#277: How To Evaluate What You Need To Evaluate With Power Business Attorney Steven Fantetti

people pandemic markets companies big commercial real estate money talking business virtual private network vote happen google reassess clients office facing good country challenges

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Okay, okay. Oh, little chill, sweat equity podcast streaming show he kind of fits because it's still hot in October, a lot of places right now, sweating through your mass swept through that holiday outfit coming up for Halloween.

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I'm lostness. And to my right your left on the tube is Eric Readinger. Hey, you want some value out up front before we bring in power business attorney, Steven fantasty. Look, if you got a website, you need to get some boilerplate. legal stuff. This is not a sponsor of the show, we just try to throw a little prize out in the front. Go to get terms.io I use it when I'm building out people's websites and they don't have that legal stuff. I go make their privacy policy, Cookie banner, Terms and Conditions terms of agreement. You can get some free stuff on there. And then you know, the more customer needed, then you have to start paying but that's our value add ready to get terms. Get terms.io et CIE grms Yes, io.io or just google get terms and probably pop up. This episode is brought to you by grasshopper, try grasshopper.com forward slash swag $75 off an annual plan for your business phone line. You got a business, you got a side hustle, you got maybe you're on the dating apps, and you don't want to use a Google Voice. You just want to have a second line. So all those creatures aren't all over. Yeah, that's what the ladies do. They all use Google Voice numbers. You know that lots of guys need that. Try grasshoppers. Try grasshopper.com forward slash like it's a $75 off an annual plan. That link will be in the show notes. 75 bones off an annual plan. Who else has given that to you down? darlin, what Yeah, I got mixed up between darlin and wonder. What? What? ExpressVPN ExpressVPN a virtual private network, try expressvpn.com forward slash sweat likey swica to three months free off an annual plan. Get that virtual private network, a computer in the sky if you want to think about it like that. Can't get frakked me when you're looking at stuff online. You don't like retargeting ads I do for people. No more won't be tracked on a virtual private network. Want to log into another country. So you can go check out Netflix in another country. Boom. Try expressvpn.com forward slash twit for three months free off an annual plan. And lastly, Warby Parker Warby Parker. trial.com, forward slash swag gets you five free trial. Let's get this party started.

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sweat equity.

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We're good. I'm gonna get this intro. All right. This is the longest intro for any guest.

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I'm going to do this like I bring up comedians with a long hit list. He you've seen him in clubs and colleges over the cut. Just kidding. He's a corporate lawyer, a law professor at Western Michigan law school is also part time out of a real estate land development company specializing in new construction developments in real estate sales. He also represents small businesses through a private law firm called fan Teddy legal calm, and he's former college wide receiver. Let's give it up for Steve Fenn. Denny. That's how you got to do it. You got to do when you bring him on stage. You do the Oprah with the name and that was Oprah Well, it's a week Oprah I'm I don't want to blow your eardrums out right or anybody listening. So man it's been forever since you've been on the show. You're definitely what probably the the most informative guests we have continually. I'll say that.

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I Dude, I send I send video clips of previous times you've been on when I get asked about why do I need an LLC and why? You know, why should I have document legal documents and why should I protect myself? I just go here he can explain it better. Like Will Ferrell in the debate at the end of old school. He's just remember last time he's gonna rattle it off. I think Serena was she just messaged me a little bit ago sorry to face on. Yeah, now LinkedIn. Yeah, we just got on LinkedIn. I didn't even know she was on it. But I remember last time she was on with you guys. We were all there talking about that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's been a while. You mean four time Emmy Award winning Serena? forzani. That's it. That's it right now. Yes.

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Yes. I what I call it phase. I say phase on like phase on love. Phase. That was like, a year and a half ago. I remember we went my point of saying all that was was we went deep on

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entity formations and the challenges and risk assessments of women on this stuff. So that was good. Yeah. Anything you're you're coming across in your kind of since then any, any trends, you're getting questions on, like any FAQs you might be able to knock out? Because we haven't talked about, you know, I help you, you know, back in the day with fantasty legal, but I haven't, we haven't talked shop about what you're talking about with a bunch of clients are getting inquiries about? Yeah, I was gonna say it's actually a good time to ask that. Because from a business standpoint, right now, given what's going on with, with the pandemic, a lot of businesses,

