A Long Overdue Update

I can’t believe it’s been two years since I’ve posted here! So much has happened. Can’t wait to share. (Please forgive the multitude of I, me and my’s. As this post is an update of my Financial Freedom journey the past two years, it couldn’t be helped.)

In early 2016, I felt a strong urge to make some changes in my routine. My work felt stale and I craved new challenges. My initial plan was to take a year off. A sort of sabbatical to take some time to explore what I wanted to tackle next. After discussing some of this with the owners of the company I’ve worked for since 1999, we agreed on a scaled back version of my job. So by summer I was, as my brother Seth calls it, “semi-retired.” I began researching some of the things I’m interested in and quickly found myself wrapped up in many projects and busier than when I had a full-time job! As I spent a little time catching up with friends and family that summer, here’s what happened…

• I reconnected with my childhood friend who I hadn’t kept up with very well over the years. John was also transitioning out of a full-time job and contemplating his own next steps. With an entrepreneurial spirit and a sales background, he was already repping as an independent for a couple different products. We talked several times about teaming up on a business–so far we haven’t pulled the trigger. Another stream of income he has comes from rental units. Over the years he has accumulated many rental properties, mostly duplexes. We decided to find and buy one together. Sure enough, in the fall of 2016 we found a duplex in Huntingdon, PA. We had fun as we bought it, fixed it up, and rented it out by year-end. Thanks to John’s expertise, landlording has been a seamless process and a nice little stream of passive income.

• Another person I talked with that summer was my brother, Chris. We both had money invested in a small company that trades on the stock market. That summer the stock price was very low. We decided to put a chunk of money together and invest more into this company. The company seemed to be taking the right steps and the stock price nearly doubled by early 2017. Unfortunately, the next quarter they didn’t do so well. The stock price slid back down last summer and has been struggling since. The good news is that some of the board members as well as some of the C-suite have been replaced. The new team is leading the company to higher sales and profitability. The market is skeptical but the stock price will rebound after the new team posts a couple strong quarters.

• My biggest project began when my brother Joe and I started exploring the possibility of starting a barbershop in Altoona, PA (also Summer of 2016). Altoona’s largest barbershop had just closed and like many towns, Altoona didn’t have enough shops to serve all the people wanting haircuts. A true barbershop provides a much different experience than going to Wal-Mart or Great Clips for a haircut. By fall of 2016 we had located and purchased a property suitable for a barbershop. It was a former beauty salon. The pink sparkly walls wouldn’t do, but the location was ideal. We did a makeover on the place with massive amounts of help from Ehredt Construction and opened up shop in January 2017. Mansion Park Barber Shop was born. Many ups and downs followed; all in all, 2017 was a good first year for the shop.

• Shortly after Mansion Park Barber Shop was up and running we saw a property in the nearby small town of Williamsburg, PA go up for sale. Williamsburg’s barber had recently retired due to health issues. That left the town without a barbershop. We wanted to test out the barbershop business model in a small town. This was our chance. We opened Riverside Barbershop in Williamsburg, PA in July 2017. It’s been a much different experience with this shop and I think we’re figuring it out…slowly.

• In the midst of starting barbershops and having barbers as employees, I decided it would be helpful to immerse myself in the barber world. Since May of 2017 I’ve been attending Martin’s Barber School in Huntingdon, PA. (The one my brother Joe started in 2014). I should graduate this month, April 2018. After that I’ll be eligible to take the state boards. Upon passing the state boards, I’ll be a licensed barber. It’s been a long year of driving back and forth over the mountains, but I’ve really enjoyed the experience and learned a lot about the barber industry.

• One benefit of driving two and half hours or more a day is that I’ve been able to listen to tons of audiobooks and podcasts. Oh…and I always make time to read physical books. Over these past two years I’ve read and/or listened to around 200 books. I read mostly business and personal development books with some classics, biographies, and fiction sprinkled in.

• Speaking of personal development, I still get to spend some time and do a little traveling with my buddy Dave Wildasin of Sound Wisdom. Over the past couple years we traveled to Dallas, Charlotte, New York, Columbus, Long Beach and probably a couple other places I’m forgetting.

  

  I got to meet some of my favorite business and personal development speakers: Jeffrey Gitomer, Les Brown, Lewis Howes and Tom Bilyeau. We also got to see many more amazing speakers at live events: Simon T Bailey, TD Jakes, Brendon Burchard, Mel Robbins, Jim Stovall, Keith Ferrazzi and on and on.

• I’ll wrap up with my most recent investment of time and money. In November 2017 I started down the rabbit hole of cryptoassets. Like everyone, I began with Bitcoin. I quickly expanded as I learned more and more about this young industry. I’m still learning. I now have more than 20 different cryptos and use six to seven different exchanges to buy/sell them. I am fascinated by what’s happening and excited to be following along and experimenting at this early stage of such a world-changing time.

As you can imagine, each of these projects has been quite an adventure in itself. I intend to write expanded posts on each over the next few weeks. They have each impacted my financial freedom in different ways. Let me know if you have specific questions about anything you’d like me to give more detail on. Thanks for taking the time to read this update. I’ll do better at keeping you posted going forward.