually meeting with a local nonprofit called Omberly and seeing how we can partner with them as well and this initiative of really trying to get into the community in many different ways.
Speaker 1:So what is your passion? What's your passionate side around community, Like, why are you? What's the focus goal here?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so my focus goal, the big goal, is to create generational wealth within the entire community, and sometimes when I say that, people get a little.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like what is that? What does that mean?
Speaker 2:Yeah, they get overwhelmed right, and what we're trying to do is really meet everyone where they're at. So generational wealth to me could be something as, yeah, your family has never owned a home.
Speaker 2:And you'll be the first person to purchase a home in your family and then through that you'll be able to pass that down to the next generation. So to me that's creating generational wealth. You don't necessarily have to be a millionaire or, you know, own a bunch of properties like we do. It's really just meeting you where you're at and like what are your goals so that you can have something that you can pass down to your future generations.
Speaker 1:So let's lay it out. How do you go from basically renting? You know, basically that's all you've ever done. You have a family of like, let's say, two kids and you've been here for six years and you're ready to get out because your kids are starting. You have a three-year-old and a one-year-old and you want to get them a yard and you want to actually invest in something instead of just rent continually. How do you get started? Where do you go from there? What's the process?
Speaker 2:From there, the first step if you want to purchase a home is meeting with a lender, because you need to figure out where you are. Is your credit good enough? How much money you do, do you make compared to your debt? You know your debt to income ratio. So how much can you afford even to purchase? And you know, sometimes people can afford more than they want to spend.
Speaker 2:So it's not always like you know. Some people always think that goes in the negative way of oh, I want this, but I'm only going to be able to afford this. No, sometimes your accrues are much more than what you're comfortable in paying. So that is the first step is getting with a lender, because they're going to let you know all the programs they have, what you qualify for and also if there's any programs out there like grants or different things to help you with your down payment. You know, help you with closing costs, those different things. So it's just so important to connect with a lender first and really get okay, where am I at? And if you don't qualify, it's okay. Then we have these credit programs. We have all these different things that can literally help you within a few months. Typically it's not going to take you years to get there. Everyone I've worked with has literally been months.
Speaker 1:Wow. So how much would you say? Because I I've heard that you need um I'm we're still renting, and I've heard, um that you need a certain percentage for a down payment, you have to save up this much amount, or you need these assets to basically back things up with, or something like that. Um, is that true? Or do you not actually need as much as most people would think, like what's out there being said?
Speaker 2:yeah. So it really depends on your situation and that's like where I'm always like you have to get with a lender because I don't know your finances, I don't know. You know that's not my uh expertise, right, they're the ones who do it every day. They are going to tell you and sometimes it's not. That's what I'm saying. There's grants available.
Speaker 2:Right now in our area, pnc has a $15,000 grant that they're willing to give towards your closing costs and also any down payment, anything, and the requirements are so minimum on it that it's really the only requirements that they said where they want you to buy in these two specific areas, because that's where they're offering the grant. So it sounds like it's pretty much open to anyone.
Speaker 1:Wow, so okay. So let's say that you have an amount that you've been approved for. Would you say, well, let's first go back? Would you typically say, like, what kind of timeframe do you look at getting started? Like going back to the renting scenario. Say, the lease is going to be up in I don't know three or four months and you guys might want to be looking. Do you just start right away? And then, how like are you when you're approved? Do is there usually a time constraint on it till you have to reapply, or is it just like, okay, I'm approved and then I can start looking in six months? How does that typically work?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I think typically you're approved for around like 120 days your pre approval, and then after that you would have to go through the process again. No, I do not recommend unless you are questioning and you're not sure where you're at, getting started. Four months in advance would be good, because if you are questioning whether your credit's good enough, whether you're going to be able to qualify, then that's a good time to start, because then you can get those questions answered right and if there are things you need to work on, then you have months to do that. Otherwise, if you are just qualified, you're ready to go. I would say maybe a couple months. You know you should start looking beforehand, maybe two and a half, because most closings happen within 45 days, so a seller is not going to want to wait three months for you to close on their house.
Speaker 1:Gotcha, and do you need to get a real estate agent, or is, or? Or? Do you do it, or is it better to seller? And then other times, with the opposite side, it's like no, you'll save yourself so much um money if you don't get a agent. So what is your? What's your? How do you approach that, or what would you say to that?
Speaker 2:so I always think you should have an expert. You know, if you don't know anything about what you're doing, you would die. I would want an expert, right Like, if I'm going to the doctor, I'm not going to go to my friend who's never gone to school and isn't a doctor, right Like yeah, that's true.
Speaker 2:Diagnose me. It's the same thing If I had to go to court. You know I'm not an attorney, so I'm not going to sit there and represent myself. So I just think of it in that way of all these other things that we use and we use it without hesitation, right, we know we need this expertise. It's the same thing in real estate. You know this person works in it every single day and they know how to negotiate. They know what to look for in a house and point things out to you that may be concerning or that you should look out for, but a big part of that is the negotiation. Where we live, it's definitely a seller's market. We've had low inventory for many, many years.
Speaker 2:So you want someone on your side that knows how to negotiate a deal and is going to negotiate a deal and it's going to win for you, because even if you have that, in a market that is this competitive, you still may lose a lot of offers should you um consider building versus buying a home?
Speaker 1:I?