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you know, depending upon what size you are, but they are facing similar challenges, and I think the biggest one they're facing other than obviously, how to handle their workforce from a remote standpoint, and still keep them you know, feeling like they're part of the company. And there's a bunch of laws you have to comply with, obviously, while you're doing that, but the biggest challenge they're facing in the markets, I think, right now is the commercial real estate market, a lot of businesses are going to have to bend and change the way they're deciding how they want to approach 2021 and beyond about needing no commercial business space, because a lot of them might not they're realizing now and with the pandemics forced them to do is take another about face to look and say, well look, do we need to have all this expensive commercial real estate, if we can still conduct ourselves, you know, in a different way, as a business and still be effective and have efficiency rates behind from our employees when they're working outside of an office space. Because that's really what office space for creative forward not just to have the inner interpersonal communication, be able to, you know, have someone at your beck and call was really to have a place of focus, so people can really, you know, narrow down and narrow in on what they're working on. On a daily basis. Yeah, so that's changing. And so I think that's going to be the biggest thing, people trying to get to Lisa's, there's a lot of clients and a lot of businesses I've been representing where they're trying to find, you know, ways to maybe get out or to maybe push some of the rents and stuff onto the you know, the back end term of the leases, so that they can maybe find a different way to reassess and decide if they want to stay in, but they're extending that longer. So that's been the biggest thing that I've seen those trends, those two big issues. I mean, there's a lot of other ones, but I'll focus on those main two is that workforce efficiency from a remote standpoint, and then to what you're going to do with with with the commercial real estate market. And you know, that that's one of the reasons why I got really heavy into the residential side of it, as you know, a lot recently, in the past 18 months before the pandemic started, which is kind of seeing what that foresight where people are going to be working from home, people are going to need homes more now than they will and that's why I'm looking forward to having a lot of those developments built. Because people now realize they want to be in the suburbs be around things schools, places to eat, you know, restaurants, markets, those things to survive because not coming to the office every day. So I'm really looking forward to seeing how that trends may change as well. And you're I mean you're literally at your house right now doing this interview and you know you you've kind of shuffled your your own kind of working environment a little bit i can i think i can hear in the background your son. No, I've got actually they're getting I'm getting Call me at the wrong time. I'm getting some

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new shutters put in all around my house and hear some noise. This guy's saying they're downstairs. Yes. Somebody today. Yeah. That just

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tell your son I said happy get happy birthday, by the way. I have my son's birthday, wouldn't it just his birthday? His birthday? It's common November 5, you were close. Okay, maybe a week early on my kids? Yeah, no, of course. No. But, uh, you know, you didn't foresee I mean, you said it. The residential is interesting, because the markets never really been higher. I guess.

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Every everybody in a residential real estate situation, all the realtor friends I have are like, there's not enough inventory to sell. Residential, residential and commercial. It's waiting for the other shoe to drop. While you say there's got to be something that some kind of conversion, there's gonna be a bunch of open office space where there's going to be owners that are gonna be like, we need to figure out how to turn this into something livable. And I know there's gonna be zoning crazy stuff with that, you know, but like, there's got to be some kind of giant pivot into like, something new that's gonna come along. There's got to be a lot of shuffling around and commercial. I mean, we're talking office space, we're not really talking like, restaurants or warehouses. Really, you know? No, you gotta it's tough because it's crucial. So big and specified,

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depending on the sector, so like, restaurants are really fucked. offices. I feel like, right, I mean, a little bit, right. Oh, sorry. I'm dropping f bombs.

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That No, it's not that one

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of us know that. I'm gonna do okay. I think I know you. I listen, I understand your point. There's a lot more I think there's a lot more positivity people should be having in that in that that space. I think the commercial service industry, including restaurants, bars, those kinds of things. I think

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You're gonna see an uptick in that because people can't stay in their houses forever, really. And I think once a vaccine comes out, you'll see a lot more

