S5 E8 - Reality TV To Top Broker; Vincent Anzalone

Vincent Anzalone tells us what it’s like to watch yourself on reality TV.  Surving the mortgage bust in 2008.  We discluss getting thru hard times in life and in work.  Projects that set new record pricing and finally being a dad and what that really means 

• how Bravo casting worked before social media 
• how a sizzle reel line became an issue for his girlfriend 
• navigating marriage stress when the show airs 
• losing Jay Michael and what legacy looks like 
• why showing up at funerals matters 
• family stories that reshape perspective over time 
• tech shifts from microfiche to ChatGPT and what it breaks 
• surviving the 2008 mortgage crash and reinventing work 
• building a Chicago real estate business through networks 
• how buyers changed with Zillow, Redfin, and Zenlist 
• winning competitive deals with escalation clauses and strong guidance 
• the Illumina Wicker Park bet and neighborhood value 
• fatherhood as the only priority and youth sports sanity 

Don't forget to subscribe, download, and we'll see you soon. 
Go to funerals. 

Transcript

Bravo Fame And A Wild Soundbite

SPEAKER_01 0:00

My wife and I would sit down, and she had just had our son. A lot of the things I said on that show that were crazy. When I say one summer, I slept at 60 girls. Last year, yeah, it was two years ago. It was the craziest summer of my life. And she would watch the episode, and then she's like, I need to go for a walk.

SPEAKER_02 0:19

What's the five P's? Do you remember it?

SPEAKER_01 0:21

Preparation prevents poor performance.

SPEAKER_02 0:24

There you go. It doesn't matter how much money we get, if we don't close, it's no money, right? So no close is no money. I'm everything that I am because of my dad's death. And I wouldn't be as successful without his death. All right, welcome to the Jason Theory, keeping it real. We have an incredible guest today, a top real estate agent and a TV star.

SPEAKER_00 0:50

I mean, I was actually. In my house. Oh, in your house? Well, that's that's that's important.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

In my house.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

That I like.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

Vince, please give us a little bit of your bio tell using.

SPEAKER_01 0:59

Okay, well, the TV show you're talking about is uh 100 Days of Summer. It was on Bravo Network. It was like, I think it was 2014. It was. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_02 1:08

2014.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Which is, you know, a while ago. Let's just say that.

SPEAKER_02 1:11

12 years ago.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Also, this camera uh adds a hundred pounds. That's why I point that out.

SPEAKER_02 1:17

Yeah, it's a special camera.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Special camera. I so that show started off as there was a show in a Bravo called Most Eligible Dallas. Okay. It was like single people in Dallas. And so they were gonna do most eligible Chicago. So that's what the tryouts were for.

SPEAKER_02 1:33

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:33

And I went and I did the interview.

SPEAKER_02 1:35

So how did how do they reach out to you? Because it's not like it's social media now. Social media, like they search social media for people now. Like how do they reach out to you?

SPEAKER_01 1:42

Well, there's this girl named Kelly Zink, who was a friend of mine actually way back with my intern when I worked in TV sports a long time ago. And she was in media and they came to her and she recommended me to these this casting company that was working with Bravo to find a cast.

SPEAKER_02 1:59

And you're in hospitality at this point.

SPEAKER_01 2:01

I was yes. I wait because I was I did mortgages from 2000 to 2009. We know you know I stopped in 2009. And then I did hospitality promotions, I mean just straight up club promotion for like six, seven years. And so that this is that era, and I was in my uh my drunken phase, basically. Just run drunk all the time. And I was working in clubs, and she said, You should go to this casting for most eligible Chicago. So that's that's how it started. It was supposed to be most eligible people. Okay, and they put together a cast and we shot like a sizzle reel, but they send it.

SPEAKER_02 2:37

I know the sizzle, they send it out.

SPEAKER_01 2:38

Yeah, the production company sends it to Bravo. Yep. And they go, All right, guys, stay tuned. They're they think they're gonna make a quick decision here, we'll get back to you. And like you're waiting, not like waiting, like you know, holding your breath, but after like a month, two months, three kind of forget about it. Like 18 months later. 18? They come back and go, all right, we're ready to go. And like, well, I in the meantime, I had met like the love of my life, and she had moved from New York to Chicago to be with me.

SPEAKER_02 3:07

He explains this in episode one.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

In episode one, yeah, it's on Amazon and iTunes. And I I don't get any money for it, so I'm don't really care if you watch. So I um my my now wife had moved to Chicago to be with me, and Bravo's like, or the production company said, Can you go on dates? I go, I can't go on dates. I can't go on build up dates with people. I have this girl who moved here to be with me.

SPEAKER_03 3:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

And everyone dates with her, dates with other people. I'm sorry, dates with other people. And I'm like, no, crazy. And they go, Okay, well, we'll try to work around it. And everyone else on the show pretty much had coupled up because they were going for the most eligible people, and they were right. They picked people who were gonna hook up. And it's a year and a half later. Yeah, 18 months.

Reality TV Editing And Fallout

SPEAKER_01 3:51

And so I want to say this about a lot of the things I said in that show that were crazy. When they first shot the scissor reel, I had the blue and white gingham shirt. And I'm in most of my interviews, you see that blue and white gingham shirt. When I say one summer, I slept with 60 girls. Last year, yeah. Two years ago was the craziest summer of my life. And because they said I was laughing. They said, like, say crazy things to the shoulder.

SPEAKER_02 4:13

So that was the sizzle? That was the sizzle. And they brought it to the regular.

SPEAKER_01 4:16

You go hold on to that shirt. And I didn't think it through. And they go, oh, sure. Okay. And because when I came back, now I'm like, now this girl's moved to Chicago to be with me. I'm in a serious relationship. And at it look, and I'm wearing the same shirt talking about her as I am saying 60 girls. So I would never have said that if I was in a relationship. Yeah. But it looks like I did.

SPEAKER_02 4:39

Bro, I watched it this morning. They totally did it the right way.

SPEAKER_01 4:42

Yeah, they're fucked me. I mean, but I I could have stopped it, but yeah, it's okay. It's not true.

SPEAKER_02 4:46

Because like in my mind, you had just met her, who's now your wife. Yes. Everybody. Yes. So like I'm like, oh my God. I go, he just said this, and now they're watching it.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

I know. Oh my God.

SPEAKER_02 4:59

I when when when the show Did you explain to her, like, hey, listen, that's from years ago?

SPEAKER_01 5:04

Yes. Totally. I said, Oh, this, I really'm like, oh my God, that's gonna be bad. This is gonna be bad. And so I every week they would send me a DVD of the episode that was gonna air the next I know. That was gonna air the next night. So my wife and I would sit down and she had just had our son.

SPEAKER_02 5:23

Oh my god, this gets better.

SPEAKER_01 5:25

So she's super hormonal. And I mean, it's I can laugh now, thank God.

SPEAKER_02 5:30

But should we watch a show and she'd be like, What why would every everything, why would you say this should be so mad? And you know what it is too? Now it's oh, I'm gonna walk around with you, and that's the woman that married the whore.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Yes, that guy's together. Yeah, it's cool. My family dude, I feel you were so embarrassed. Like my extended family's like, what's wrong with you? Who did you marry? No, my family to me. Oh, her family was like, oh my god, did is she with the wrong guy? That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_02 5:57

Yes, her family had to be freaking.

SPEAKER_01 5:59

And she would watch the episode, and then she's like, I need to go for a walk. And it was like February. Bro, isn't that walking weather?

SPEAKER_02 6:07

That's a huge strain.

SPEAKER_01 6:08

I know it was. And and God bless my wife, Jessica. Like, one of the greatest things about her, she's like, either I get over it or I don't. Either we move forward or and then she so she doesn't bring that shit up. She doesn't bring up anything from the past, which is pretty unique in my woman.

SPEAKER_03 6:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

To not like go, remember that one time 10 years ago. She's not like that at all. And so I got the right person for this physician. Uh, but every week it was like, why would you say that? What's wrong with you? I I have to go for a walk. And she'd go for a walk and she'd come back. How old were you? I mean, this is upper 20s? No, no, it was uh I was 40. At the time? Yeah. You're probably like that at 40? Yes. I was at the very tail end. Your mid-50s? I'm 54.

SPEAKER_02 6:55

Are you two years old than me? You look good, dude. What are you talking about? The fatness come on.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

I could do better. My wife's incredibly fit, so it's very frustrating.

SPEAKER_02 7:02

Why don't you have her kick your ass?

SPEAKER_01 7:04

I I mean, I know. This is not a is this is like an intervention? Is my wife coming in? No, I mean, yeah, I gotta get together. I've been a little lazy. But like it was, you know, I was I was a grown man, you know. And uh I was but then when we when she got pregnant, I'm like, I gotta get out of this nightclub stuff.

SPEAKER_02 7:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:23

And so I guess when I got back into it. So I would like I said I did mortgages for like 10 years and I had my own company, and so I really was involved. So it wasn't like I was a co-promoter going straight into real estate. Like I had done real estate, and I had you know, hundreds of clients that I had from mortgages that thought, oh, this guy's a real estate guy. And they didn't go to you know, Couvey or Underground and see me there. Yeah. So they probably wouldn't have used me. Uh so then I had like a little bit of gravitas when I came back into real estate in God, what year

Loss, Legacy, And Funeral Wisdom

SPEAKER_01 7:52

was that?

SPEAKER_02 7:52

15, maybe Jay, who passed away, who we're talking about, who started flats, and then you're telling me it just exploded.

