We are taking you along the path of how CEO of Boron Capital, Blake Templeton, went from being a college dropout to a Millionaire CEO. In this episode we discuss a few of the many lessons that Blake learned from his mentors that catapulted him to where he is today. The path, the mentors, and the stories- this episode has it all starting from the very beginning!
We are taking you along the path of how CEO of Boron Capital, Blake Templeton, went from being a college dropout to a Millionaire CEO.
In this episode we discuss a few of the many lessons Blake learned from his mentors that catapulted him to where he is today.
The path, the mentors, and the stories- this episode has it all starting from the very beginning!
--Become a Solomon Investor Today: http://solomoninvestor.com
-- Speak to our team to learn more: https://legacy.boroncap.com/free-call
-- Make sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode!
Key Takeaways:
Blake’s journey from a broke college dropout to making his first 6 figures (2:10)
The two lessons that Blake learned from Tony Robbins that helped triple his net worth in a single year (6:32)
A key mental framework from Keith Cunningham about how to understand the game (10:07)
How Robert Kiyosaki views the public market (16:05)
Competing against Ray Dalio in the stock market (18:08)
How does a Solomon Investor fortify the walls to his kingdom? (22:50)
How learning marketing strategies from Russell Brunson is pertinent to what we do at Boron Capital (25:42)
How is investing in yourself, by seeking counsel from the pros, vital to success? (28:40)
Behind every successful person is a story- their own personal path to their success.
Today we are taking you along the path of how CEO of Boron Capital, Blake Templeton, went from being a college dropout to a Millionaire CEO.
Early on in his journey, Blake learned that in order to be the best, you have to learn from the best. With that realization in mind, Blake sought out the top mentors in the business and personal development niche.
In this episode we will discuss a few of the many lessons Blake learned from his mentors that catapulted him to where he is today.
--Become a Solomon Investor Today: http://solomoninvestor.com
-- Speak to our team to learn more: https://legacy.boroncap.com/free-call
-- Make sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode!
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-- DISCLAIMER: Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Any historical returns, expected returns, or probability projections may not reflect actual future performance. All securities involve risk and may result in significant losses. No communication by Boron Capital, LLC Inc. or any of its affiliates (collectively, “Boron Capital, LLC™”), through this website or any other medium, should be construed or is intended to be a recommendation to purchase, sell or hold any security or otherwise to be investment, tax, financial, accounting, legal, regulatory or compliance advice. Nothing on this episode is intended as an offer to extend credit, an offer to purchase or sell securities or a solicitation of any securities transaction.
- I am your host Blake Templeton. This is Solomon Investor Podcast. I have with me my main man, Zachary Morrow.
- What's going on Blake? Excited to be here and really excited about this episode and digging into the recipe over the last 14 years that you've been able to build on top of King Solomon's wisdom and breaking that down. So excited to get into some of the stories as well.
- That's VP of Investor Relations at Boron Capital handles all of you amazing Solomon Investors. Okay, I got a question for you guys. Proverbs 11:14, have you heard it? "Where there is no counselor, the people fell, but in the multitude of counselors, there is safety." I want to take you behind the curtains today, back 14 years and show you all the counselors, all the different people who had specific perspectives on specific things in money, in scaling, in actual business, tangible cash flow in why not the public market? Or why the private market? All the specifics that have taken us from 14 years from zero to over 300 plus transactions with tons and tons of investors and not one single investor has lost money.
- This is going to be super exciting. And we're starting at the beginning, right? You're going to share everything from the beginning.