Speaker 2:mean, I think that's all just on preference. I think people don't realize what goes into building. It's not an easy process by any means. If you have the funds and the means to do that, then yeah, absolutely, why not build your dream home? But sometimes you can take also a property that's already there and maybe spend less money, because and that's actually what I just did with my personal home that I bought back in 2022. I just bought an existing home, I renovated it from top to bottom and then I sold it two years later and still was able to make $160,000 some dollars on it.
Speaker 1:It was like $10,000.
Speaker 2:So having that mindset and doing this day in and day out that's also something you know as a realtor specializing, that they can kind of show you those things of how you can build that equity in, versus if you build a brand new home you're not going to have probably any equity in that. You know, I can't imagine just because of the process and a lot of people don't think about too like you're bringing utilities onto that land, like there's a lot of stuff that goes into it and we're talking it's not thousands of dollars, it's like tens of thousands of dollars to get those things done so okay, so first.
Speaker 1:So just to sum it up, you you first go to a lender, you see what you're approved for, they give you whatever the timeframe until we recommend it. You've said it's typically 120 days, but that could differ based off of who you're talking to and after that you get with an agent. You get with an agent, and then you said that it typically takes between 45 days after you get with an agent within that 120 day pre-approval mark. Is that what you is that?
Speaker 2:what you said. Okay, yeah, so once you find your home, you can close in as little as 30 days um. The average closing time is about 45 days because of what the like?
Speaker 1:you have to get it inspected. You want to make sure you dot all your I's and everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So you will say what inspections you want to do, which could be like home inspection, pest inspection. You might want to do a camera of the sewer line to make sure that's good, at least here where we live, because a lot of the homes are ordered, so the sewer lines are ordered, so you want to check that. Um. Then you have municipality. They have requirements, right, they have diet tests, they have occupancy tests, and then you have an appraiser who's coming in for the lender and actually looking at the house and saying what needs to be done or what doesn't need to be done. Um, versus on the lending, and so you, yeah, yeah, there's several steps. Like I said, you can definitely close within as little as 30 days if you have good lenders and title and all the things right.
Speaker 2:For us paying cash, we can close in as little as two weeks, so it just depends on what you're doing.
Speaker 1:So how did you get into this? Like, how did you get into real estate? And you know this whole journey that you've been on. How did you, how did, what kind of got you into it?
Speaker 2:So I actually owned my own business and it was cell phone stores. And not too long after owning those. It's just something I fell into right. It wasn't something I wanted to do, but it was an opportunity and I took it and through that, um, I started looking for my own house because I had a child and you know, me and the father were, I don't. I think we were already married or we were getting married, so we were kind of doing the whole thing right, like we had to be together and we wanted to start planning for that future.
Speaker 2:So it was when I started looking for a house is when I realized like this is weird, like I'm so excited and it wasn't just about like looking for a house for myself. I was just so excited every time I went in these houses because I didn't have a big budget. So I'm looking at houses that need work. You know, they're outdated, they smell like whatever it is. They've got red carpet, green carpet.
Speaker 1:The pink sinks.
Speaker 2:Yes, pink, blue tubs, all this stuff, and I would just be so excited to go in and look and like, imagine, like what it could be.
Speaker 2:So that's when I realized like there's something else here like this actually gets me excited, like I enjoy this, and um, so from then I was like I'm gonna take my real estate you know license, I'm gonna like get involved in this. And I took the two-week course and, you know, took off from, you know, being at my cell phone stores and after that I actually convinced myself that I didn't have the time and I was like why did I just put all this effort and go to classes for two weeks and then now I'm not gonna take the test because now I don't have time? Um, and honestly, I held myself back and I find a lot of us do that. We sit in like comfortability and what we're doing, versus truly going after like what we desire and what we know we we enjoy, and, um, it took me eight years from that point to actually go get my real estate license and like start being my dream, yeah so what did?
Speaker 1:I guess you just had the cell phone stores during that eight year period? Yeah, did you sell that? Okay, what was that? What is that? I?
Speaker 2:told it to my partner, like they bought me out.
Speaker 1:Okay, how did you? What was the time? So you said six years. What was how? After you got? Okay, so you took the test after six years later. Right, what did you do from there? How did you grow it? How did you grow to what you are now? How did?
Speaker 2:you grow to what you are now. Oh, it was a whole process. So I got my real estate license. I had already bought my first investment property and was a landlord by the time I got my real estate license, so I knew that I wanted to pursue it.
Speaker 2:I also in that time frame had bought that house that I talked to you about, my first house and I sold that house within one day with multiple offers after doing stuff to it. So that was 2018 when I got my or no, that was before 2018. I'm sorry, that was a couple of years before I became a realtor. So that between those two things is what pushed me and gave me the courage and some confidence into like, okay, I have a rental property now. That's been going well. I also essentially remodeled this house while I lived in it. It sold in one day for multiple offers, went over asking price. So I'm like, okay, I'm going to pursue this. But, like I said, I got my license. I started learning the ropes right. The contracts are very in depth. You know our agreement just the sale of agreement is 14 pages long, so there's a lot to learn.
Speaker 2:You essentially always have to be an attorney to like understand all of the contracts which people don't realize right this back end to it. They're like understand all of the contracts which people don't realize right this back end to it they're like, oh, you just get to show houses and it's great.