SPEAKER_01 8:00

Oh yeah. He was great. Uh so Jay Michael My sister knew him well.

unknown 8:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:05

And had nothing but fond things to say. He was because when we're watching the show, Sophia's like, she's like, I see him all the time.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

Yeah, he was really funny, super smart, really creative. He created this whole marketing brand with his partner Alex, and they had this company, Flats. And they were the first company to really focus on micro apartments, like very small living spaces, but great amenities. Uh at a time that was just kind of coming out for rentabilities, they really like but now that's everything. That's everything.

SPEAKER_02 8:30

Yeah. And they here's your 700 square foot two bedroom, two bath.

SPEAKER_01 8:34

Yeah, it's for like three grand.

SPEAKER_02 8:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:35

And they they they've gone the company since has gone national. From what I understand, to this day, Alex still gives Jay's mom a 10% cut of everything.

SPEAKER_02 8:47

As he should.

SPEAKER_01 8:48

I know, but like he should.

SPEAKER_02 8:50

That's just being a Santa person.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

He's he's a mensch, as they say in their in their community. But like people he should, but I don't know that everyone does. He's doing it. Yeah. And that's I mean, you know, you know, good job, Alex. Proud of you. And so, but Jay uh was 35 years old, had a brain tumor, and out of nowhere, and then he went through first round of treatment. And my wife and my son Luca at the time was probably like five, right? And we went to go visit him in the hospital, and he was in remission, he was coming back, and we're like so excited, we're gonna get together and spend time together again. We're so just like we're like crying, we're so happy. And then, like two weeks later, like he died. Like, what? It was I can't, I mean, right now, it's it was it was rough. Uh, because he was just a great person and like a like a real like pillar in real estate. It was a big yeah, who knows what he would have done. I mean, the company's gone crazy with without him, and he wouldn't have held them back. Uh, but so it was a real loss for everybody, and that was that was the guy that I really connected with the most on that show, probably. And like Ray Austin was a guy who played for the Bears. Yeah. He's funny on the show. When we got in that he's funny on the show, he's hilarious. He's one of the funniest people you'll ever meet.

SPEAKER_02 10:03

She's like, I got a little bit of clout. I played for the Bears.

SPEAKER_01 10:06

It's great, but like you see this guy, like when you see a strong safety in the NFL is the greatest athlete on the planet. Yeah, you're fast, you're strong, it's like everything. Yeah, and that's him. And when he was mad at me and he said he's gonna punch me in the face, I was like, oh my god, this is gonna hurt so bad. Because I'm like, I'm not gonna back down, but he's definitely gonna kick my ass. You know, and that because there's no we had the one C on the show in uh when we raced on the golf course. Yes. This guy was like, he was not just state champion. He was what we talked about, because I was a fast track star in high school, believe it or not. When I was a senior year, I was the fastest white guy in Illinois, but it didn't make the finals.

SPEAKER_02 10:46

I thought you were like the 50th fastest person.

SPEAKER_01 10:49

Yeah, maybe. And but so it was decent, in fact. But when he told me his track times, I was like, what? Holy cow. So we were goofing around the race on the golf course. We ran. I mean, he just he ran backward past me. That's how much faster he was. But uh so he was great, and a lot, you know, a lot of people on the show I did I did keep in touch with a little bit, but at this point, not really anybody. Uh, Tara, who was a vet, she moved to Wisconsin, but she was my veterinarian for my dogs before she moved. When she married this guy, Mark Bell, who's great. Uh, they're a great family, but other ones I don't really see it that much anymore.

SPEAKER_02 11:21

Yeah. What what like when Jay passed, what was what changes? Any changes in terms of how you held yourself, how you looked at things, yeah. How you looked at your kid, your wife, like what what because the silver lining in someone dying when you're it's unexpected is the knowledge you gain about life itself.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

Yeah, I mean, I know you lost your dad.

SPEAKER_02 11:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:45

I lost my dad when I was 19. And the one thing I noticed was that when I was, you know, 19, it was just like, wait, what? Yeah, what's happening? It was the lung cancer, he smoked, it was quick. And so I've never smoked a cigarette my entire life. I'm not an idiot. So I mean, I am an idiot, but not there. He so when my dad died, the next day I realized like, oh my god, like everyone must be so shattered. But I'm like, you know what? Everyone got up, went to work, the life goes on.

SPEAKER_02 12:15

Life goes on.

SPEAKER_01 12:16

Like your life is fucked. Like, you know what I mean? But like, and people care, but you get one day, you get that one day to mourn and for people to really like let you know that they they care about you and they care about your dad and this stuff. And then the next day, the sun comes up, sun comes up, people go to work, and that was a it's a great lesson. And I know this did your podcast a lot of that is like you know, I would be of everything I am, is because my dad died. And and like I get that. And then my mom died when I was 35 of breast cancer. So I was an orphan. And that was a that was a rough one. But I'll tell you what, I go to a lot of funerals. I don't know about you, but I go to if you there's a funeral for someone that, even though they're not my friend, but I respect them, and I can go, I go. Because I know they just get you get one day.

SPEAKER_02 13:08

Fuck, I'm like the opposite, man. I stay away. I stay away. Gotta go. I can't.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Yes, you can. No, I'm telling you, like you I went to my aunt's funeral.

SPEAKER_02 13:17

My my my niece died. She got she drowned in she was young in in our spring break. She went to save somebody that was drowning, and the guy turned around. Like saves himself. Saved himself. Listen, it it's a fight or flight, it's a human thing.

SPEAKER_01 13:32

Yeah, human thing. He's not a bad person.

SPEAKER_02 13:34

And it's probably the last like that was like twenty years ago that my aunt. Okay, no, that was different.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

I'm not gonna tell you how to live your life. I'm just telling you that for me, I should. I should feel there's no true selfless act. There's no there's no such thing.

SPEAKER_02 13:52

Yeah, I agree with you.

SPEAKER_01 13:53

I'm going there for them, but for me.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

For you too.

SPEAKER_01 13:56

Yeah, I mean, because it makes me feel good. Now I don't enjoy it. So I've it's borderline selfless. Uh and I'm not trying to say I'm great here, but I it's just my thing. Like if and I've uh emboldened and and increased relationships over this, which is not my like intent. I'm I'm really just there because I know what that's like and how much it means to that person. You don't re forget you don't remember like who didn't go, but you remember everyone who was there.

SPEAKER_02 14:25

Yeah, you do.

SPEAKER_01 14:25

You don't go, oh that guy missed it. No. It's just like no, that guy was there, and then that girl was there. And I I remember that. So I go for that. Did you go to Larissa's Holebrook? I was out of town. That was I couldn't go rough.

SPEAKER_02 14:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

Rough. I just I just saw today, I actually yesterday, on Instagram, I looked at some page, I said, Kath and Holbrook follows this person. I was like, oh yeah. And I and I lost a a friend uh last week. Same thing. Like I have dead people on my phone, which is it it's a weird thing. You know, it's like you want to text them sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 15:04

Our assistant passed away three, four years. Yeah. Fentanyl. And and I and that and I have heard like I they it's randomly that our our marketing girl has the same first name. So when I put the name in, it's her and then it's our old assistant. And I can't delete it? I can't delete it.

SPEAKER_01 15:25

No. I can't either. I have unfortunately a lot of dead people in my phone in

Family Stories That Stretch Time

SPEAKER_01 15:30

my phone. So my stepfather died a couple years ago. He was 94.

SPEAKER_02 15:34

That's a great life.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Fantastic life. Like he was born, and I did his at his eulogy at the funeral. His first memory, you'll love this. We were having dinner at Formento's about 10 years ago. I have an older stepbrother and a younger half-brother, a very complicated family. And we talked about, I was talking about the Devil in the White City, the book, and it's about the World's Fair of 18 uh 97.

SPEAKER_03 16:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 16:01

And then they also talk a little bit about the Columbian Exposition, which was the next World's Fair in 1933 in Chicago. And I mentioned that, and my stepfather goes, I was there. And my brothers keep talking, and I go, wait, hold on a second. Did you what did you say? Oh, sorry. I said, What did you say? He goes, I was there. You were the 1933 World's Fair. He goes, Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:23

Think of what he's seen.

SPEAKER_01 16:24

Oh my that's what I said. He goes, It's my first memory because my sister took me, he was three years old, because he was born in 1930. He was three years old. He he says she walks me up these stairs to big steel tank with water. He doesn't know what's in there. And he gets up there and a hippopotamus comes out of the water in front of him, and it scared the shit out of him. That's his very first memory. Because you know, like my first memory is when I like cracked my head open, my family's upset about it. And like you remember these high-emotion moments in print. This is his first memory. 1933 World's Fair. Oh my god. What he saw. And he was uh he was a great man, he was in the Air Force, he was a everybody served back then. It's 11 sisters. Oh my brothers.

SPEAKER_02 17:09

And yeah there was 12 children.

SPEAKER_01 17:11

12 children.

SPEAKER_02 17:12

11?

SPEAKER_01 17:13

Two of them died young. One, this is horrible. One was like dropped behind a radiator in like south side of Chicago. He went to Farragut High School and died from Mike Burns at a very young age. Like the way kids died back then. That's why they had 12 kids. Yes. Because you lost a couple. You're gonna lose some. Yeah, but my dad's family, most of them lasted, you know, in the 90s. Like I had my stepdad, but still. Like he raised me. He was he was great. But yeah, it's a totally different time. He went to Farragut Academy, which was he was Jewish. There were like kosher Jews, so they had two kitchens. You know, but it's funny because when he raised me, he really didn't care about Judaism that much. My w my mother went to Catholic school.