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people flooding to those, you know, specific establishment. So I don't think there's going to be as much of a hindrance, I think we're getting beyond that hindrance. Now, despite a potential second wave coming, you know, I think they're just FDA approval of a drug today that that just got on the market for COVID. So I mean, there's gonna be a wave of those drugs coming. Yeah. So I think pretty soon, you're gonna see that kind of level off. And I think a lot of those I have a lot of clients that are actually doing franchising restaurants, and they're really pushing, getting their new establishments built and ready to go, I think 2021 you're gonna see that uptick. And, you know, at the end of the day, I think that's going to be one of the things that that that comes out of this, where people can see that, you know, those establishments are needed in society, given the fact that people will probably likely be working from home or they're going to need those escapes, I mean, 6 million homes were sold in the United States last year, that figures probably dropped this year down to 4.8 million or 4.5 million probably in by when 2020 is done. Although interest rates are lower banks are lending, it's a little easier to kind of get money, but it depends if we're even employed, because unemployment rates high. So those things kind of counteract each other and make those numbers look different. But I think, you know, the number of home sales has steadily risen, I believe, over the last 10 years on I think there's a slight dip in 2014. But all this was right after the recession. So you're going to continue to see that, you know, scale high. And I do think eventually, you're going to see that residential real estate market will continue to stay hot, and there's gonna be a big need for new builds. And that's one of the reasons why I want to get involved in Yeah, even in the thick of,

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of, you know, the spring when it was kind of we're still really in the unknown. I talked to a few people, you know, that are higher ups and construction companies. And I'm like, what's the dip? You think? Cuz in my head, I just don't know. I don't I'm not in it every day. So I get to ask questions like you just just like that, like, I know. It's good to have no say assume you're stupid. Yeah, yeah, exactly. instantly. So know what you don't know. So I don't I don't go into it and go, Hey, I bet you guys are like, really sucking right now. I, I just go What, what is the impact on y'all? And they're like, you know, it's about 15%. And I'm talking guys, these construction guys do the high rise stuff around the country kind of builders. Yeah. But it was gonna face a different, a different perspective, I see your point because like law firms and all those county and all those big companies, and they have, they're often those high rise office buildings. And they're not might not even be able to have the same amount of funds coming in anymore, because a lot of businesses cut back on legal fees and things and they can't afford to obviously keep rent. And if you can do and use a law firm remotely, in virtually, which is I think friends going, especially from those particular service. No, if you want to call them white collar, service industries, like accounting and law firms, I think they can be done virtually and remotely. And that's where that shift might be. And so that's why that commercial real estate might drop, like you're saying, on a psychological, psychological level, I don't think I think a lot of people transition to remote, I really don't think we're that good at it. Especially if you're an office to hear that. I know, like I know, personally, I like to go into the office a lot more than work. I don't really like working from home because I can get distracted by shutter installers and stuff.

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No, but I'm saying like, I'll find things to do my ADHD can go off the chain with the you know, assigned list of

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a punch list of things to do, as well as try to work. And so like, I know myself that way, I know a lot of people transition, they go, Well, this is pretty great. We don't have to spend that much money in rent. Right. What they don't do, and I'm noticing this just anecdotally is they don't know how to really remote manage yet. Right? That that's the thing. Yeah, that people need to be managed still like, and it's just going to be the Wild West until they figure that out. Like just whatever, you know, accountability stuff they got to come up with. I mean, most people aren't like you recognizing going to an office is a good thing can be a good day. Most people. Right, it's great party time, maybe. Yeah, again, and what Eric just said is right. And logging. He was compounding on the point that you you said, I think you guys are exactly right. Because remember, when we started this this call, you know, I said, you know, those two main things we're seeing is that workforce efficiency and of course, the commercial real estate market. We talked about the commercial real estate market side, now you're talking about work workplace efficiency, and because the pandemic hit us, you know, out of nowhere, um, people didn't really have a plan. And so you're right, it's Can you project manage, as love would always tell me, can you project manage from afar? You know, can you still have efficiency do that? Is there a plan in place, a lot of companies didn't have it. And so it does create challenges, especially if you're a small business trying to grow and trying to scale it can be difficult. We don't have that plan in place. You can't have the oversight over all your workers. And then you're not making the strides or meeting the numbers or projections that you're attending to me, especially by q4, which we're in now. So, you know, as people strive towards the end of the year to try to show different types of revenue and different results. You know, those things

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You guys just talked about with a deficiency standpoint that happened probably, you know, towards the middle of q2 and as q3 went through, they probably just haven't figured it out yet, or they're still trying to.