Speaker 2:like you know, people buy their dream homes and their first homes and that just must be so neat. It's like, no, there's this whole other side to it. Um, so I did that, and then 2019, me and my brother started flipping houses together, and from that we learned very quickly that contractors are terrible and a lot of them do not work great, and on our second flip we lost money because of that.
Speaker 2:Because, we refused to let the properties go on market without everything being done correctly. So we knew we were going to lose money. But we ripped the stuff out, we redid it and made sure everything was right and looked good before we put it on the market, because we wanted to hold integrity in what we were doing. Yeah, sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 1:I was just going to wanted to clarify one thing. So you don't, so you'll. You only need a real estate license if you're taking a commission, like if you're representing it for other people. Is that the type of thing? Versus if you're flipping it for yourself, then you don't need a license for that. Is that right?
Speaker 2:well, you either need a license if you want to put it on the market, or you have to hire a realtor to put it on the market for you you would have to sell it off market, since you're not a realtor okay, that's cool yeah okay, sorry, you could yeah, from there, basically, we ended up deciding to start our own construction company. Now, I'm not saying this is the way you need to do it, or how you should do it.
Speaker 2:But we were like we knew how important like the construction end was and we were having a really difficult time finding good contractors that we just decided we're just going to open our own and, you know, we're going to hire the people, we're going to train them, we're going to make sure the work's done right.
Speaker 2:So we did that and we worked for a lot of clients because we wanted to make sure we kept our guys, you know, working the entire time, otherwise we knew we would lose them. So we kind of sacrificed for a little bit of following our dream to build that foundation, to then set ourselves up for success, for these guys to then transition over into doing the work on our houses only. But I will say what we did just kind of add another layer to it is we knew that a lot of our guys wanted to start their own construction companies. So we actually helped them open their own LLCs and guided them through that process so that now they can follow their dreams as well and not only have their own construction company, but they can also. They also have the best of both worlds, right, they were just starting out so that they could work for us and not struggle to get work until they built their businesses up and were able to get more work yeah, that's, that's pretty, that's very nice.
Speaker 1:Um, you mentioned that you had a child back when you had your cell phone company, cell phone business. Yeah, you know the family work balance while also pursuing, pursuing the, the, this dream of freedom and, and, uh, you know, helping communities. How did you manage that aspect of it, like the, the family life and the entrepreneur life, because entrepreneurship does require a lot of work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, it definitely does. So I had my son already. He was a baby when I opened my cell phone store.
Speaker 2:So he literally would spend 12 to 16 hours a day with me at the cell phone store while I was trying to do the construction and painting and all these things to get this store ready to even be able to open. So, as a baby, he was right by my side. Um, during all that. Right, I'm just feeding him in between and, you know, taking care of him while I, like, worked the entire time and I guess I was you know, fortunate in the sense that he was a baby at the time, because so he wasn't like super mobile.
Speaker 2:But even throughout those years of owning the cell phone stores, I got a nanny per se and he would either be with me there at the cell phone stores all day, like I had made him a playroom, and I would do some schooling stuff with him while he was there for me.
Speaker 2:So it was pretty interesting because, even though it was like really difficult to, you know, handle all of the different things right, like you said, you're trying to be an entrepreneur, you're trying to build a business, you have a child you're taking care of Um, I wouldn't change it for the world because I got all that extra time, because I was an entrepreneur, I could bring my kid to work with me, like I had the flexibility to do what I wanted to do for him and I got all that extra time.
Speaker 2:And I think even for him he thrived from it, because from a very young age, people would say to me all the time, like I cannot believe this kid, like he can carry on a conversation with an adult at seven years old, you know. So he truly thrived where people thought like oh, you're homeschooling him, you're. You know he's not going to get socialization and he's going to laugh in these different areas and meanwhile this kid was better at speaking than most adults that's usually how it is with homeschoolers yeah yeah, we've gotten the same thing from our three-year-old because, just because of because he's not in daycare, he's at home with us all the time.
Speaker 1:um, yeah, there are some things now that are starting to pop up that we're gonna have to figure out. But how did uh, how did the transition go there on the family balance, into your cell phone business and then trying to get into real estate in that six-year period? Obviously you still had that, but when you really took off and you went and took the test and then you transitioned, how did that transition look?
Speaker 2:So I mean, I had another child in between all this, so I have two now. My daughter was born in 2015 and I didn't start real estate until 2018. So I think sometimes there is no balance. Like that's just the way it is sometimes, you know, I think sometimes you have to go all in on one area because you are trying to build something you know, so there will be those struggles you know like and you'll feel guilty about it, you know I ended up putting my daughter in daycare because I'm a single mom and, you know, my son was in school, but she was obviously not, she was a baby, uh.
Speaker 2:So I put her in daycare full-time to be able to start building everything that I wanted to build. And that's just the reality. Sometimes, you know, and and I I feel guilty about it because I'm like I spent all this time with my son, I homeschooled him until he was eight before I put him in school and I didn't give her the same. But you know, that's the way life is. You have to pivot at times and things are going to change and you just, you know, need to pivot with those things too and with the changes that need to be done, I think. But I still believe that I have an amazing relationship with both of them, even though they're more different, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I 100% agree. I, when my first, my son, was born, I was in the middle of starting a app. Well, it's a bit of a business, I'm not ready to share yet but it's still ongoing. But I was like, okay, we have an office downtown and I told my wife I'm like I need to go all in on this. I know that he was just born and everything, but we can get this whole thing up and running in less than a year. He's not going to remember me not really being around. This is my opportunity right now to actually do this while he you know he's developing.