SPEAKER_02 17:54

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 17:55

So we did, I've always done Christmas in Hanukkah, like everyone. Yeah, where's the last name come from? Antonio, that's from my real dad.

SPEAKER_02 18:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

The guy dad, and there's a whole other story, but that's a whole another podcast.

SPEAKER_02 18:06

And you kept his last name.

SPEAKER_01 18:08

Because my my mom divorced him when I was four.

SPEAKER_02 18:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 18:12

And then I married my stepfather.

SPEAKER_02 18:14

Did your stepfather end up adopting you?

SPEAKER_01 18:17

No, he wanted to, but I did my my father still in my life. Oh.

SPEAKER_02 18:21

He wasn't like he. Oh, I didn't know I didn't know if he was a man. No, no, yeah. He's great. No, he's great.

SPEAKER_01 18:24

I saw him every weekend. We were we were really close. Oh, okay. That's different. Oh, he's great.

SPEAKER_02 18:28

Okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:28

And him and my grandfather like that.

SPEAKER_02 18:30

That makes more sense.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Will you change your name?

SPEAKER_02 18:33

You're Italian, damage.

SPEAKER_01 18:35

Exactly. Anyway, so is this podcast? Am I bringing it down? No. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 18:41

This is really interesting.

SPEAKER_01 18:42

Okay, good. So I just thought that was really crazy that he was born in 1930. He was at the 1933 World's Fair. Yeah, he did he did see a lot. Like you said, what what did he see?

SPEAKER_02 18:52

I mean It's crazy. My grandfather lived to 105.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_02 18:57

And he was at my house.

SPEAKER_01 18:59

Well, when did he die? What year did he die?

SPEAKER_02 19:01

Maybe 15 years ago. Okay. No, no, more. Because what year was he born then? I think no, literally. Yeah. So my son was m just born, so two years, and then he died about five years afterwards. And my son's 18, so 16 years ago. So put that together.

SPEAKER_01 19:25

I'm not good at math. Me either. Not right now. That's why we're realtors. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:29

And uh, and he's like, and I was we're talking, and in and like I got a guy who's like 95 years old. He's been alive since basically like 1907, 1905, lived through the depression, two world wars, everything. And I just looked at him and I was like, what and I I I it'd be interesting if you could think about this question and go back to your grandpa.

Tech Whiplash From Cars To ChatGPT

SPEAKER_02 19:51

Yeah. And I said, What is the what is the one invention that changed the world the most since you've been alive? And he just sat back and he looked at me and he goes, The car.

SPEAKER_01 20:04

Yes. That was my my grandfather born right around 1902. And that was the same time.

SPEAKER_02 20:12

Carmen.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

I think that model A was 1903.

SPEAKER_02 20:14

Yeah, he said he said when the car got affordable, he goes, the world got small.

SPEAKER_01 20:18

Yeah, well, I'm throwing horses.

SPEAKER_02 20:20

They're on fucking horses.

SPEAKER_01 20:21

That's why if you ever read Devil in the White City, which was back in 1897, there were like dead horses in the street. They would just leave them there. And then like the sanitation wasn't great. Who eats them? No, like rats. Oh you think rats are bad now. And there'd be dead dogs and dead horses and like all this smut uh I think it's cuts that's the word. Like, you know, black in air. And like they said you couldn't see like more than a block because it was such bad. You think we had bad air quality last week?

SPEAKER_02 20:51

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:52

There was nothing. I mean these people were smoking 400 packs a day.

SPEAKER_02 20:55

I love when people are like, we're in such a terrible time. I'm like, bro, people are living to 95 now. Shut up.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

Yes, you know, I oh Bill Maher is the one person that's public that kind of is the closest to what I think I am.

SPEAKER_02 21:08

He hates that, what people say. He hates that. And I agree.

SPEAKER_01 21:11

He goes, You think it's worse? Like my stepfather was in the Air Force in Biloxi and they had colored, you know, colored people drinking phones. You think it's worse now? I mean, come on.

SPEAKER_02 21:22

He Bill Maher also brought up once. He goes, he goes, he's like, 50 years ago, you took a cold shower.

unknown 21:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:28

Didn't have hot water.

SPEAKER_01 21:30

Yeah, it's like it's the things that have gotten better. It's unbelievable. Yeah. I mean, just in my life, it's I my wife is nine years younger than me. So there's she's not that much different, but there's some things, like some songs come up, and I'm like, I was like in high school, she was like, I was like, you know, nine or something. It sounds pretty creepy. And one thing is when I went, when I went to India, I went to Indiana University. Okay. Can you believe our football team, by the way?

SPEAKER_02 21:55

Dude, you guys are like psychotic.

SPEAKER_01 22:00

Because I never followed them because they were horrible. Then I'm like, how are we the best team in the country?

SPEAKER_02 22:06

No. Yes. Yes. What's his name? Mark Cuban.

SPEAKER_01 22:09

Yes. Yeah, he was a big part. And Signetti. Signetti just did it.

SPEAKER_02 22:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:12

Perfectly dude. Anyway, I went to Indiana. I I was the only guy in our dorm who had a word processor with like three lines of text.

SPEAKER_02 22:22

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 22:22

So everybody would go and borrow my. It wasn't that it was expensive.

SPEAKER_02 22:25

You would type, it was just there, and then you hit enter to make sure. Go, you check it first.

SPEAKER_01 22:29

It wasn't everyone said typewriter.

SPEAKER_02 22:31

I think it was I think it was a brother.

SPEAKER_01 22:33

It was a brother or Smith Corona, maybe?

SPEAKER_02 22:36

I had a brother with like three lines.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

It was like you flipped it up. Yeah. Yeah. It was like kind of green. Yes. Yeah. So I went. With dot matrix. And it was like three lines, and you could edit it. And that was unbelievable.

SPEAKER_02 22:47

Unbelievable.

SPEAKER_01 22:47

And you press a button, it would print. Next. So we'd have people in my room all the time using that thing. Man, can I use it? I'm like, yeah, but I go do my papers.

SPEAKER_02 22:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:56

And my wife thinks that's hilarious.

SPEAKER_02 22:58

And I go, and when when I We didn't, so you're two years, you didn't have email either.

SPEAKER_01 23:01

No. I the on the year I was leaving school, they just started.

SPEAKER_02 23:05

But it was inner school, inner school. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 23:08

Indiana.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 23:09

Yeah. I mean, I didn't I didn't have a cell phone until I was 29.

SPEAKER_02 23:13

Oh, just forget it.

SPEAKER_01 23:14

My son is old.

SPEAKER_02 23:16

I know.

SPEAKER_01 23:16

No.

SPEAKER_02 23:17

Forget it. It's crazy. One guy had a phone and he was filthy rich at my school, and his dad was an agent, and he had to have a phone, and he we got stuck once in the mountains in Malibu. And his G he's like, hold up. It sounds like a problem. Real campaign problem. He pulled out it actually. He pulls out this brick phone that's got to be about this big, the gray one brick. I'm like, what is that? The bag. Yeah. Yeah. And he's like, he's like, dude, this is a phone. He's like, we've got to be quick, though. It's like $3 a minute. And he goes, it's $1.50 just to connect. It was crazy. And I was like, bro, what?

SPEAKER_01 23:51

That was the first one. That was it's they're cheaper now. What you said, something else that made me think of something that we're old guys talking about stuff, people probably bored to death. But there's something else that changed a lot.

SPEAKER_02 24:05

And then I mean when we used to write papers, you had to go to the library in the microfiche, right? Like you'd have to look up every article and read books.

SPEAKER_01 24:15

It was wild. Like you couldn't like read research was going getting the book, was not like Googling things. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 24:21

You know what's terrible now is that my my son will get something from high school and it'll be like a hold this or hold that. My sons now take whatever teachers get them and they run it through ChatGPT. And then ChatGPT is like, this was written by ChatGPT. My son's like, even the teachers won't even do anything.

SPEAKER_01 24:39

I know. I know. It's crazy because I have a buddy who's a principal at a school, it's like Dev Devry High School. Okay. It's a newer high school. Brian Nairo, high Brian. Great guy. He's a master's in like English. He's super educated. With Dundee Scotland. He's like the most well-read person I've ever met. And uh he says they have to have these programs to detect whether or not it's written by ChatGBT, because kids are just doing that all the time. And for I'm sure like for a couple years, or maybe they got away with it.

SPEAKER_02 25:10

Yeah. Now it's like they have that stuff where it's like they need to.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

We had to buy Cliff Notes. Cliff Notes, the kids don't know about Cliff Notes anymore. Cliff Notes were the best. It was. It was like, for the anyone who doesn't know at the time I shoe, it was a summary of a book that you were supposed to read. Like, read the Odyssey, and you're like, no way. So it would give you like enough that you could talk about it.

SPEAKER_02 25:32

Yeah, it'd be like it would take 500 pages and make it 40 pages. And the print was big. It's too much to read. It's still too much. I think I did the clip notes on everything.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

I did read The Devil in the White City. That's why I bring bringing it up. It's like the book I've ever read. That's my one book.

SPEAKER_02 25:48

She got a tattoo of that book on your back. I'm really into it. So what so what let's get into a little bit of real estate. So you're you're you're like, hey, I'm having a kid. I can't be out till three in the morning. I can't be partying four or five. Oh hold on. So what was when you said I'm stopped going out at nighttime, what were your spots? Let's go back to that.