- As much as I can in a podcast, while Bob and Jane are on the treadmill. So here we go. I mean, I was a college dropout without penny on my name. Everyone thinks because of where we are, they are like "Man, you must have gone here, done that or had these degrees." Man, I just came from the School of Hard Knocks, and I realized I could pay for speed. I realized that if I wouldn't found the best people, that I could actually ride their coattails to success. The reality is that when you seek out a counselor, you got to know why you're seeking out that person, you got to know... I mean, it's very, very tight of what you want. And I mean, in the very beginning, gosh, I put money on... I put things on credit cards. I mean, I was begging Wells Fargo to give me a line of credit and then figuring out how I'm going to pay it back. And the reality is, I got really good at doing one thing, holding my commitments, being loyal, executing when I said I was going to execute. And I mean, this is just like the fundamental principles that were birthed in me at a young age. Fast forward, after nine months, we're making six figures in real estate. And I realized that what got me here, wasn't going to get me there. Like I had a gap of, I took myself to where I could take myself and I needed more. And so, man, one of the special mentors that I had built a great relationship with was Tony Robbins. I ended up paying over $300,000 in private consultation and mastermind time with him, traveling the world, going to all of his private events, we have a thing called Platinum Partners, and it's private inner circle, where he's consulting us directly, but then we're traveling with him, we're playing. And a quick story, one of my favorite trips, was to France and it was driving muscle cars. And so I mean, this is 200 people from all around the world and we're literally, in the French Alps, driving everything from Ferraris to Lamborghinis to Convertible Jaguars, With everything having all the bells and whistles. I mean we're driving 800, $10 million vehicles. And like these are all like professionals. These are people who obviously we're all paying a lot of money to do this thing 'cause we're all in this mastermind with Tony. And I'm telling you, everyone got behind these cars and you just kind of turn into a little kid again, and we're racing in the French Alps around the curves. I remember I'm driving... At this time I'm driving a Ventotour, Lamborghini. And I mean I never thought I would want a Lamborghini. When you sit in that thing, it's riding so low to the ground. I felt like I had more control going 120 miles an hour in the Lamborghini than I did in any other SUV in your hometown. I mean, it's crazy. So I'm driving it, and everyone they just start peeling out. We're going around the curves, and there's three muscle cars in front of me. And they're like, peeling out, going around traffic, cutting into the opposite lane. There's a freaking cliff hanging off the... And I remember this big box truck coming. They came around the corner and I'm just like, "Oh my gosh, they're going to get hit." And they obviously peeled back in. It was the most fun, just all the crazy things that you at least have to do once. And it's times like that that we would play hard and then we'd go work hard, and Tony would just pour in. And I spent 117 days with Tony, and he taught me two huge things, taught me tons of things. But two things I want to focus on right now, one is scaling a business. In scale, he went through and said, "You got to find the actual weakest link." That framework is how I actually go through all the deals, all the investments in our clients portfolios, all the... As we grow the investment portfolios in the private market. I process through where's the value link broken? Where is the... We're always looking for a value add in a property, so there's always a weak link, and if I can go find that weak link, then I can actually supercharge the cash flow of it because everyone one is deficient somewhere. Another principle is peak performance. And, man, when people talk about peak performance, it's most people coming from a mindset, you got to keep your head above water. And Tony really helps me specifically understand how to control emotions and how your emotions and all things can't be ran by the circumstance, and now when we apply that to investments, I mean, I tell you I tripled my net worth in one single year, just sitting under that counsel, because it helped me run business in a whole different way. It helps me realize that... I mean, now I would say I do it from a heavenly perspective and that God's wisdom actually is what really holds the weight, but that mental framework of sitting in a position and not letting something affect your emotions, man, that was a game changer for me.
- So, okay, obviously we sped through that just like the race cars in the French Alps. But I want to pull back on a couple things. Number one, it sounds like an awesome time, right? Who doesn't want to do that? Number two, that you came out of college, not a penny to your name, you ended up getting started in real estate, persuaded Wells Fargo to give you a line of credit, and then found the right mentors, the right counsel to help bridge the gap from where you were to where you wanted to go. And so you made advancement, you got teamed up with Tony Robbins, and you said how many days on the road?
- In a single year 117.
- 117 days, learning from him and you learned?
- Yeah.
- Yeah, crazy so. And in that time, I mean, you got to, one triple your net worth. But the principles came in and they became foundational principles of how you go into every deal, right? Starting with the End in Mind, beginning with the End in Mind, looking at every single deal uniquely, where's the break in the value chain? How can I add value? And then how to stay in that peak performance? And so how has that impacted everything over the years? I mean, what's that look like, in a scenario today, right?