Speaker 1:Well, what ended up happening was, um, it took, it's taken longer than a year, which that's just how, how things go. And I, I uh, after realizing, wow, I'm never gonna get those like special moments back, those one-time type of moments, uh, when we have the second kid, when we have the second kid, I'm like you know what I'm not going to. I can't keep going all in and missing out on all this stuff. I have to figure out, you know, maybe I'm only available on the weekends or something, because I was completely like you know. I was, I was we're, it was basically like you know, I was over here for a year, type of thing, and I definitely agree there's there's.
Speaker 1:There are times where you have a big opportunity, like something that I'm in right now, where it does take way more. You have to be like, okay, listen, I have to deviate from the regular schedule. There's this really big opportunity here and I just have to. This has to have all my attention right now and make like you know, explain that. And make like you know, explain that. And I think that the whole, uh, work-life balance thing, I think it's people are just a lot of the people that talk about it are unrealistic or don't have kids if you know, what I mean.
Speaker 1:It's like you don't really, I don't, I like, or they've already, or they've already made it like a pretty big and you and they don't technically really have to work anyway.
Speaker 2:That's what.
Speaker 1:I was going to say I think there's those sacrifices.
Speaker 2:When you're in it right Because you're in it Until you get to a point where you've built such a great team or you don't really need to work, you can't totally dictate your schedule.
Speaker 1:I mean you definitely have guidelines, but sometimes like things are gonna come up yeah, especially when you have like a crisis or something come up where you have to drop everything, deal with that fire. And, um, one of the there were, I had a guest on and we were talking about something similar and one of the things, one of the things that he said was that, um, talk to your family Like they don't need to necessarily know the nitty gritty what you're talking about, but, you know, communicate like this is. I have to be gone. This is really. This is for the family, this isn't for me, this is for our family and this is what we're building.
Speaker 1:And I was like you know what? That's a good idea, because I grew up where my parents were working all the time. They were trying to build their business. They are business. And it wasn't explained to me when I was little what they were doing until I was in like my teenage years and mom would tell me. Mom would tell us all yeah, dad's working really hard for you, stuff like that. And I'm like, okay, that could be a completely different perspective, because he was gone all the time. You know, he was on his cell phone all the time or gone all the time. But yeah, I think that is a subject that should be broken up and talked about a lot more in terms of, you know, just that kind of reality.
Speaker 2:I think it should be shared, not only with your family, so they can, you know, envision and see what you're doing and what you're building and make them a part of that as much as you can, but also even with your team. I found, as an entrepreneur and as a leader, that I wasn't sharing it with my team either, so that they could, you know, have that buy-in and understand truly, like the capacity and the largeness of this goal and this dream that we're going after of creating generational wealth within an entire community.
Speaker 2:Right, because as a leader, you can get stuck in like you're just supposed to lead and you're supposed to make the decisions you're supposed supposed to do everything, but you really need to include everyone in that you know, because they need to know what their hard work is going towards as well yeah, 100, I wouldn't like.
Speaker 1:Okay, how do you? How do you do that with your team? Can you give me an example?
Speaker 2:so we we meet every week for a team meeting and what I've done in that is I share the vision with them every time. I share updates with them every time we have a meeting like this is what I'm doing now. This is what's going on, and not that they need to know, right, because I'm handling it. I'm doing now. This is what's going on, and not that they need to know right, because I'm handling it. I'm doing it. This is my part of the business, essentially in my part of the job, but I keep reminding them and telling them. I want you to know this because I want you to know what we're doing and how we're moving towards this goal and how we're accomplishing it now, but it's obviously not accomplished in full. And the other thing I do is I share our mission.
Speaker 2:We read it every single time that we have a meeting and I also share our core values every single time we have a meeting.
Speaker 1:So you would recommend, would you recommend coming up with those as soon as you get started or kind of developing them along the way? I mean, obviously you'll develop them along the way, but do you think getting started as a fresh entrepreneur, should you think about those things in the context of the product or service or whatever you're building from the get-go?
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely, because I think it's a roadmap and I think if you don't have that, you're doing a disservice to yourself because it's it's almost like your. Why right, and it's like why are you what's going to keep pushing you forward whenever that times get tough, because they get tough like real tough.
Speaker 2:And it's all the time. You know, no matter how big you grow, the problems just get bigger. So you know, I think it's great to have it from the beginning. It doesn't matter if it's like perfect right, it's about just doing it, putting it out there, so you do know what you're working towards. And then, as you said, you definitely need to critique it as you grow, because it is going to change as you grow.
Speaker 1:How do you deal with those tough times? Can you give me an example, if you are comfortable?
Speaker 2:As far as business.
Speaker 1:Business, general, personal, I know for me it's usually. It doesn't. It's always the same thing. If something's blowing up in business, if there's a big problem or something in the company, or it's the same thing in my personal life, the first thing that I do is I'll pray and go to the Lord, ask him what I need to do in this situation, wait and try to listen for something or turn to scripture or whatever, and just try to wait and lean on him for that understanding.