SPEAKER_01 26:09

I was at Couvey A lot. What the fuck is Cuvier? Cuvée was a nightclub at 308 West Erie. Okay. Now it's not there. It turned into something else, and then people got shot.

SPEAKER_02 26:22

Well all that that whole area there, that's like sound bars, all the all those bars.

SPEAKER_01 26:28

Just a little bit northwest of a sound bar. Okay. And it was a 4 a.m. club and it had a good setup. It had like in the middle, you had all the VIP tables, and there are two bars, and you could just walk around the VIP section.

SPEAKER_02 26:40

When did when did bottle service get big? Because it wasn't when I like, you know, I probably hung everything up in like 05, 04.

SPEAKER_01 26:49

Right about it. Right that time.

SPEAKER_02 26:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:51

Because that's when I had my mortgage broker money.

SPEAKER_02 26:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:54

And that's how I got into Nike Life because I was spending so much money as a mortgage guy. And like I'm like, well, I do know this scene very well.

Reinventing After The Mortgage Crash

SPEAKER_01 27:02

And and after as my, you know, I always tell people I had a mortgage company in 2008. It wasn't like business slowed, it just stopped. The the faucet went off totally. And it wasn't like, oh man, we're doing a little less. No, we we went from doing lots of work to none super quick. And I had built a life based on that income. You know, the BMW, the big condo, and all the employees, and the big I was renting an office at 1030 North State. It was Arnie Morton's old office from Morton's Steakhouse.

SPEAKER_02 27:35

And we had a that's 1030 North State. Where were you?

SPEAKER_01 27:38

1050 was the business. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

Morton's was on this Morton's was on the north end.

SPEAKER_01 27:43

Yes. And it was that was the group basement. Yes. And we were like on the fourth floor. Oh, that are right to Morton's from our office.

SPEAKER_02 27:50

You know how much money did you spend at Morton's?

SPEAKER_01 27:51

Too much. And uh, but things were going good. We had, you know, we had employees, I had full-time employees, I had a lot of guys working for me, doing mortgages, and then it just went dark. And I had to like rent up my condo. I I send my car to swapolease.com. I had two condos at the time that I I barely held on to. Like I was deterred. A lot of people I knew were just like, just foreclose, let it go. You know, because you were just over the everything was so overleveraged. Yeah, there's no equity. It was all leveraged. I was like, I'm not gonna let them go. So I moved to like a one-bedroom apartment and I just cut my costs a lot, and I just was I held on to them. I barely did. And it worked because you moved back into one of them.

SPEAKER_02 28:31

What were you doing to like so you're your how did you go from the mortgages to not making any money to holding on? Obviously, rebuilding, did you go straight into like this? No one had did people have money then? 08 to 11. Were people spending money on bottles? Yes.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

People always have money for alcohol. I mean, at least they did. I guess this new era, this new generation. No one drinks. But back then, it was the I think some people always have money. There's people who benefit from you know bad times.

SPEAKER_02 29:01

My clients made millions from 08 to 12. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 29:04

A lot of guys like Don Wilson, who had a lot of money.

SPEAKER_02 29:07

Doogie made five five X. Bought all this real estate.

SPEAKER_01 29:10

Great. I mean, the guy did some great stuff.

SPEAKER_02 29:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:12

You gotta give it to him.

SPEAKER_02 29:14

I traded next to him for years.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

Oh, really? Yeah. DRW, Monster. Wow, monster. Monster. I mean, that's true.

SPEAKER_02 29:21

He was the single largest trader in the world for a long time.

SPEAKER_01 29:24

Really?

SPEAKER_02 29:25

Oh, dude, if I told you the amount of contra like if the amount of money that came through him, like on a platform, if he was a platform, billions.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 29:37

On a daily basis.

SPEAKER_01 29:38

I mean, it's crazy.

SPEAKER_02 29:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:39

But he did. And then the building's about like the where uh restoration hardware is, you bought it.

SPEAKER_02 29:43

Yeah, but he bought all of oak straw.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

Yeah, all this stuff.

SPEAKER_02 29:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:48

So I was, like I said, the money was gone. And one of my buddies, Lonnie Rodriguez, had moved out of town. He was a promoter, moved out of town, came back to Tony and Lonnie. Yeah, yes. Yes. And then Lonnie came back, and Tony kind of had his own thing and didn't really need Lonnie anymore. And Lonnie like knew how to do promotions.

SPEAKER_02 30:06

Tony and Lonnie were at Funky Buddha. Yes. And they worked out with me at the old place on Clark. Yeah. Where Jordan played, Pip and played. Yeah. So all the traders, that's we were the ones filling all the seats.

SPEAKER_01 30:22

Luke Canellis. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:24

And one of those two had the blonde hair, was tall, thin, slender guy.

SPEAKER_01 30:28

Oh, that was that was Tony Tony was a little shorter. Lonnie's like a real handsome Puerto Rican guy.

SPEAKER_02 30:34

Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

And uh so Lonnie came back and goes, Look, I I know how to do this promotion stuff, but I've haven't been here for a while. And you know everyone. The Buddha was done then, right? It was done then, yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 30:44

This is this is like 2008. Yeah. Because they kept making the Buddha bigger.

SPEAKER_01 30:51

Yeah. And then it beat and then Funky would something else now, but then they did Red No 5 too. Okay. On it was on Fulton Market, and they were new, and they said they would give us like $1,500 to do a Saturday night flat. And I'm like, I need I need $750. Yeah. You know what I mean? I could use it like to keep my everything afloat here. And so we started doing that. And we started we did Saturday nights and then we started. So what do you do?

SPEAKER_02 31:21

Do you go out and try to like well we this is pre-social media?

SPEAKER_01 31:25

We had we had a lot of numbers and a lot of text marketing and calling people, texting them, a lot of texting. I would do, I think you could do like 20 at a time, and I would do like you know 400 text messages in a in a week and telling people, hey, come to Lumen Saturday. And that was kind of a flat fee deal, and a lot of deals changed. But then we started doing, we got really in with all the owners, and so if a new place opened, we kind of wanted to be the guys to introduce it. So we created this brand called Genuine Entertainment Chicago. And our we say we'd say our niche is new, which is easy because everybody wants to go to the new place.

SPEAKER_02 32:07

Yeah, I want to go to the new place.

SPEAKER_01 32:08

Also, we would do like Hubbard Inn and we did like Public House and we did Mercadito. We did Fridays at Mercadito. It was a huge deal. Yeah. The guys from Mercadino, I love them. They were from New York, and they had this just won the best taco in New York, and they came to Chicago and they're gonna open Mercadito. And they were smart enough, at least, to say, look, we don't really know anyone here, but we want to like connect to the community, so they hired us to do Friday nights there, and it was killed. It was we did it for like two years every Friday night. We were at Mercadito. It was just, it wasn't like a it wasn't like a club. It was like come to the bar. And there's a club downstairs called Double A, which was small, but really it was just come to the bar, hang out after dinner, come here, get a margarita, and then go out with us to Cuve or wherever, wherever. We went to Cuvey a lot. And then we also did like, I'm trying to think of some other places we did like oh Paris, well, Paris Club was it was a huge one.

SPEAKER_02 33:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:02

We did Paris Club on Thursdays. But at one point we would do one place at Wednesday early and then Wednesday night late, and then Thursday early, Thursday, and then so I was out Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday till four every every week. Oh, that's a lot. I cannot step in a club ever again. That's a lot. It's a lot. I mean, you're I'm basically hung over every day. And it's yeah, it's a lot.

SPEAKER_02 33:27

And you're not in your 20s.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

No, I wasn't. I was in my late 30s. Yeah, that's the recovery time. Okay. Yeah. And that Nelcote was this really cool place that Chris Dexter and these guys opened, Chris Freeman. Uh was like a was named after the place where the swelling stones rented a house in France, and it was really like kind of rock and roll in French. It was it was a cool concept. But yeah, I was still doing that until like 41, I think, is when I fully got out.

Becoming A Chicago Real Estate Agent

SPEAKER_02 34:02

And then you get into real estate.

SPEAKER_01 34:04

Got into real estate. I put on Instagram that I passed my test, and the first person to react is like Sean Conlin. He's like, come come meet with me right away.

SPEAKER_02 34:14

Sean's a good guy.

SPEAKER_01 34:15

He's the guy he's a Titan in the industry. So flattered. Yeah. And then also someone else too. Oh, Chris from Jameson. Okay. And we're we're friendly with both those guys. It was tough because I liked both of them. And Sean was like, you know, come, I'll show you. Frankly, Sean was never around.

SPEAKER_03 34:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:34

But it was still him, and I was really flattered. And so I worked with Conlin first.

SPEAKER_02 34:38

And he lives in Malibu most of the year.

SPEAKER_01 34:40

Yeah, I I guess no. He I think he's in the Caribbean.

SPEAKER_02 34:44

Oh, okay, because he was he was in Malibu for a long time.

SPEAKER_01 34:47

He's had a pretty nice life.

SPEAKER_02 34:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:50

He worked very hard for that. Yeah, yeah. He's earned it. And so Chris actually, Chris introduced me to Jim Miller, and Jim Miller interviewed me and they never called me back. So I'm like, okay. And Conlin stayed on top of me. So I'm like, okay, that's exactly what wants me more. So I worked with Conland for a while and then I moved over to domain properties for a short time. Okay. And then I went, I think I went to Dreamtown for that. So I've been with Dreamtown for a long time now. Dreamtown is Baron Water.

SPEAKER_02 35:17

Yeah. But same thing.