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Yeah, I'm still impressed that like the school systems did as good as they did having any sort of plan like that. There was no like, Oh, well, this could happen like that, you know, and they had a system set up, that kind of worked good enough, like, for the parents, it sucked. And it was confusing and all that, but it was there. And it passed as an education for that amount of time. You know, we're all happy with it move on. Well, but not in California and Nevada in other states, where they're still not schools store and open a lot of places, which is no, I'm talking about just the remote learning. Oh, yeah, like side of it. But

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it's a patch, though. I mean, it's definitely like, it is it's definitely tough to manage both for a lot of people. I mean, you had to really do it. My kids are old enough to really do any kind of schoolwork, you know, right. But you're, you're having, you know, that kind of four way foray into like, Oh, I gotta do homework. I got to really sit down like kind of stuff I gotta do. I gotta tell you what it is. I'm usually just like, I just put this. What was that? Like? Eric, cuz you have you have children, right? That are in school? Yeah. Working if you take classes, right, yeah, it was there, eight and five. Right. Right. Right. So it was really only one kid at the time. She was in second grade. And it wasn't right. It was a lot of like, where do you go here and they It was very convoluted. And there were stuff spread out because they have all these different websites that do different things. And it was not, it wasn't easy. It wasn't it's not easy to get your seven year old up amped for school and then lay on the couch. I mean, they had to do zoom calls every day. And it was just battled to get her to sit up and not be laying in bed. like Yo, come on, man. Like they're gonna, you know, get one or maybe one rule. I like Jordan Harbinger. You know, the former Wall Street real estate attorney that has the Jordan Harbinger show 50 huh? No, but he he, what's it called? He had a good rule. I heard when I listened to the show, right as this stuff was starting to happen and he's like, get dressed even if you're working in your own house because it creates this weird boundary. Yeah, no, right. That's why I do it. My wife has makeup on me. Like I said the other day she's like, Well, why are you dressed like that every time you work from home and it's it's funny, you'd be surprised your attention to detail changes. When you're simply typing on a computer you see the cuffs on your sleeve and you realize you're wearing like a collared shirt that you're probably doing something important maybe you'll focus differently and so that's why make a habit of dressing like this everyday you know, I'm working from home instead of wearing like my triple option t shirt or something. Yeah, that's our former college football podcast for all right, he does it hey man. Check it out.

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The beauty of it is we can always bring it back whenever whenever the world settles out again, but man it was this season would be the worst ever do any big 10 starts up this week. Yeah, yeah, so weird. What? You told me the top 25 he's like Louisiana's in freaking out Carolina like what are you talking about trying to get real waiver wires for my top 25 League and it's like decimated like you're starting third string running backs positions not enough people for Justin fields, man. You'll be fine. No, he got drafted. All the way. So first day, friend of the program, Brendan T. Gleason. Nice buddy of mine. He got he drafted them and stashed him for six weeks. So

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he knows what he's doing. Yeah, it's one of those things where Look, that's kind of a little bit of dovetails a little bit into kind of things are opening back up. Florida is definitely the most American state because we're just letting it go, baby. We're gonna be that petri dish, man.

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And so for click for sure. Well, I try to that's my optimistic, positive take on Florida. When everybody shits on Florida. It's like, Look, we're the most American state not only do we take care of relatives that you don't want, they start a new life down here. But yeah, we don't want them. Yeah, either. We want to visit your grandma. And we deal with y'all traveling down here, you know, to go to the beaches and whatnot. Go get airbrush t shirts in Panama City, but like, but also, yeah, get your get your tats and all that stuff. Well, the governor had had a had a had a tough decision to make, you know, and whether the government did it right or not, I think with hindsight, it's really not too much worth battling over that point in the in the debate right now. I mean, obviously, mistakes were made and obviously that's based on information that the government didn't have, but I think you know, everybody everybody looks at that and politicizes everything we really didn't look at economic wise, how balance and then now we're getting data that the mental health of all this where we may be shut down way too hardcore. It may be worse than the actual death count. But if they might, yeah, that was that was my that was my my point earlier to your restaurant, you know, quote was basically to tell you that I think somebody