- Yeah, I think to best answer that, I would say that that mental... Those mental frameworks integrated with some other mental frameworks that came up from Keith Cunningham and Keith ran Tony Robbins... Runs Tony Robbins, Business Mastery, and Business Mastery's an intensive event on essentially scaling business. And so Keith Cunningham is one of those guys he's built on optics and metrics. And so when you realize to scale, you've got to actually get into the optics and metrics and see most people don't know the scoreboard. He talks about knowing the rules of the game. And if they don't know the rules of the game, you don't have the scoreboard. Like the scoreboard, most people are just looking at the bottom number like are we making money? And they're not looking at should our expenses be lower? And should there be... Are there gaps and blind spots? And going back to the mindset of you've got to know what you don't know, and if you don't know what you don't know, there's always going to to be a hole. And that's actually how every single investment we do, is literally in our due diligence process is pushing buttons and pulling levers. It's like, can we actually lower the risk? And like where is the blind spots of this company, this portfolio, this entity that owns this $50 million worth of said real estate? Maybe it's 50 million in self storage and like what are they missing? Where is their blind spot? Like we're pushing buttons and we're going to buy this, that $50 million worth has to actually mean more to me than it means to them. Like I can make more money with it because I'm pushing buttons and pulling levers and seeing okay, they're actually have a deficiency here. Like, there's... The numbers tell a story and most people, if it's making money, they quit telling the story. Like it's good. They just they quit looking into the real story to know the scoreboard and when you can read the scoreboard. It might be making money, said money, but you're not winning on the scoreboard. Because maybe there's inflation or maybe there's taxes that are going to be coming out that you're not... That aren't being looked at or maybe your expenses are elevating, and your incomes and all things are long term you're going to lose on the scoreboard. And so, man, with those two principles together, Keith really helps the mindset of... I mean, we have a... I mean, as you know, we've an... I mean, just a ridiculous amount of due diligence, 13 different ,
- No
- 13 different economic index items, and a proprietary system that literally have to all line up and have to all say green with a good check mark, and most investments don't even get close. And so, but Keith really helped me dig under the hood and like move the carburetor out of the way and move this scoot the engine over and seen all the blind spots. And then that's... As you know man that's been beautiful in our investments because we're able to then buy stuff cheaper and then make a much more revenue than previously expected.
- Yeah, you hit a couple points that I think are critical and for those who don't know, Keith Cunningham is the real Rich Dad of "Rich Dad Poor Dad". Robert Kiyosaki's, "Rich Dad Poor Dad" book, Keith Cunningham really is the mentor in there that has helped shape so much of what Robert Kiyosaki does, correct?
- Yeah, correct
- And so Keith, sat on our Board of Directors, and you were directly mentored from him. And you know what? That's passed on to me is just the attention to detail. I mean, that it is... So for those who don't know, my background in the military, I was on a Presidential Security Force. And the attention to detail is so acute that you cannot miss anything. And Keith comes with just a laser sharp, I mean a razor sharp focus into the numbers, knowing every single number down to the smallest degree, and he doesn't let you get away with anything does he?
- I'll tell you what? He man, he is like a Iron Fist handing a grown man cry if you're not careful. One thing he'd always tell us is we had to be 16 of us in a room and he'd say we were bringing due diligence too as we were growing a master portfolio and he's going to look at it and it's like I would imagine the military when I think about a guy having like a big sticking like waxy on the head if you're not standing up straight or whatever. He's like, "If you have something, it's not what it needs to be in your due diligence, I'm going to find it. If you have an inkling that a number might be off or that shouldn't be like that, and you don't tell me, 'cause you're thinking you're going to figure it out later, and make it better and smooth it out. I'm going to find it and I'm going to..." And so, I rem... I mean yeah, it's just one of those things where it just comes that point of you literally become so authoritatively dominating and finding all the holes in due diligence and knowing that that's what we go into. And obviously on the other side of it, man, you're 1000 times better because that you know that your know, your money or in this situation our clients money is protected. We know that we know it's going to make money, we know that boom or bust in any economic global scale something we know well, this is going to make money though. No matter what this is going to make money. It reminds me... It reminds me of... You've mentioned Robert Kiyosaki. It reminds me Robert has had a profound effect on me as well. You and I have been in a penthouse suites, spend some sweet time with him after a