SPEAKER_01 35:18

Uh we're still, it's weird. We're still kind of, I still have you voltag. Oh, he's the owner. He's still involved. Heather Hillebrand's still my uh manager. So not much has changed, but I haven't moved a lot. And Dreamtown and Beared and Water have been great with me.

SPEAKER_02 35:31

So it's been good. What what have you noticed? What's the biggest changes in your clientele since you started till now? Like what are things that either annoy you or it's better? Like are there things that have just like you know has chat GPT, the computer, all the research people do? Is that do you do you feel that that is helped or hindered? Is it you know, like what's changed?

SPEAKER_01 35:58

I feel people are more they're more disengaged with the sort of properties that I'm sending them. You know what I mean? Like I I use Zenlist. The MLS MRED is just not very user-friendly. No, it's terrible. For me, it's the quickest way for me to get information. Like I know how to work that thing like you do. Like you want to know what when it was built, how many days I'm gonna do it.

SPEAKER_02 36:22

So I search and do all my stuff for myself on MLS. I mean, too. But all my clients are on Zenlist because it's just the easiest way to communicate.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

But I find they still send me Zillow and Redfin listings they want to see. And it's true, like a lot of my clients send me stuff. If they're if they're like real estate junkies, they're sending me the places that that we go, they go by for the most part. Um, if they're not, and I feel more useful, I like that. I like when I send them something, or if I get something for top agent network or off-market from someone else, hey, this is I just send a guy today something that uh Tim Sheehan sent me in the West Loop that's coming up. Like I feel like I feel more useful because I do really, and I'm sure I know you do too, but I really want to help my clients.

SPEAKER_02 37:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:08

I do feel I have a value in the process, absolutely. But I do feel like my searching has become less important to them because they have a lot of properties at their fingertips. But in kind of a good way for us, all this pocket listing stuff is kind of putting us in the driver's seat a little bit too, because they're looking at Zillow, they're not seeing anything on the PLN. You know, they're not seeing Ethereum Redfin, same thing. But they are seeing some things that they get. I don't even know what's happening with Zillow and Compass.

SPEAKER_02 37:40

It's different like every week.

SPEAKER_01 37:41

Every week.

SPEAKER_02 37:42

I'm like, I don't care anymore.

SPEAKER_01 37:43

I know, but like the good, I think that's good for us.

SPEAKER_02 37:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 37:46

Because I am still a junkie. I still look at stuff all the time. I have my own personal feed that I look at every day. Yeah, you too. Every like a few times a day, just to see what's out there. You know, I don't need to see what's going on in Middleothian. But like, I need, you know, if it's the north side of Chicago, I want to see what's going on. So I see like I look at hundreds of listings like every day, just kind of, I mean, I don't read all of them, but I I look at it.

SPEAKER_02 38:09

I look at the addies and if the address and the picture. And I'm like, oh, if this address, yeah, like when I wake up every morning, I have a search of the whole north side and it's news, new price list, new contingent price change.

SPEAKER_01 38:20

Price change, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:20

And I just go through them like, I don't care about the address, I don't care. Oh, it's totally, you know, it's a three united Ashland. I don't need to look at that.

SPEAKER_01 38:26

Yeah, it's 8900 south. I don't go that far anyway.

SPEAKER_02 38:28

But it also helps us like stay on top of things and have an idea of what's going on. What what are some of the challenges that you have with your clients right now in today's in I mean, obviously the low mark I'm not talking about like the low inventory. Yeah. Are there personality change chance stuff that you have with your clients that you didn't have in the past? Or are the most people you work with are people like that are are referrals and they're they're gonna be like, hey, I trust like I'm gonna trust you.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

Sphere focused, as I say. Most of my clients are people I know or friends of people I know. Every once in a while I'll get someone different. And I and again, and some sometimes in a way, like I had a client, actually, a client that made an offer on the house that you and I didn't get marked. This the second the second deal, and it was not as high as your number. Even include even considering they were not working with an agent. I, you know, I added that two and a half percent, and but they're still lower than you. And I but I said to them, I said, you know, I I I think you're gonna have a problem if you're in this competitive market working without an agent, because even if you're up there and you're competing, a lot of agents are not gonna be familiar with, I'm not gonna work with someone if they don't know that you know this business. And you, you know, you have someone who's guiding you, and they might get an inspection report and just cancel.

SPEAKER_02 39:56

Yeah, there's no there's no barrier of entry.

SPEAKER_01 39:58

Yeah, that's like, yeah, they're just I don't know what you are like. And if if they come with you and I know what you are like, I know what to expect.

SPEAKER_02 40:06

People don't understand that.

SPEAKER_01 40:07

Yeah. And so this is a great idea.

SPEAKER_02 40:09

I think people do

How Agents Win Competitive Deals

SPEAKER_02 40:10

that are smart.

SPEAKER_01 40:10

Well, these people now do because and I love them, they're great. We looked at it, we made a Jeff Lowe had a place on Altkill, they got like 25 offers with like $400,000 over asking prices. And we looked at this one in Lakeview, it's a great house. I worked with a panel at Marshack, it was awesome. It was a single family with a three-unit coach house in the back. Oh wow. And they were they're asking $195, which is low. If you consider that if you're getting six grand in that coach house in the back, it's worth like $800,000.

SPEAKER_02 40:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:42

Just that.

SPEAKER_02 40:43

Just that.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

And they're asking, so you're asking one one for a house in Lakeview. It's like, and not that she didn't price it wrong. It's just if you look at it that way, this is a great buy.

SPEAKER_00 40:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:54

And my clients needed a little flexibility with extra living space too. Like a nanny, maybe her mom. I go, this is great, guys. You can Airbnb one of them.

SPEAKER_02 41:01

When your parents, when your parents come in, you block those days off.

SPEAKER_01 41:03

And they just yeah, they just were rented out anyway, but like you can keep one empty.

SPEAKER_02 41:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:08

And so there were tw there were 25, 22 offers on that. No, 15 offers, sorry, my bad. 15 offers on that one. We I worked with Ma Pamela. We wrote this like really heartfelt letter. We did all the tricks. We did escalation clause. I mean, she and it worked. We barely got it by the skin of our teeth. And they would no way they would have gotten this house without me. No way. And they didn't, they never heard of escalation clauses or writing a letter. It doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_02 41:38

It's you the like you're you're the buyer. Yes, pretty much. Not them. Like people don't understand that. You're the buyer.

SPEAKER_01 41:45

Yeah. And so I felt like I really earned my keep there. And isn't nice. Isn't it feel nice? Yeah. You earned your keep. Yeah. Mine. 100%. You came in, here's my offer. I'm like, you're gonna get it.

SPEAKER_02 41:58

I pulled you aside first.

SPEAKER_01 41:59

Yeah, you did. You said, look, here's what's gonna happen. Here's what's gonna happen. I was like, I like what's gonna happen. So we're good.

SPEAKER_02 42:04

Yeah. I mean, they people don't understand that. And I think that's the that's the biggest change, I think, in our industry over the last two years, three years. And it could be from the low inventory, it could be from the changes in the PLN and us having stuff that people don't have. But I also think it's a lot from the changes that the federal government did, where now you have to have a buyer's agent.

SPEAKER_01 42:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:29

You have to have a buyer's agreement. I love the buyer's agreement.

SPEAKER_01 42:33

I know I was I didn't like it at first, but now I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_02 42:35

It's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 42:35

You know.

SPEAKER_02 42:36

I'm like, let's just get this out of the way right now.

SPEAKER_01 42:39

Yeah. Which is what you should always do. It is. It's like and it's more transparency and and people uh go, wait, I'm gonna have to pay 200%. I go, well, you don't have to. We but just so you know. Yeah. But like if something works out and you like it at that price and you're okay paying it, you can. But it's just I want you to know how this works. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:58

There's a gross and there's a net price.

SPEAKER_01 42:59

I tell people if you you make an offer with me getting paid from the seller, and if they don't want that, then don't do it if you don't want. You know, we can talk about it then. Yeah, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it, pretty much.

SPEAKER_02 43:11

I I really first and foremost, it gets rid of people that are really just not interested in using it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:17

Yeah. So they're just they're just using you to go peek and then they plan on going around you anyway.

SPEAKER_02 43:22

Yeah. And I'm like, oh, then you know, then this is this is let's just end this now. I I I love it. Where do you see things? How do you feel about the market?

SPEAKER_01 43:32

Well, this particular time we're in, you know, almost August. So it's gonna slow down here. It's slowing down a little bit. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:38

I mean, uh, how does how does your how do you do mentally when it slows down? Like when you're so crazy for six months and then all of a sudden it closes down a little bit, and you know it's gonna go back up.

SPEAKER_01 43:52

Every year I get I get freaked out. Yes, totally. You'd think we'd be better at this.

SPEAKER_02 43:56

I call my wife, I go, I'm so depressed, that's so slow. She goes, We have this conversation. Every year. Every year, the third week of July.

SPEAKER_01 44:02

Well, good. You know what? I know we're both crazy. I feel good now.

SPEAKER_02 44:05

Yeah. And I'm like, the world's falling apart. I'm depressed.

SPEAKER_01 44:08

And like I have I have a few great clients who are like always looking for stuff. They keep me engaged. I have uh I have a couple stuff right now, but not a ton. But we we had a we have a project in Wicker Park. Uh one in Wicker Park. Yeah.