Speaker 1:And usually just by doing that, just the action, it kind of clears everything out of the way and it brings like the focus on you can, like you, you're the one in control of this of my life and it kind of clears, almost like clears my head and then it's like the answer of this is the direction, this is where it should go, and it's not all the time like a voice or feeling or anything, it's sometimes it's just logic, like I couldn't see this before. This this makes. That makes sense. How do you deal? So it's so. It's the same for me, it's the same. My personal it's the same. In business, it's the same um that I'll recommend for any, for anybody, uh, but how do you approach that like what is your kind of go-to approach?
Speaker 2:yeah, so line is the same as definitely god. I can't say that in every moment. I always go straight to prayer, like I wish I had that.
Speaker 1:Uh, consistency with that because I'm talking big things, because I'm I'm the same way I'm talking like big problems. You know, like I guess for you someone burned down a house and you just lost like all that investment, that would be a big issue, right?
Speaker 2:yeah, so I've learned through the years. The biggest thing is god in my life for sure. It has totally changed me, helped me grow and become the person I am, because I used to worry a lot more. I used to have, you know, the mentality I think a lot of us have when something happens to you. It's like, oh, this always happens to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, always Like you don't want to do that over yourself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because you honestly bring that into your life. When you do those things, say those things like that's what you basically are telling your RAS in your brain. So that's the type of stuff it's going to show you, because our brain is there to help us and when we feed it these things, it thinks that those are the things that we want. You know, so it's really how that all works. You know, so it's really interesting how that all works. But, um, for me it's definitely been, because now I've realized, like I can only control what I can control. So like her house burns down, like I could, I can't control that. There's nothing I can do about that. Like it's done.
Speaker 1:It's gone.
Speaker 2:And now we just need to focus on how do we rebuild or what do we need to do with the insurance company to then get, like, the money back out of it, whatever we have insured for. You know, I'm very like pretty calm and collected, uh, with all of these types of situations in my life, but I'm not going to say that they don't affect me, or you know, I don't struggle because I do, but it's, it's really I just realized like none of it matters. It's about figuring out, okay, like how do I do this if there's a problem, or what is the next step, because everything else truly doesn't matter. I get to sit there and worry about all day long I can't, you know, get upset about it, do all these different things, but how is that moving forward?
Speaker 1:it's true. Yeah, I know, for me I usually will. If I can remember to do this, I'll allow myself to be like maybe a minute or two or five depends on the thing, but between a minute to five minutes of letting, of feeling the emotional impact, because I don't want to stuff it down, because I it can come out. It might come out without me, even, you know, realizing it. So I'll, if I, if I, if I can go, if I can remember, I'll go find some space or go take a walk and just emotionally feel whatever the thing is. And then it's like, okay, let's, let's actually look at how it's. I felt it that's good, we're moving on now and, um, let's see how we can. Actually it can't. Is this salvageable or is this something that you know? Do we start over or do we just move on?
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah and the rest are perfect. So I think we should all just remember that, like we're gonna not do it right, we're gonna fail, but you'll have to use those failures to learn from them and then use them to continue building, because in my mind, honestly, if you're not failing, you're not really doing anything. Then um and I tell my employees and everyone I work with that I'm like I want you to fail, like if you're not failing, then I know you're not really doing anything and you're just sitting in comfortability.
Speaker 1:yeah, I mean, you're not growing. That's like you have to learn. I think the worst type of failure, at least for me, is the type that I cannot figure out what I'm supposed to get from it, like I don't know why it failed. I did everything right. I'm looking for the thing I did wrong, like what did I do wrong? And it frustrates, so it's because that is like to me, a true failure, if I can. It's a true failure when I can't figure out what I failed and take that.
Speaker 2:No, it's the same for me. Like I do not do well in gray areas, I need to know, like I need to be able to figure it out. So no same. And I still haven't figured out how to handle that any better.
Speaker 1:I haven't either, yeah. If I can't figure it out, I'm just like, it's just like there all just keeps going and it keeps going and I'm just like a process, that what it's like. I just need to solve this puzzle and until I solve it, I might. There's this part of my brain where I cannot move on. I can't go forward so it's interesting.
Speaker 2:This just brought something in my head. So, last or no, 2023, november 2023 I was sleeping and this will probably sound weird to some people, especially if you don't have a relationship with god but I was sleeping and something woke me up out of my sleep and all it said to me was let it go, like loud enough enough, like completely wake me up, you know, out of my sleep. Like what the heck was that? Yeah, it was just let it go, and I'm like what does that mean? Like let it go. I'm like what am I supposed to be letting go of? And it still bothers me to this day. But I think it was a general comment of what we just talked about, when you can't figure something out, like I think it was just saying like let it go, like you know, you know, maybe I'll figure it out years from now or, you know, whenever.
Speaker 1:Maybe I'll never figure it out.