conference. But times with Robert, he comes from a... It's a same lineage of wisdom, but it's from a different personality. and Robert has a healthy distrust of the public market. He has a very clear picture of saying... One his famous things I remember him always saying is, "Wall Street and the Fed are like criminals. They're, like stealing from the poor and the uneducated." And financial literacy is one thing he taught me. to be financially literate you can't just believe what the news say, you have to know what's happening with money. And he was really big on cash flow, he's really big that, in the public markets not cash flow, everything has to have cash flow or it's not real in. And that's something that he's been... I mean, Keith Cunningham and him, even Tony Robbins on scaling businesses, everything came back to cash flow. And that's why as we have our own clients that come to us whether they're moving from the public market into the private market. They like "Hey, I don't want to be in the volatility." or it's the doctor, the attorney, and they like "Hey, we want to throw money at something." Or, those people who are coming in with bigger money and they're like, "Hey, let's partner on something. We want larger returns and we're willing to take more risk." And we end up partnering we bring them into some of our bigger deals. But it's all about cash flow and cash flow in that picture is king. And that reminds me... It reminds me of when I met Ray Dalio in India. So I'm with Tony Robbins, we're in India where we're visiting the culture in India. And that's a whole nother conversation for the culture, the beautiful culture of sweet people. But we're in a room and I'm sitting right next to Ray Dalio. Something about Ray that I really admire is he's very straight forward about what's happening in the current market. He's the master of explaining the economic cycles. Like Ray Dalio would be the guy who, even though he's in the middle of the public market, and he's actually saying, "I got 160 plus billion and the largest hedge fund in the world stuck in the middle of a volatile market." He'd be the first one to tell you. And this is what I love about Ray. He says, do you want to be in the world's largest part of the... What does he say? Do you want to be in the world's... Do you want to play poker against the best players in the world? 'Cause I'm one of the best players in the world. I have 1500 employees. And the best poker it's hard for me, like the start. is hard For me, and if you're going to play in the market, you're playing against me." When he explains the economic cycles, you're like, "Ray, you're genius. No, I don't want to play in the public market against you." And so, one thing I love about Ray is just that he's so straightforward about what's happening in the market. He's always very clear, and you got to have counselors on all sides. I mean, Ray's accounts in the public market. He's very clear saying, "Hey, this is not for the faint of heart. It is the casino." I mean he'll be the first one to say "I'm playing poker. I'm one of the world's best players playing poker. I win some, I lose some." He says, "There is always a winner, and there is always a loser." And so, man, the nuggets that you can pull from people, even in situations like that in the public market, are just unparallel to what... If you just... I have people all the time and you too Zack in our firm and just tell us "I'm a money guy, that's where I get my wisdom." I got the money guy. And like, often I'm just like, "My goodness. Have you not understood that with a single counsel, you're going to fail?" Like, you need to have a multitude of counselors. You got to get multiple perspectives, you got to call timeout and cut the emotions. I mean that's what it's... Having multiple counselors just changed everything for me 'cause it advances your literacy, advances your wisdom, it gives you clarity, and it helps you find holes.
- Yeah, it goes back you mentioned something with Robert and I remember the time you're talking about that's New Orleans right?
- Yeah.
- I think was Peter Schiff was in was there and-
- Yeah Peter Schiff was there as a lot.
- Yeah, that was... I like New Orleans I may come back to New Orleans sometime, once this all smooths out New Orleans is on the list. But you mentioned, Robert has a healthy distrust. And I'll just say it's so prudent. It's not to say that you're going to agree with everything he says. But it's an interesting principle that if you go into everything with a healthy distrust, it encourages you to go and find where there's holes, where something could be off. And it's the same thing like you're saying with counselors is not one single mentor or counselor was able to fill all the gaps. So when you're processing the idea of a Solomon Investor and how you're trying to stand on God's wisdom and all those pieces, you've had that as a foundation, but then you went out and saw different people that had different skill sets, in different places to be able to help fortify your walls. And really, it's about... We talked about building the empire building the kingdom, being a king in the kings court and something I'd want to leave all the listeners with is, fortify your walls. Find the counselors in the different areas where you know, you need to grow. where are you going? What are you trying to accomplish? And go and find the people that are in those spaces to help fortify those walls. It's not just about having one.