Illumina And The Wicker Park Bet

SPEAKER_01 44:25

Yeah. Illumina, where it's a really cool situation. And I'm not here to pitch it, but usually in a 25 by 125 lot, on the back end of that 125 is an alley. Almost every lot in Chicago. But because of the way this works, so there's Paulina North of Division and Hermitage. Okay. North of Division. At the back of Paulina is Hermitage. So there's another street on the back and not an alley. So what we did is we took these six lots that were vacant for 50, 60 years. And every buddy wanted to do a multi-unit there. And the alderman's like, give me 20%, you know, affordable. Affordable. And then that developers like, no, this is the kills it. So my but my reading.

SPEAKER_02 45:06

So let's just talk about the fact. I've had numerous podcasts on it. So instead of getting affordable housing, not affordable, let's just say instead of getting two bedrooms, one bedroom, three bedrooms, and providing more housing, the Alderman killed it. So now we're getting four and a half million dollar houses.

SPEAKER_01 45:25

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 45:27

So it's not working. That's why we don't have houses. So the developer wanted to provide liquidity.

SPEAKER_01 45:35

Tons of developers.

SPEAKER_02 45:36

Yep. Everyone.

SPEAKER_01 45:37

Every developer wanted to do 40 units.

SPEAKER_02 45:40

No one wants to build $4.5 million homes.

SPEAKER_01 45:41

Now we're doing one-tenth of them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:43

Anyways, go on.

SPEAKER_01 45:44

So we took six lots. Now I say we. I mean, I didn't, I'm I'm part of it, but really. You could say we. I've been in in the big from the beginning. Yeah. Brent Norseman is a fantastic architect. We sat down, he goes, Do you think we could get four million dollars for a house here? I go, well, how long ago? A couple years ago. I said, that's that's a that's a Noah was crazy, right? Tall fucking overall. I said, okay, okay, Vince. Because I sometimes can't overprice stuff.

SPEAKER_02 46:11

Because you're not north of North Avenue.

SPEAKER_01 46:12

That's it. And I said, okay, North or North Avenue, North North Avenue all day. Like, and I said, okay. I but I lived in Waker Park for 15 years.

SPEAKER_02 46:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:21

At Division and Walcott. Right in the middle.

SPEAKER_02 46:25

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 46:26

And I liked it better. Like I preferred Division Street to North Avenue for sure. All day. And so I said, why it's the school. It's a school. School too. But also, there never had been a house of that quality.

SPEAKER_02 46:40

Dude, when you first posted those, I was like, what the fuck? Is he fucking?

SPEAKER_01 46:44

Your sister called me yesterday to look at it.

SPEAKER_02 46:46

We have a buyer.

SPEAKER_01 46:47

I know. I had two full price offers.

SPEAKER_02 46:50

I know.

SPEAKER_01 46:51

F 4449500. The first buyer who paid $4 million backed out and went to go to Lakeview. And so Brent's going to build them a house up there. We would say, let's just raise it $400,000 and see what happens. Two buyers. Crazy. So North and North Avenue again, that would sell easily. And South, and I looked at everything that had sold for the last you know eight years. At some point, you're going back so far, the value doesn't make sense. But there had never been a house of this quality, not even close. There was one that uh Ryan Pruit sold on Wolcott, which was actually Kelly, the girl I brought up early, Kelly uh Zink, her husband Alex and her had this house. It took a three-flat with a side lot.

SPEAKER_02 47:34

I I had I had I You saw it? I had a buyer for it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:38

Awesome house. They had a slide.

SPEAKER_02 47:40

Yeah, downstairs. Yes. Ryan, maybe put the slide.

SPEAKER_01 47:42

They had a side yard, but there was no alien back, so the driveway took a yard side yard. Yeah. Which was, I mean, super cool house.

SPEAKER_02 47:49

But it was it it was a little funky here and there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

I mean, awesome.

SPEAKER_02 47:53

But that's probably the highest sale since that was like two seven.

SPEAKER_01 47:57

I'm like, I'm gonna ask four. And so I go, Bro. I go, I know this is crazy, but I think, I think if you're building these houses, these 6,500 square foot houses. Also, the lots are 72 by 65.

SPEAKER_02 48:08

Yeah, they're wide. It's a lot and a half.

SPEAKER_01 48:10

It is, but it's it's a more of a like a square.

SPEAKER_02 48:13

Yeah, you get better four.

SPEAKER_01 48:14

It's a suburban feel, which no one has. Everyone's on the shotgun. The shotgun or the hot dog hallway, or whatever you want to call it.

SPEAKER_02 48:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:22

And so that really turned people's heads, and we put the pools in there, the four foot plunge pools in there.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

But like when you two years ago to say you think you can get four million. I mean, like, like you're talking about It was I was really I was nervous that I was nervous.

SPEAKER_01 48:38

You guys are putting a lot of money. They're paying four million for the land. It's on you. And it's on me now to sell that that no one's ever done. And I'm like, people. People don't understand that. And I'm like, guys, we need like we need a catch. We need like an image. We need a name. We need a brand. We can't just go addresses. Yeah. Addresses are cool, like 1222 North Poland, 1224. But like, what is that? So we I said, let's. I worked with uh Gintari, this girl in my and my team, who is a really great design eye, and she worked on a name and she came up with Illumina, which is like a word that never really existed. Illumina, but but you get it's kind of like that. But like it means like you know, you get to feel like light. Right. Yeah. And these are a ton of light and like 13-foot ceilings, first floor. I mean, they're they're gorgeous. And so we committed this created this community because again, uh, because Hermitage is on the back side, we had two houses facing Hermitage, two houses facing Polina. We took six lots and chopped them in the middle and went that way. Yeah, they changed everything. And we have like on Paulina, there's one driveway that comes off of Paulina on Hermitage. Well, it's a little different now, but let's just focus on Paulina. Paulina's at one driveway, and there's one house in the north, one house in the south. And so it's just like this little community of these gorgeous monster homes. What's also interesting, Paul Lina used to be an L. It used to be an L track that went there. Yes. So all the houses on the west side are set way back. So the northeast, the person that just paid the most, north southeast corner has tons of light to the south. It's like a corner house. And Paulina's on the east, and then the other house is like pretty far north. So you it's like almost like a core, each house is almost a corner. So they're they're very unique. And so I thought, okay, I think these are so unique that we can get four million, but like I couldn't believe how quickly we got four million.

SPEAKER_02 50:29

I mean, if you take a look at the price per square foot and you look at like your development wicker park, you look at Bucktown, I mean, I know everyone says Lincoln Park, Lincoln Park. The price per square foot by us is insane.

SPEAKER_01 50:42

Not low. And and the thing is, by the way, everyone south of North Avenue better thank me because your values all went up.

SPEAKER_02 50:49

Yeah. Well, once that somebody sees that, okay, there's that. Like when I look at here's my thoughts, and I've posted it a thousand times on Instagram. When when when I think of high streets, traffic, I mean public transportation and highways, and a little bit of grit, great restaurants. Yeah. And I and I think of then I've got like you've got at LaSalle number two, schools by you. Yeah, you've got Burr, Plat like, in my opinion, there's no way anyone else should live anywhere but wicker park in Bucktown.

SPEAKER_01 51:30

I I loved it for a long time. The only reason I moved to Lakeview is we've my wife wanted to have what we wanted to do a mixed-use studio. Yeah. And so it was just hard to find out.

SPEAKER_02 51:39

But for pricing, think about that now.

SPEAKER_01 51:41

I mean, it's on fire. What's a huge get for that neighborhood is that Whole Food that's going on. It's going at Ashland and Division. Yes. And me, they're putting Whole Foods there. That's huge for that neighborhood. And a big selling point for us at Illumina saying, look, two blocks east of you is Whole Foods.

SPEAKER_03 51:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:59

One half block south is Division, one half block north is Milwaukee.

SPEAKER_02 52:02

This is like a And that Milwaukee just dumps right in North Af while you take the side streets. Yeah, it's I mean perfect. Think about all the restaurants in Chicago. Take downtown, the most expensive restaurants everywhere. You can't get a table at Delee's. It's crazy. I mean, I fifty to two. But I mean that's like 200 a person.

SPEAKER_01 52:23

I know. It's great, by the way. I've been like four times.

SPEAKER_02 52:25

I go there. That bread? I go nonstop. That bread? It's ridiculous. Unbelievable. I was like $7 a bread?

SPEAKER_01 52:31

I'm so happy for that guy.

SPEAKER_02 52:32

I don't know that guy, but like He lives at One Chicago and I bumped into him. It's like a group of dudes, and I was telling my friend how much I loved the restaurant because they had just opened. He called him up in his apartment. The guy came down and introduced himself. But I'm there all the time. I did a review for Delee's on my Instagram. It had like 60,000 stuff. I mean, like, dude, that restaurant is but that restaurant could only survive in Bucktown and with the park.

SPEAKER_01 52:57

It's a nice, it's a step up for that neighborhood. Because not really, there's been some really nice restaurants there, but that's like a steakhouse. That's the only one I can think of over there.

SPEAKER_02 53:04

That's a that's a that's a downtown steakhouse. It's a river north.

SPEAKER_01 53:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 53:09

And it's doing and it's thriving here.

SPEAKER_01 53:11

And like over on Western, Boof House is awesome too. Where's that? On Western, just north of Augusta, it's got the abstract cow drawing. It's called Boof House.

SPEAKER_02 53:21

It's good?

SPEAKER_01 53:21

It's very good. Okay. It's like a boutique steakhouse, probably 40 seats.

SPEAKER_02 53:26

All right, really good.