Speaker 2:But it's about like, let it go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like you can't, it's. Maybe now is not the time to figure it out, maybe it needs to. Just, maybe you're right, like it, just let it go for now and you can always bring it back down, that's. You're actually just reminded me of a uh, one of those picture pictures of uh balloons that are up here on the ceiling. And you're down here and you're holding all these balloons, and that was the same thing it was. You can let go of the balloons. You can always pull them back down from the ceiling when you're ready to deal with them. I love that concept because it's exactly right, because we all can be holding on to all these different things, thinking that if we let them go, they're just going to disappear. I'm going to forget, which you know might happen. You might forget, but it doesn't mean it's not still there, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, it was interesting and I like just mauled that over, I mean, I said that was 2023 and I'm still thinking about it like yeah, specific, you know, and I I think it's not. I think it's like you just said just let these different things go and maybe they come back, maybe they don't yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 1:you're reminding me that I probably need to go have some meditation time or something, see if there's anything that I need to let go, because I know last time I did that it kind of freed up so much space Thinking's processing power in my brain that I was able to, actually because I wasn't as stressed anymore Because of that, of those things. It was like I think it was two or three things. It has something to do with like forgiveness. I didn't, I was holding on to things, um, which is kind of the same concept, kind of have to let go and let let it go to the, let it fall on the lord instead of holding on to it, um.
Speaker 1:But it's so much more freeing when you do that, because you're able to actually focus on the things that actually matter to you. And sometimes the things that you're holding on to are not like they're actually holding you back, you know, and they're holding you back from your dream or your goals or that relationship that could be better and you just have and you can't figure it out. But sometimes you're right, I think, yeah, you do have to just let it go, sometimes without and and I would almost add to that and say trust god, that he'll deal with, he'll figure it out, type of thing almost in some situations yeah, and, as you said, I mean you're holding yourself back.
Speaker 2:So you know, even if you just claim that, knowing what I'm doing is holding me back and I don't want to hold myself back. You know, even like you said, forgiveness, if you don't forgive, you're holding yourself back as well, being able to move forward. Um, and I know that very well. You know, just throughout the different things in my life that's happened, and you know, realizing and thanking god that I finally got to a place of realizing that and being able to move forward, because I couldn't move forward until I did those things. Truly, it wasn't just holding me back, it was like it was such a negative in my life and I was, you know, doing things and like basically going down a downward spiral because I'm not forgiving this situation or this person or whatever, you know.
Speaker 2:I mean, I was only hurting myself. It's like what do they call that drinking? It's like you drinking poison and expecting the other person to die from it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's, that's so true, because I feel like a lot of people in terms of forgiveness is they almost? I mean it's I don't know is it natural or not but, um, it's like I'm gonna hold this against you, um, to hurt you. When it's not doing anything to the other person, it's doing all the things to you though, yeah, and, and somehow I mean i'm'm guilty. I'm sure many people are guilty, I'm guilty of it, but it's like I'm going to stick it to you, I'm going to hold on to this because you don't deserve forgiveness. And it's like, yeah, the person probably doesn't deserve forgiveness. I don't think any of us deserves forgiveness, but you owe it to like at least let go to and let and let it fall on the lord and trust him, but he'll deal with it, and that I fit.
Speaker 1:But that's can be so hard. You know, that's not we talk about it, people talk about it, people have books, but it's. It's also goes back to that balloon thing. Like we, we can let it go, we can forgive somebody, but then we see the person or whatever, we pull the balloon right back down. I got you and we and um, but it's like a process you have to keep letting, letting the balloon go and then, and eventually it stays up there. I feel like, at least At least kind of I don't know if that makes any sense the balloon concept.
Speaker 2:No, it totally makes sense and it's funny because it's so true and I just think about different situations. You know there's a lot of things I've had to let go this last year and also forgive without you know. You know that's the other thing people want, like an apology, or they want like some type of remorse or or something you know to show them that like, okay, now I can forgive you, right, because yeah you've like pled to me and apologize and did all these things and it's like once again you may never get those things and apologize and did all these things and it's like, once again, you may never get those things and you're not doing it for the other person, you're doing it for yourself, you know.
Speaker 2:So, that's what you need to remember and, um, that's. But yeah, your knowledge is perfect in my opinion, because it's so true. You see that something gets brought up, you think of something and then you're like, oh, I'm holding on to that again.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I'm just still thinking about it. Wow, uh, wow, okay, so let's move into the programs that that you've created, that teach kids entrepreneurship. How did what tell me a little bit about that, like an overhead, and then let's dive into some meat yeah, so basically we're still in the very beginning stages.
Speaker 2:I have gone into the.
Speaker 1:Key.
Speaker 2:Sport High School and started teaching the kids about passive income and just what that looks like. Right, because I think we're. I know we're not taught that. I wasn't taught that in school. That's why I'm passionate about it and want to teach the kids this so that they can have a better foundation than I did, you know, growing up and taking all these years to figure these things out. You know I want everyone else to be in a better place than I was. I want them to get there quicker than I did, you know. So that's why I'm starting to teach these things and that will go into. You know credit about. You know how that affects you whether you're buying a house. You know credit about. You know how that affects you, whether you're buying a house, a car and the different things how to budget, um, and just talk about too. I think the other big thing is is you're taught in school that you need to go to school for all these years.
Speaker 2:You graduate, then you go back to school again just to graduate, um, and you don't have to do that. And for people like me who weren't interested in school and knew that they weren't, like I felt like there was something wrong with me because I didn't want to do that. That wasn't my path and I don't want other kids to feel that way. I want them to know that, like, what are your dreams? What do you enjoy? Like go after that. Or maybe you want to go into a trade? Like, go after that. You know, whatever it is. I want them to feel comfortable enough to be able to, like make those hard choices and not just go with, like what their parents tell them or what the schools tell them or the teachers tell them, you know, because they're afraid that someone's going to be upset with them, or you know they're not doing what they're supposed to. Oh, and the other big thing too, which we touched on is schools teach you that you shouldn't fail and you shouldn't mess up and you shouldn't make mistakes 100 percent Right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's true, I have it, and it instills a fear to not even try.