- Yeah, Zack it's a really good point. And I'd like to go into processing a little bit more about what fortifying the walls is. What we're talking about the Solomon Investor how a Solomon Investor thinks is you process like King Solomon, you process... You got to own a domain, you have a kingdom. And your kingdom is whatever your influence is. So obviously your kingdom will cover your money, your resources, the allocation, energy, your money, it's your family. It's anyone you have direct influence over, is inside your kingdom. But if you're going to actually do something with your money, you got to have to fortify those walls and fortifying those walls. The reason that many counselors is needed 'cause you got to have wisdom to fortify your walls. So a part of the fortifying of your walls is having the right mental frameworks about money and the right mental frameworks about money. We've talked about Robert Kiyosaki and I don't agree with everything he says, but he has some really strong mental frameworks about... He's going to invest where he's going to get taken care of, where he's going to be protected, where he actually, "I can actually make cash flow." Think Ray Dalio I don't agree with everything... I mean, clearly he's in the public market saying "It's a game of poker, the world's best poker game. So we got on agree to go there." That doesn't make sense to me. But man, the mental frameworks of economic cycles, he's telling us, "Man they're printing money. The only way the stock market is upheld, is they're printing money. They're actually buying up the stocks the Feds are buying up the company stocks. It's not the Joe and the Bob and the Tim buying it up. Like the newS says. No, they're having to keep it. So when you know the mental frameworks of wisdom of money, man that changes the game, you're playing out a game of where you have advantage. I think Tony Robbins when he's saying, "You've got to be able to scale." What he burned into me that everything was scaled, I scale my clients money, I scale our investments, I scale our profit margins, I scale our due diligence, I scale our ability to actually have what we call vertical synergies. And that leads me into who really poured into my soul on vertical synergies. And that's Russell Brunson. So some of you might not know who Russell Brunson is, he would be called a one of the best if not the best marketer in the world. So you say Blake, what has marketing had anything to do with my investments like my pension, my IRA, like, how does that tie into my money? Because the investments have to be marketed to the end buyer. So in the private market, in real estate, for example, we have clients, we have tenants, we have customers who are actually being serviced inside each investment. And so Russell is so big , Russell Brunson is so big on upsells and actually having what we call vertical synergies, where it's a complimentary product or service, or continuity of a monthly charge, that we would charge a tenant or a client or a customer. And that literally raises the profit margins that we can pay out to our investors. And so as you and I are in Russell's inner circle,
- Yeah.
- And the counselors thing is some people are like, "I get counsel from a YouTube video." You can get counsel from a YouTube video, okay? I'm just telling you, I got face to face encounters like, I'm getting my counsel from people who I'm sitting at their table. I'm eating food with them. I'm like, I'm not just, listening. I'm actually asking the hard questions, I'm seeking like where are my blind spots? Tony Robbins I've spent hundreds and hundreds of hours with him and processing and with Russell, same thing. We're in the inner circle with him, Tony, we're in his partnership, Ray Dalio, we're with Tony Robbins in India at one of his events. Keith Cunningham hundreds of hours in his Board of Directors where he's looking down into our investments and seeing why something is something where we can tweak things and make things better. Robert Kiyosaki is literally sitting on the couch in the penthouse suite. And just asking the hard questions and these guys are beacons in their own right, in their own industries, in their own niches. And the many counselors has brought so much wisdom to how we run and operator investments for our clients.
- Yeah, man, you mentioned some good things there. And one takeaway I'd have is, like you said, is trying to get that face to face time because as you're moving forward, it's always processing, how can I pay with speed? because you've spent a lot of money to get the opportunity, to spend time with these people. But we also have to recalibrate what that pays back. It's an investment, so you're investing into yourself, into your education, into your ability to grow into the future, and now because you spent that money and paid on the front end, you're coming out way further ahead on the backside. So you paid for speed, and in advanced yourself at a much quicker rate. And so it's just like, with Russell going in and getting into inner circle, spending that time there, learning more depth about the synergies and the vertical integrations of how we can build things out. And then also with horizontal integrations. And I think it's important to note is you mentioned why is marketing important? Well, guys remember with what we do, we not only own the real estate in our investments, we own the business as well. And every business has to have customers. So we've been... I mean, it's been the last two years, we've been heavy, deep dive into understanding how to create traffic and drive traffic into every investment. We want to be able to control piece of the investment and then add value in other areas. So, we've talked about wedding and event venues in the past, right? One of the niches we have investments in. Well, 91% of the ownership there doesn't have any paid online traffic. So what happens when we come into a market, and we drive all of our digital marketing into it? It changes the game. It's an X Factor, right? So these little tweaks, build X factors into every market and investment that we would go into.