SPEAKER_01 53:27

So it's a little different. It's like you're not gonna go there and bring your you're not gonna bring your expense account there. Uh and because it's not like a 10-person table. They want like the big, you know, Mastro's, uh, Gibson's kind of vibe.

SPEAKER_02 53:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:39

Um, but that place is great. It's a neighborhood steakhouse, very good. Nickies up.

SPEAKER_02 53:43

Nikki, I'll tell you, like, Nikki's like, we don't have to go to downtown anymore. We just go to Badili's for all I go there for every special occasion.

SPEAKER_01 53:48

And now that I'll tell you one thing about Wicker, Miss Wicker Park I miss is how quickly you can get everywhere.

unknown 53:54

Oh, dude.

SPEAKER_01 53:54

Now that I'm in Lake View, I always been like 10 minutes late. I probably've been 10 minutes late to everything for a year. Because I'm always like, oh, well, I sleep, I'll be there in like, you know, five minutes.

SPEAKER_02 54:03

How far east are you?

SPEAKER_01 54:05

I'm at Lincoln and basically Lincoln and Belmont.

SPEAKER_02 54:08

Oh, you're not that far east. No.

SPEAKER_01 54:10

But like, but I'm also like far from the expressway and far from the show drive.

SPEAKER_02 54:14

We talk we lived in Roscoe Village for about seven years. We talk about all the time. We're like, man, by the time we got to by the time we got done to Vercy or Fullerton to 90, she goes, now by the time we got to the highway, she goes, now I'm already in Glenview at my mom's house.

SPEAKER_01 54:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:29

It just it just everything is set up.

SPEAKER_01 54:32

But I do I do like it. But yeah, I when I meet my friends in like River North or West Loop is far from Lakeview.

SPEAKER_02 54:39

Let's let's loop far from everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 54:41

I know. But I but I want to open up the casino. How are you gonna get it? Like for me now, Lakeview, it's like 25 minutes.

SPEAKER_02 54:49

Yeah, that's a night out. That's like an excursion.

SPEAKER_01 54:51

And they go to Adelina Prime, which is great. You've been there?

SPEAKER_02 54:54

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 54:55

It's great. And so where else did I go too recently? I love restaurants.

SPEAKER_02 54:59

Oh I'm not a restaurant guy.

SPEAKER_01 55:01

I know you're not. You eat for fuel. I eat for fun.

Restaurant Picks And City Rituals

SPEAKER_02 55:07

So tell me tell me your best, your f your favorite three restaurants right now.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

Well, Arla is the old Fred's Barney's on the top floor of that building at Oak and Rush.

SPEAKER_02 55:18

Oak and Rush.

SPEAKER_01 55:19

Okay. So it's Arla. Am I getting that right? Yes. Because there's a new one, could Naya I haven't been able to, but Arla is the Adelina guys. Okay. And it's Japanese and Mediterranean. Which are my two favorite cuisines. And they do it, and the chef does both, in my opinion, very well.

SPEAKER_02 55:37

Does he mix them or are there separate entrees?

SPEAKER_01 55:40

A little bit of both.

unknown 55:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 55:42

There's definitely like you can do sushi, and then you can do like Baba Ganoush. Which, I mean, for me is great. It's a beautiful restaurant. It's gonna be really sceny. On the top of Barney's. Top of Barney's old Barney's building. I miss Barney's. That's one you don't miss it. Oh god, I miss that scene.

SPEAKER_02 56:00

I mean, if you miss Barney's, I'm gonna edit that.

SPEAKER_01 56:02

I'm gonna gold coast guy. I was a gold coast guy for a long time. I'm gonna edit that. I used to live at 980. Oh no, I used to live at like 1200 Lakeshore Drive and work at 980 Michigan. So I was there all the time. Oh my god. I so Arla's great. What else? I still like this hogsaw place at Armitage Ale House.

SPEAKER_02 56:21

Yeah. It's great. It's good.

SPEAKER_01 56:23

It's hard to get. I mean, like it's it's heavy, but like the the lamb is there, uh, the pot pie. Uh I had two English friends with me the first time.

SPEAKER_02 56:32

I had the pot pie. It was great out of the street.

SPEAKER_01 56:34

Fish and chips, unbelievable. I had one guy from Bath, England, one guy from Cheshire, England, and we went there and they said this is the best English food I've ever had in my life at Armitage Alehouse.

SPEAKER_02 56:44

How is the fish and chips? I love fish and chips. Is it two pieces of fish? Is it heavy, or is it or is it just one little skippy shit? No, it's they do good portions. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 56:54

You're gonna, you'll be, you need a nap after that.

SPEAKER_02 56:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 56:57

What else do I really like? I haven't been to Naya yet. I hear great things about that. The one below Chicago Cut.

SPEAKER_02 57:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 57:03

I'm going there like in a couple weeks. Just cool. My my buddy's gonna pull his boat up. We're gonna get up and they can serve you dinner on the boat, but we're gonna go inside and sit down.

SPEAKER_02 57:11

That sounds like that sounds like the second season of 100 days of summer.

SPEAKER_01 57:14

Here he comes. We're gonna do that coming up. What else? I keep a long, I keep a list of restaurants.

SPEAKER_02 57:21

Really?

SPEAKER_01 57:21

Yeah. And I try to get to like you can get to all of them. You know what, you know, Tommy Choi, of course. Yeah. He is really like a real fruity. Yeah. And he's he's talked about this place, Creepies. That's in Westloop. It's a French place because it's like a play on the word crepes.

SPEAKER_02 57:36

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 57:37

And I'm really excited to go to that one. I haven't been there. But the place we love probably the most is Itoko up in our neighborhood. It's a little Japanese place from the guy who did Momotaro. I think it's Gene Keito. Boker restaurant, Rob, you know, Rob Katz. I love those guys. And I just actually texted them yesterday.

SPEAKER_02 57:57

Is that by Gigi's Chicken? It's right next to our. Yeah, I went there. I wasn't a huge fan. Oh well. I may have the wrong stuff.

SPEAKER_01 58:04

You can. The first time I went, I had outside with my wife. I had traditional stuff, but I found the stuff on there, like the best miso soup I've ever had. My son gets the Katsu Don. We have expensive food bills. And we, I just you I call, I put it online, and in 20 minutes I can pick up my dinner. And it's fast, and it's like two blocks.

SPEAKER_02 58:24

You don't eat there?

SPEAKER_01 58:25

No, bring it home. Bring it home all the time.

SPEAKER_02 58:28

I always think food when you travel doesn't taste.

SPEAKER_01 58:30

It's like two blocks. Oh, it's like it's right there. They have great ramen, a great hamburger, stuff like that. That's not just the sushi stuff, but they also create sushi.

SPEAKER_02 58:39

I love that restaurant. Have you had any have you tried any restaurants in Bucktown? Have you been to Antico? Um the On Armitage, Antico. They make their own.

SPEAKER_01 58:47

Oh, the original place. They've been there for a long time. Oakley in Armitage is. Yeah. Yes. I went there like years ago.

SPEAKER_02 58:52

It's great. It's great. I love that place. And then everybody loves the new one that the guy it's got a it got a Michelin star, the one that's Indian Mexican food. I've never heard of it.

SPEAKER_01 59:01

I've not been there. I know but there are.

SPEAKER_02 59:02

I've been to small. Myra. Mira? Mira. I've not been there. I walked in there, the smell, I was like, yeah, it's not for me.

SPEAKER_01 59:08

It's not for you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 59:09

Not for me.

SPEAKER_01 59:09

I know. Like some places I like Indian food, but not all the time. It's drum. Cumin, I love for Indian food. But just Indian Mexican. I was like, what is I know. Well, like the people sometimes. Well, I mean Japanese Mediterranean. That's what I was thinking. It's good. That place is good. I'm trying to think what else. The Atoka is a place we go a lot, and Cota de Volpe, which is right next to a great neighborhood restaurant. That whole area, the Southport corridor, has really changed.

SPEAKER_02 59:36

But it's nicer on the South Eye.

SPEAKER_01 59:38

Yeah, by me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 59:40

That's where everything's at. I don't know if the rent's a little cheaper, but like when you go north, like by Addison, it's just bars.

SPEAKER_01 59:47

And then also it gets to retail. It's like shopping. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 59:50

But that south end seems to be. I you know where we went last night, which was like one of the best meals I've had in a while. The the place that's attack attached, you'll know the name of it. I had forgotten I went last night. Attached to Shuba's. Oh, Tidehouse. It was good.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:04

It was great. It's beautiful too. Dude, it was really good. That's that's even closer to me.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:09

And and so we're gonna be able to do that. Dude, there's we we got the the this that the what's it what do they call the salads? The the like god is a word for like not spring salad, but it was like a something salad. I know we got the salad, the burger was fantastic, yeah. And then we got broccoli. And what they did with the broccoli with with like garlic and like melted cheese, dude. It was my wife looked at me and goes, this is one of the best meals we've had in a while. I'm like, I gotta go.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:38

I haven't been there for a while. It was time to go back. It was really good. Yeah, there's a Vietnamese place on the north side called Sochi to the north side of Belmont. It's a Vietnamese place, it's great, it's like modern Vietnamese. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:48

I've never had Vietnamese food.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:49

And then there's a place west of there called Konbini and Kumpuri. It's a Japanese shop, and they have tons of sake and Japanese liquor and Japanese like stuff. And I'm on the sake of the month club over there. And I love that place.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:06

Saki is great because when they give me a sake list, I'm like, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:09

I know. Just don't do not get unfiltered and just get like a Jun Mai Dai Ginjo. Do you remember that? Okay. Text me when you're there. Text me at the restaurant.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:19