Speaker 1:Yes fear to not even try. Yes, yeah, that's. Uh, I've never thought about that I do. Going back to the whole college thing 100, agree, I got um, well, I was homeschooled, but even in the homeschool community it's the same, similar type of thing. I mean, it's not as big as uh, it is in public school. I was, I went to public school but, uh, then we transitioned home school later but, um, but I know, I know, for, like, my grandparents and some the parents of some other friends, like they were pushing for like caught the whole college thing and everything which is I, you know, I don't have a problem with going to college, but you're right, it's not something that you have to do. I mean, I guess I would say, if you want to be a doctor, then that's something that you probably want to go learn how to be. You don't want to do youtube videos and research and stuff like that to be a doctor, but, uh, but for something like you know, starting a company, uh, you going into real estate, there's lots of helpful information out there that you technically don't have to go to a college to gain that information.
Speaker 1:And going back to the whole economics thing, you're absolutely right, public schools do not teach economics. College courses will teach economics, you know they'll do like college courses will go teach that. But as a kid you know I would have loved to have been taught in third grade or second grade or even first grade. You can start there and go all the way up of, like you know, basic currency, stuff, saving, the reward of saving, and then going out and buying, buying something that you saved for, but not overspending, like with my three-year-old right now. He is saving for his favorite bar of soap and it's six dollars and he has, I think, 250 now. But he'll, like we were trying to teach him, come up to us, ask us for a job and ask us how much that will pay and weigh out the job options, what you can go do, um, that's, that's where we're starting right now.
Speaker 2:But yeah you're absolutely right yeah, I think that's that's. I just think that's amazing. You're doing that at such a young age and giving them that you know foundation, and that's what I've tried to do with my son and my daughter and they're only so interested, you know. So you can only do so much, but for sure my son, definitely, and my daughter, uh, she's just younger.
Speaker 2:So I guess I always use my son as an example, just because she's not on the same level yet. You know he's 16, he gets it. You know he's getting older and he'll talk about these things, you know, with his friends or with his teachers, and it just brings me so much joy to know that, like, okay, I think he's not paying attention, he is and it is getting in there, and it doesn't mean that he's going to be an entrepreneur or anything like that, and that's okay with me. It's just more of like, so I don't have a problem with college or anything. It's just more of still giving them that foundation, though, you know, so that they have it, you can use it, uh, whereas you know I go for me, like I said, and I've talked to many people you just don't have that foundation and that's what I'm trying to like bridge that gap, essentially yeah, I mean it's when, like it's so important I feel like it's, I don't understand why it's not being taught.
Speaker 1:I mean, even in the homeschool community it's not being taught which you would think it would be, but it's not being taught. I mean, even in the homeschool community it's not being taught which you would think it would be but it's not. And that's because, well, another thing too is homeschool community. I guess people think that there are a lot of entrepreneurs, which I don't know the research, but I know in my own community there were not that many entrepreneur like families, which I guess, which would make sense, because if you're an entrepreneur, then the whole economic concept is almost always you're always going through the process, because you're having to ultra, manage your finances in a different way, because you're self-funding, bootstrapping your projects, uh, whereas if you know you're doing a nine to five, then I guess it wouldn't be as much of a thing on your mind to teach your kids at like, because it wouldn't be as important, I guess. But it still doesn't make sense why public schools wouldn't be doing this. And you're right, the fear of failing and not even to not even try is 100% a thing and that's something that can be instilled at a young age and then you carry that the rest of your life until some kind of dramatic thing happens and you're almost forced to face the fear, to go for this thing, which I've heard entrepreneur stories where that happens a lot of the time.
Speaker 1:Heard entrepreneur stories where that happens a lot of the time. They're kind of forced into the entrepreneurship journey, whether it be um getting out of a bad relationship and then suddenly like you don't, now you have to do something. What am I gonna do? Um, which has been common on the show, but yeah, I love it. So is your. Uh, is your like course for the kids? What age is, or what grades does that start off? Or how did you figure that out?
Speaker 2:so that the high school dictated that. So it's okay in the seniors. So, which you know, makes sense to me.
Speaker 1:That's still good, though, Like I mean, you got to start somewhere.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and I think it's good because I mean, you're talking 16, 17 year olds, so they're not yet serving their life, but they're going to be doing that soon. So I think it's the perfect timing to start setting them up for that success. And, yeah, I mean I would love to see it happening much younger, but, you know, if we're at least getting them before they get out of high school, you know.
Speaker 2:I'd be happy about that, and I think, that these concepts too are going to be difficult even for a 16 or 17 year old to understand.
Speaker 1:you know, and trying to really break that down Into the basic, level True, especially if they haven't been Kind of already taught or encouraged At home. I think at home is probably a big one too. To Not fail, I think, because being an entrepreneur isn't just about going out starting something, it's 100 about having a mindset of being okay with failing, and that kind of should go out, that kind of should spread out throughout all your life, you know yeah, no, it should.