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In the service industries, there, there should be some, you know, movement towards giving more openness to them and realizing the need for them. It's because of mental health. Like I said, You can't just human beings aren't meant to just be stuck at home all day, they just can't human beings by nature of social, you know, they need, you know, something outside of their everyday structure and routine to be able to break that up the monotony of it. And you know, what people want to call it being the new normal, you know, I think a lot of people disagree with that, I think you need to be able to have it, where people can obviously, you know, see the world a little bit more, because they know there's going to be restrictions, especially now on on a go forward basis, whether you're traveling in by car, by plane by ship, whatever it is, you know, it's just going to be different now. Keep as much normalcy as you can. They tried to shut down the beaches for like, a week. And we're like, that doesn't make any sense with all the rules that we know, I remember that was like, fuck that noise. There's some sense in terms of how you keep them open in terms of how many people you can have gathered. I mean, obviously, we know there's the spread can happen when you're in larger groups like that, and even smaller ones. So I mean, it's just hard because you're facing a country that's built on its right to be free. And people think that that's been infringed upon every single time. And I think sometimes people may be lost sight of the fact that, you know, we're all in this together. Yeah, it's important, you know, to understand, maybe we got to be smart and sacrifice a little bit of that, right. Maybe someone's not coming at you. Yeah, that's not free speech. You don't have free speech anymore. People aren't saying you have the right to peacefully assembly people aren't saying anything. It's just we need to look out for each other to stop the spread so we can get back you know, running things and basics, like we were before. Yeah, I know. A lot of Americans have a lot of Abbie Hoffman in a minute very, like, you can't can't You can't know that. It's for those of those idiots out there. Don't know that is good luck. Good luck. No, Abbie Hoffman, one of the Freedom Fighters the there's a Netflix movie that just came out done with Sacha Baron Cohen as Abby hoffa called the trial the Chicago seven weird, very important, free speech guy, very important in the, in the activism and protests in the in the late 60s and 70s. Maybe one of the first kind of stand up comics to in a way.

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In the

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reference that you were saying, well, we all have a little Americans have a little bit of like, you can't tell me what to do, because it's almost in the DNA of the country, because we really just kind of deflected and we're like, no, and like, That's right, and the thing here and that's on a micro macro scale with a lot of people you know, well, right. And I think you felt it with from a business standpoint, because, you know, the majority of businesses owned in the United States are small businesses, and when they're shut down, it's their only livelihood and they feel like they're being tread on in that regard. I think that's what also no weight applies the effect of it well, you're you're a new converted American now you just voted for the first time Yes. Tie

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laces on your choices of President that's why he's so nice, because he's from Canada. Yeah, so

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Thunder Bay right like I'm just gonna skip this

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for you. I know twins. Come see Ontario, Ontario, which is just outside of Windsor. I want to meet your dad that constable up there man. I thought you've met him No, no, I just saw I just see news articles when he's when he's pimpin big pimp out here he's down here a lot. He'll be down here again when this thing's all Yes, that's a constable and not a cool name for for, for running, running the show up there running which show the police police. He's actually deputy chief. Okay. I thought it was a police officer. I don't know. Canada's weird might have been the mayor. Yeah, I was. I was kind of guessing. I was hoping Steve floated through that. is you

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know,

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what's, wait, what else am I talking about? Well, I you know, your future politician.

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You will be I know, well, you've got the makeup to to be that for sure. I've been saying that since like the first time we met Mike. Why are you so onpoint and

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shaking hands kissing babies? Why are you so on point all the time? All the time. We were next door neighbors. That's how we met and I was like, why? Like, I'd be like, look at me getting up at 6am walking the dogs and I'm taking the day and you'd be back they just got done with the dogs. We've been like I've been up since 430 I just already ran like five miles just got back from the gym. Like oh fuck, you

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know but you're on top of it. Now I say your your your work ethic is contagious and it's in a good way. It's very, it's it makes you go like I got it. I can step up my game a little bit more but work ethic and compliments aside. You know, how these things are getting politicized. D Are you seeing that in kind of business legal or any legal stuff coming up, like how this election is going to affect any of anything for maybe the small business owner that's listening, or someone that's trying to start a brand and then that like