- Yeah, I love that. To say that a whole another way. We've done the hard work, if you're going to be in the private market, you're in the public market as Ray Dalio says you're in the world's poker game.
- You're competing,
- you're competing-
- That's important.
- Against-
- Point to note.
- With the best players in the world in poker. But we've spent the millions of dollars to go get the council. We've got the council from the legends. Over the last 14 years, we've spent the time, we've built the sweat labor. And you guys damn young me
- And we're still building it.
- It's all vitamins. I mean, the eye cream. No, I started young, I play hard, I work hard, and we've spent the time, the late hours, the wee hours, I'm telling you Tony that an in between four and 1:00 am and then I go talk to him afterwards and beg him dead for more answers. So I'm just telling you right here, we've spent the time so you didn't have to spend the time. And that's how we build out the investments, the massive due diligence, we find the holes, we pull the levers we push the buttons, we actually realize... I mean, every single mental framework I've taken from whether they're a billionaire like Ray Dalio, or they own 21 different companies that have a revenue of 5 billion or 6 billion like Tony Robbins. The underlying mental frameworks are what sit before every single investment we buy, whether it's a $10 million, property fund or it's a $50 million property fund, and so you're coming into something that has been vetted unscrupulously like, just with all the technology, the advancement of due diligence, the ability to like pull back the curtain and see all the problems that could be and then fix them. You're coming into something that's tried and true. And that's what's... That's the blessing of having multiple counselors that bring safety. Again, Proverbs 11:14, where there's no counselor, what the context would be is not having lots of counselors. So there's no counselor the people fell. But in a multitude of counselors, there is safety. So I just asked you the question, right now where you're at. Do you feel safe? You want to feel safe whether the economy is in a volatile market or the public market, the stock markets in a volatile situation. You just got to say, do I feel safe? Is there where I want to be? Is it the counselors I'm looking for? Do I need new counselors? And, man, it's been... It's so good. We love any market, in the private side, we love any economic cycle. I mean, this cycle is going to be the cycle is and I can't control it. I have influence over our private market. But I can't control the globe. But that's the beautiful thing about being in the private market. So you don't have to control the globe, you can actually tie the roots and the anchors down in the 3D investments that a Solomon Investor has. And I mean, you can actually control that market. You can control the price, you can control the traffic, you can control the expenses. And, man, I just love what we do, Zack, it is so fun. Like every day is a new adventure, every day as we expand, we look at new portfolios or buying, new large acquisitions. It's just... 'Cause nobody plays with the the peak performance that we're going into. So everyone's we got holes, every investments got a hole, we find them, we extract the greatness out of them. And that's why we've had people I mean, I think the longest out of the 14 years I think I've had people who have been with me 12 years of the 14 and goodness invested six, seven, eight times over, deals and doubled and tripled and quadrupled their earnings, is so good.
- It's been a fun episode.
- It has and if you guys have not tapped into all the resources that we got for you I want you to go to Solomon, or I want you to text. Go to your cell phone and text the word Solomon to 31996 we've got so many goodies we want to give ya'. Financial literacy, that's what you got to have. You got to have wisdom. I want to give you a Solomon's wisdom, I want to impart into the wisdom that we're getting from the counselors. From the Tony Robbins, the Ray Dalios, the Keith Cunninghams, Robert Kiyosakis, the Russell Brunsons. These are just the ones we've been on this podcast. I mean, we're chock full of... We've spent the money, we've spent the time, we've poured in. I want to give it to ya'. So type in, go to your text, if you want to send me a text message, at the top, you're going to put the phone number 31996, just those five numbers. Then you're going to put the word Solomon, S-O-L-O-M-O-N and when you press send, that's going to send you a link that's going to allow you to plug in Financial Literacy is Everything. And if your money is as important to you as your money is to us, then that's the most important thing that you could do right now is gain financial literacy. So guys, it's been grand. Until next time, this is the Solomon Investor Podcast. God bless you guys. We'll talk to you soon.