Speaker 2:And that's what I try to teach my son all the time. When he doesn't like win a basketball game or something, I'm like, okay, I'm like what went wrong in this game? You know what, what? What could you do better? What could your teammates? You know you guys as a team could do better. You know, instead of being like super upset or mad about or whatever because that's not going to change anything like let's reflect, let's look at this and see what we can change for the next game so that you can do better. You know, with your team and I think sometimes, you know, he probably gets annoyed by that, to be honest, because he just lost the game. So of course, there's that emotional attachment there being upset, but I've just continued to say the same things over and over because I'm just truly trying to teach him like you're gonna fail and it's okay to fail you know, this is a part of life.
Speaker 2:So, like now, what did we learn from that? You know, what did you see in the game that maybe you could do better? You know what did you see in the game that maybe you could do better? You know, and it's not about putting it all on him, it's just evaluating the whole team and seeing how they can work better together.
Speaker 1:You know a hundred percent and I also think, um, I know I'm guilty, I've been guilty of this in the past with teams that I've worked with and uh, but it's it's, it's you. You have to come at it objectively as best as you can, meaning, um, you have to be able, because so a lot of sometimes we want to blame other people oh it didn't work out because that person failed well when in it was it could have been. It was probably your fault. You know, and but.
Speaker 1:But there are times where it could legitimately be another person's mistake and not yours. And you have to be. You know, when you're emotional you want to blame someone else. You don't want to confront it, even though you know it was your fault. But yeah, I think just trying to figure out a way to like zoom out and just or get rid of the emotions, go take a walk or something, and then come back and ask a series of questions like what could I have done better? And asked a series of questions like what could I have done better.
Speaker 1:And I think it's a different approach if you're the team leader or the leader, versus if you're in the team. I think it's a different approach because if you're the CEO, well then almost everything comes back to you in some area. Maybe not the full thing, but maybe you didn't evaluate that person well enough and you let that person do some job and they did a very crappy job. That that comes back on you, right, but it also lands on that person. So you're kind of sharing in in that, but it's still up to you to fix it, not the, not necessarily the person absolutely, and that's why I have these conversations with him too, because he is the leader, you know and okay he has to.
Speaker 2:You know, even if he's not the one bringing down the ball and being the point guard right, he does do that part of it too. But everyone on that team knows and has known for years, he's the leader. You know every parent, every coach, everyone is like Landon is the leader. You know he stays calm under pressure and all the chaos, like he makes good decisions and he doesn't really let that stuff overwhelm him. So just trying to instill that part too.
Speaker 2:So I'm glad you brought that up, because that is the other part of it, of you are the leader and as the leader, even if you didn't do something wrong, you basically lead this entire team. The way you talk to the boys, the way you are, the way you handle yourself, they feed off of that, you know. So you have to then not only reflect and look at it as a whole, but then how can you try to instill these things in your team, right, how can you try to get them to do the things that they need to do? Because that's essentially, like you said, your job. Whether the CEO, whether you're the leader, it's falling back on you, even if it wasn't you.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Okay, we're going to wrap up. I think this was a great episode. So, Tara, can you tell me a little bit of what the future looks like for you? What does this year look like? What's something that you're trying to accomplish this year?
Speaker 2:you know, start teaching people about generational wealth at all ages, because you know, and the thing is, you don't have to start when you're young, you can start at any point in time, and I just really want people to understand that and know that, because maybe they're 60 years old and they've always wanted to buy their first house, but they haven't done it yet. You know that can still be done and you know that's why we want to get not only into the schools but into the community as well. So that's like my biggest goal for this year is just really building that out and seeing how we can improve it and continue getting it out to more and more people, because the hope is like let's create something that people can use all over the world. You know, for areas like what we have, this specific area and that's a very rundown, low income, you know needs revitalization and also isn't getting that right. Like you said, if you have parents or different people are teaching you this, great, but you know the parents, all the people don't know about this either, so it's definitely not hot. So that's like my goal.
Speaker 2:And then the other part of it is just, you know, getting on these different podcasts, because I want to get it out there. You know there might be other people interested in this and hear this and think, oh my gosh, that's amazing. I want to be a part of that, you know. So that's been. Another rule of mine is just getting on podcasts, putting it out there, being able to, like, get it out to the world so that people know what we're doing right, because how else will they know what?
Speaker 1:we're doing. How can people uh get more information on this or follow you on this?
Speaker 2:so it's just my name, which is probably a little more difficult Tara Zalewski, which, which I'm on, you know every single platform LinkedIn, facebook but I guess an easier one would be our website, which is rtzone. So that's rtzone, spelled out O-N-E. Um, that's a little more simpler if you can't spell Zalewski.
Speaker 1:Perfect. And yeah, what's uh, what's the if someone was going to take away? Uh, what's the? What's the if someone was going to take away? What's the one point that person should take away from this episode?
Speaker 2:I think the one point is never discourage yourself, like if you haven't started yet. Start today, as I was saying, you know, it doesn't matter how old you are, what you have going on in your life, but you need to start now. So don't let it discourage you if you feel like you're too old or you don't know enough or whatever the excuse may be, because really that just comes down to it, isn't you know? It's an excuse essentially. And don't be afraid of failure, like we talked about, you know, or getting uncomfortable Like this is absolutely what you need to do.
Speaker 1:Awesome, well this is absolutely what you need to do. Awesome Well, dara, thank you so much for this episode. This was great. It was great talking to you, great getting to know you, and I think this will be very valuable to people.