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Time hustle phase, we're trying to get it going, what would change them? You know, that's a that's a great one. Kanye is our president very pertinent question. There you go, that's a question where they have these town halls that maybe you should have went to stood up and asked it, because a lot of it is going to depend on business, you're gonna be making their decisions, and even what people do with their markets from sorry, with their money from an investment standpoint, with the markets, people think that whoever becomes the next president, or whether Trump remains the next president, of course, is, um, you know, is there going to be a change to the markets? Or is there going to be changed to the tax rates, people think, you know, I've been hearing that they say, Biden gets in, and he's gonna, you know, increase the corporate tax rate. And so businesses are going to be taxed more right now, with Trump, you know, rates, like the s corporate and some other corporate tax rates up, he reduced a lot lower. And so businesses feel that they're keeping a lot more of their money, they're able to do things to, you know, maintain payroll, or to put money into r&d, whatever businesses want to do with their money. You know, but I think you really don't know yet. I think the principles between Democrats and Republicans, in terms of how they decide to spend in tax have been pretty clear. For decades long, I think there's not really much to dispute about what their views are on that. But really, what it comes down to is when someone gets in the office, what they're really going to do, because I think it's hard to say, because, you know, if Joe Biden wins, and people say, right now what you're hearing is that they think he's, he's gonna raise taxes on everybody, then they say, he's not gonna raise taxes on individuals, if you make over 400,000, then they say he is gonna raise the corporate tax rates to generate more revenue for the American government. So they can put money into other social or other programs, etc, or maybe even into fighting COVID-19 and being ready for the future, because they say the country wasn't ready for when this wave came. But I think you don't know. Because you don't know what's called what Congress is going to do, or you don't know who's going to be elected in terms of the representatives and how they'll vote on this. I know, if the if the positions they're taking when they're campaigning, are going to be different when it actually comes time to put a bill together. So you really don't know. So there is a lot of unknowns, a lot of clients aren't taking that wait and see approach. people I know who are investing their money are taking a wait and see approach really to see what happens because the markets can fluctuate. And it's been different since the pandemic started. So, you know, it's really hard and not everybody's having access to the markets, not everybody has money available, you know, to always invest. And so that's a whole different side of it. So people are really waiting and seeing if you're asking my opinion to really answer your question hone in on it is, you know, there's a lot of unknown and uncertainty right now, until this election is done. People really don't know what they're gonna do to make decisions, but not growing their business or doing anything until the into q4.

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Especially because of the pandemic. And it's not just the president, you know, Congress is just as important. So it all depends. There's so many variables, you know, state reps count, too, right? I mean, counting the closer you are, the closer they are to you, the more important they are, the more they affect your local. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But it's just like so convoluted to be like, Oh, this happens. This is gonna be so bad. And if this happened, it's like, it's so weird tribalism, the presidential election. And like, I don't think it definitely has an effect. We focus so much.

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cheer you on. It's funny, though. Did you watch the debate last night? No, because it's pro wrestling. I don't need it. I'm not who's undecided watching these things? Like, ooh, you know, good night. I'm sure it sways some people but it's really just promoting its own kind of echo chamber on each side to me at least. I don't think it does it like

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the you can see an effort by the democratic side big time to get people to vote. Generally, you see a lot of that because I like to see paid for by who and then I'll go look it up. And it's like, almost everything that's telling you to vote is a democratic entity that's doing that. Fine. I don't care. I mean, that. I don't think pox on all sides. There is but I just look at it on a very dumb guy level like that, like the YouTube interstitial ads I get. It's, you know, to go vote just generally go vote. I'm just saying like vote or die style. This has been a thing for a while down, I think about Well, I mean, it's a demographics thing. For sure. Right? Like, but they're like I have a hard time getting out to vote are more likely to vote democratic usually. Yeah. And so there's this whole swath of people that don't even vote at all. I you know, you got to vote though. You got to vote, everybody's got to vote or die. I know Kanye is not going to get in unless you write them in. So that's,

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you think you think I'm not gonna write them in? I'm gonna, I'm gonna send you a picture of it. Because I hate both of them. I don't think it's illegal, isn't it? To take a picture of my own Valley? I think so. All I thought if I did it, what if I say to you, as a male, I think you should reassess your situation and make sure you're comfortable. You have the right to vote where you want to get me wrong, but I think you should reassess a little more research. why he's a great producer. He be He, he's, he made it. He's a self made guy, very American, you know, from the heartland of the country from Chicago. You know, he can collaborate things. He can collaborator, he, you know, he's just a little bipolar. Probably and

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I mean, I think some some experience helps. I think we've learned that, you know, over time too, but it's that thing of like Asperger's helps

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me focus. So I look, I'm this is not a popular opinion, I do think No, I if you want to give Trump, it's okay baby. No, I'm saying like, if you want to give Trump any credit, he is a master at PR. And I really don't think like, Look, I don't love that he represents the country with what he says on Twitter and stuff. But I think he just goes look over here, look over here like a magician. And then he goes and really does whatever boring stuff. So I've tried to ask people give me a track record of all the terrible things he's done in four years. And everyone's like, Yeah, well, he said this, I don't know, I want actions. What were the actions that were bad? And I can't even tell me about kids in cages. You got to you got to bring up Obama's error doing it too. Here's one that I can tell you law. It's not just action, sometimes it's also inaction. Okay. Fair, fair, quick answer to because not a lot of time to get that list because it would be I think that's something to pay attention to, for people listening, we're not gonna we don't get into politics on the show. It's just a way to think about anything really, like, break it open. And you're 100% correct. Because a lot of the times when I'm doing consulting, and on the marketing side, I go, who's your number one competitor? And a lot of people listen, when I go in, typically, it's not it's usually the person, the patient, the client, the customer, whatever the user, it's their decision to not use you at all, for no reason, like, a lot of the time, and you're like, Ooh, what's going on them? And it's like, okay, you know, I think, yeah, no, you're absolutely right. And that's, I think that's gonna lead to one of the big things you might see in 2021, to pay how companies come out of 2020, I'm looking forward to seeing I pay attention to this just basically the acquisitions market. And what that means is, there's going to be a lot of mergers and acquisitions happening as a result of some companies maybe not being able to survive at the end of q4 when they find out where they're at. And maybe they become good target companies to either love a company. And now you might see some medium sized companies that it could be challenges or competitors, even to my clients or to your clients, Lawler to whoever Sure. And now they're going to be grabbing a pretty good company, you know, that might not be able to make it right now. And they're going to be just as strong almost duplicate their efforts. And now there's a brand new competitor out there, you didn't see coming, and they just, you know, expanded themselves, and were able to, you know, scale and create more and more market share for themselves. And now the whole challenges in the in the markets by industry will vary. And I think that's going to be a trickle down effect or unintended consequences, if you want to call it from the pandemic as we go into 2021. So I'm curious to see what happens with the mergers and acquisitions markets, with companies and those target companies that will be coming about, you know, as we move forward, and if I remember from john oliver show a couple years ago, we're in the era of corporate consolidation like crazy, right? Like, there's more, there's more corporate consolidation than ever, because there is it's been real, especially in tech, where I kind of lean a lot it because it, the idea of making an app is to sell it to a bigger company a lot of the time, or you really can't repeat after a while, because you can kind of get those fundings in the mezzanine level rounds of funding. But a lot of the time, it's just like, I'm gonna need some hardware to back that up. Eventually, you get into tech sometimes, because Yeah, I got, I got a cheat code to do this thing that no one else has seen. And then I'm going to sell it to some bigger entity, like YouTube to Google, you know, yeah, you just got it. It's hard, because money helps you stay competitive. Because as you grow in scale, the challenges get greater. In order to deal with those challenges. You need more money, or you need a back office support personnel, all these things that small companies or low app developers don't have. So it's interesting. We'll see. I mean, you see Google now facing antitrust, you know, suit from the US government, that's going to be something new that probably people think is coming, I think you might see in 2021, depending upon who gets into office, a breakup of some of these big tech companies, whether it is Google, or even if it's Amazon or somebody because people think there's monopolies out there and things going on. So I don't think there's a denial that some of these big companies are monopolies. But you know, whether or not they should be broken up is a whole different argument for different issue today, but not Apple with my boy, Tim Cook, or Auburn. And you're gonna say, Yeah, but I mean, again, they're worried about privacy. Okay. Yeah. But this is why I was saying it's, it's interesting to take, you know, a 50,000 foot view on all of these things that we talked about, even just during this call where it's about, you know, what our company is going to do about employee efficiency? What are employees going to do, how they're going to scale their company from a commercial real estate side? What's the mergers acquisition market going to look like? What are small businesses going to do and make decisions on based upon who becomes president? How does what the tax rates, all these things are now after effects of what's going to happen, what's the New Year hits once the election is done, and we're gonna have to start looking at all these things, and you really want to get prepared. If you're a business right now, trying to have a plan in place to get ready for what's going to know what you're going to do, if any one of these events happen because they're gonna come fast and it's going to come hard and if you're not ready, you're ready to plant your that's where you're kind of going to be, you know, not moving forward, you're going to be going backwards.

35:00

To start over again. So that's a big challenge and, and unfortunate, there's a lot of things you really can't do. Because all these things, you know, they're not at your mercy as a small business owner, being a size business owner, you kind of just got to hope for you know, things to turn the best way they can for you and get some good advice, get some good attorneys, get some good accountants, and then kind of get yourself in the best position you can with your talent that you can, you know, whether you need a recruitment company to help you find more talent, and you know, scale and be more more more feasible for your business. I've talked to 100 business owners probably since mid June. And I keep telling them look, you know, don't wring your hands use this time valuably, like, if you're if you really are in a weird holding pattern, start working on your strategy. What are your goals to get out of this create contingency plans? Like you're talking about? Start do what I used to do every quarter, I used to ask you, hey, go through my agency agreements. And let's let's clean these up, because you're too long. Yeah, that's a great thing. That's a great deal. 15 pages, but you got to, you're only as good as the four corners of the pages, right? As long as that's the governing rule. Yeah, for that contract. I'll tell you what.

36:07

Your contract is tight, right? No loose ends, no loose ends. But I will tell you this, because obviously, we can't get into everything that that a business can do. But if you had to give advice to a business on at least one thing they can do, I can tell you this from what's happened with the pandemic, to help set yourself up for 2021 or even towards into q4 is what happened as a result of the pandemic, you can go back to March, April, May, middle of q2 was what people were getting out of contracts, they were canceling your service contracts, good contracts, I was a part of having helped people terminate tons of contrast, and people were sending in cancellations because they were trying to save money for what's going on. This is a great time, if you are a business owner, no matter what size to reach out to those companies or individuals that terminated and say, Look, have you reassessed? Where are you at? Where can I help? Where can I help you add value me We can't do a contract for the same amount of money or for the same amount of goods or services. But maybe we can incrementally slowly go back and help you build up your business. So if you can provide that kind of value add to somebody, I think this is a good time, if you had to make one decision to say, Well, you know, Steve, saying all these things, where do I start? I think that's the first place you started as a business to really find out how you can get yourself moving forward, and then deal with all the other things that we've talked about that are going to come down, but we still have a good baseline in place, setting yourself up to find out what your margins are going to be where your numbers are going to be at how many clients you'll have, etc. As you start moving towards into q4 Yes, someone read the art of the deal by Trump. No, I've never read that. No, you're really you're really tapping on never split the difference. Like just because you know, something's going awry doesn't mean you can't salvage something else. I agree that I'm a firm believer, no matter how bad the situation gets, there's always a way out. There's always a problem solution. Don't think binary A lot of people think zeros and ones. Well,

37:49

yeah, I think that's a big part of American exceptionalism. And obviously, I think that's just a big part of how human how human nature works. I just think people are always gonna keep grinding to find a result, because people aren't always happy with, you know, the status quo. I think we're seeing that in a lot of other things, not just from an economic standpoint, even from a social justice. So I think you're gonna see that in every every phase or aspect of American life as we go. Throws that out a minute. 35 All right, well, we'll let you go. Right. Oh, that's a mic drop. Yeah, I was gonna wrap it up there for you on this on this podcast. Of course, man, of course, if you want to hit Steve here good to fit any legal comm and hit him through some awesome badass guy, man, his website, and you can contact him through that I make this website behind on my he's behind on my blog post. Why? Oh,

38:40

no way. I'll catch you

38:44

in a row and I'll schedule out months. I'll see you so thanks for having me on with crazy guys. Yeah, man. Let's get together. Shoot man. Absolutely. Later, buddy.