Whenever we go to like uh whenever we go to what's whenever we go to Nobu to like do on sake, I'm like, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:24

Yeah. Realistically, I can drink the cheapest sake and I like that. I don't want to be that guy who's like, I can only drink you know 100 bottles. But sake is a good liquor because it's more alcohol than wine, but not as much as liquor, and it's clear.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:38

I don't get hangovers.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:39

Yes, it's nice. I mean, you can if you do a ton. No. But like if you drink relatively responsibly, you'll feel a lot better. Yeah. Otherwise, that's I mean that's a big part of the reason I like it. And I just like the buzz, I feel it's like a happy sake of the month. Oh, actually, speaking of alcohol, I got something for you. This is I get these for clients, and I had to buy a hundred of them. So you're getting one. My friends get them, uh, my family, and my clients for us. It is the best cocktail shaker I've ever seen.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:09

And uh let me see this.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:10

I had to buy a hundred to get my logo on it, but I've had them so long that I have my old logo on it. But what's great about it, see my my old logo on there, is my biggest pet peeve when you shake a cocktail is like shake it, and then you can't get this off.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:25

Yeah, you have to like slap it sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:28

Unscrews. I mean, how great is that? And then inside, look, it has microphones by the way, has measurements like milliliters and ounces, and you can measure how much you're putting in there. Isn't that great? Why has anybody thought of that? Well, elevated crafts did. I mean, it's it's really the best. It's for you. You'll love it. Like, I give it to my friends, and then I was like, that I'll go back to the house. Actually, I gave it to two bartenders one time at an event, and I went to another event, and they were using my cocktail shakers at the other event. That's how great these cocktail shakers are. So that's for you.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:02

Can I use this for a protein shake?

SPEAKER_01 1:03:04

Yes, you can. I know you will. And then I know you're not gonna wear this, but I just you're not gonna wear my logo. But that's my new logo. Let me see.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:12

And that's oh, I like this.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:14

It's kind of cool. Like the blue on blue.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:16

That's so sick.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:17

Yeah, I know you wear hats, you know.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:18

I'm a big hat guy.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:19

I know you are. That's why I brought one for you.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:20

I like, and it's a flex fit. Let me see.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:22

I have flex fits are the best. That's pretty good on you. I'll be honest. Look if I'm ready. I gotta get one of your hats now. You're branded. I'm branded, dude. I mean, I don't think anyone's gonna go to your house and like start working with me for that just because they see that logo, so you're good. I'll put a piece of tape over it. Put your logo on it. I do like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:41

I do like the hat all the time.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:42

That's great, it's super comfortable.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:44

It's that flex fit from whatever brand that is. I like it. It's like the high the breathe run. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:50

I like it a lot.

What Fatherhood Changes Forever

SPEAKER_02 1:03:51

Thank you. All right, leave us with uh a lasting memory of thought or something.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:56

You should have thought of something.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:57

Wise. Doesn't have to be wise. The the the the out okay. Let's we'll we'll we're gonna do real estate. No, forget real estate.

unknown 1:04:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:08

The greatest, like when you sit back and think of your kid, what's the the one thing that comes to your mind? And it doesn't be something you've done, just like a thought, like bringing up a child in this life or like like this is really what I was here for. Like, what is what's having a kid, what does it mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:27

Well, when I met my wife, I was I did not have a paternal instinct. Like it wasn't like I can't wait to have a kid. And I wasn't it's not like I was like, I hate kids, yeah, like Bill Maher. Wasn't wasn't like that. But I was like, I just, you know what, I'm gonna be that guy. I guess I got married when I was 26 to like my college sweetheart and divorced 10 months later because I was just too young to be married and wasn't ready. And then so from then now I met my wife when I was 39. And I thought I'm just gonna be that guy who's gonna live on the Gold Coast and never be married, and all the divorced guys are gonna hang out with me. And I'm like, that's that's not a bad life, you know, it's not so bad. A little douchey, but realistically, like I thought that was gonna be it. And then I met my wife and she's like, Listen, I know that you're not like real keen on a family, but like I I want a family, and so it's not an ultimatum, but it kind of is.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:23

Which date what date was that? No, it was five dates in, six dates in.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:27

It was like she was waiting like almost a year.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:29

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:30

Yeah. She goes, This is great, it's going great. I think she was kind of like, either it's gonna fall apart, I don't have to worry about this conversation, or I'm gonna have to have the conversation. So the good news is I made it to the conversation. And she said, I it's I just if you don't, then like I'm not saying like break up immediately, but like, you know, why are we doing this? Yeah. And I thought right away, I said, you know what? With you, I will do that. I'm willing to do that, excited to do that. But I hadn't felt that this it took Jessica to come in my life. Also, she had a lot of. Experience as a nanny. Because I have no kid, no experience raising kids. I would say if like my wife died during labor, I would not know kids can't have solid food. I would have probably given steak.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:11

You would have figured it out.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:12

I mean, I would have figured out. God, I hope.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:14

Cavemen do.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:15

I know, but no, they that's why they had 10 kids because they fucked up the first couple. I didn't have that luxury. Uh luxury. What a horrible thing. But so I the so anyway, so when I had my son, it ended up being like the only thing that matters.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:32

It's this thing that I didn't think I wanted. Now it's it's all that matters. It's it's providing for him, taking care of him, raising him right, and then leaving him as good of a situation as possible. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:45

So when you pass, he's ready to go.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:46

Yeah, he is a great kid. He has a really sweet, his mom was able to get her sweetness and her gentleness in there, even though he has a smile, you're a little reckless. And he's 12 years old and he's five foot nine.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:58

Oh, he's tall as hell.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:59

Yes, he's suspiciously tall, Jason. Yes. Suspiciously tall.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:03

What color are his eyes?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:05

Not the right words. No, no, he's definitely not, I think.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:09

Ancestor you're not. They make a test for that.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:11

Find this out later. No, he's a great kid.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:13

He definitely looks like where'd you go to the doctor for a second? Just don't tell your mom.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:16

Exactly. Spit in this cup.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:18

Yeah. Let me cut your hair.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:20

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:21

That's awesome. They become your world. It is.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:23

I know you're super involved in your kids.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:26

And your kids are really into sports.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:28

My son just wasn't until just recently. And do you know Joe Summers? He works for uh U.S. bank now, but he's been a mortgage guy forever.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:38

He's a really good basketball player. He has two kids, well, three kids, but two boys. And one is 16 or 15. And my son is now taking private basketball lessons with his son. That's so awesome. Because he's behind in basketball skills and he wants to travel for the team next year, which is so exciting for me because I love basketball. And I'm excited that he's into sports now. But I I couldn't really get him into it before. He liked jujitsu, but he didn't like he didn't want to play soccer. He liked one to tackle. He likes that. He likes wrestling and stuff, but there's not any good wrestling programs, unfortunately, unless unless I go to Notre Dame, which is like a real schlep on a regular basis. So he likes basketball. So I'm excited about that. I know your kids are like, I just saw your kid just won't.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:22

Yeah, Hamlin changed. Congratulations. Exciting. It's yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:25

I know you're so involved.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:26

Yeah, it's the hardest. Like, people are like, it's really funny. I'm like, parents are always like, oh, where's your kid with baseball? Like they're like, oh my god, Hamlin Park, like, oh they're like, that's too crazy for us.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:35

This is something I want to talk to you about.

Youth Sports Pressure And Better Parenting

SPEAKER_01 1:08:37

I saw recently the government is looking into private equity firms being involved in the world. I know. And I I personally think the kids are playing too much. And that's not what you're kidding. I'm not judging. Yeah, yeah. I have a friend whose son is a really good baseball player and he played. My friend went, my friend went to a hundred baseball games last year. A hundred. That's too much. Yes. And I said, these kids they can't play this much. Also, it's just too much. You're going to wear them out. And it's not like you have to do this, they make it seem like that, but it's just so these people can make money.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:07

Yeah. So private organizers. Private equity in sports is going to be a problem. I mean, it's it's destroying professional sports.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:15

And that's a whole other discussion. 40% of the NBA is owned by private equity now. And that's why you're seeing all these salary dumps and all this other stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:22

Yeah, there's no like feel for it. It's just bottom line.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:25

It's bottom line. It's a problem. Like my son this year played 38 games this summer. So no baseball.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:33

Oh, that's reasonable.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:35

Yeah, 90, 100 is crazy.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:36

Yeah, no. I mean, like, so like when we put the travel team together at Hamlin, like I'm one of the coaches, and like the coaches all got together, like, dude, we're not going out of state.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:45

Good. We're not doing this.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:46

We have to go to Iowa because Hamlin goes to Iowa as a group. Okay. That's it. I'm like, I'm not doing this. I'm like, he's nine years old. I said, there is enough baseball to be played within 20 miles. 20 games. But there's 20, there's 20 miles. I can, you know, we do play, we can't play the city anymore because the competition just is not great. So we do go to Palatine. That's about as far as we go.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:11

Palatine, this, that. But I I it's all about development. And man, you gotta make sure they're having fun.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:18

Dude, I'm telling you, make sure they're having fun. Because once the fun is gone and a kid, it's like now it's work. And he's 12, right? 12. Yeah. 12, 13, 14 are the big years. I know.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:32

And so those are the big years here. I think there's a B team. He goes to St. Alphonsus. Okay. Uh, there's a B team there, and I think it's kind of like what he's hoping for. So he just wants to play and not have to worry about winning, and he just wants to get a wide outlook, I hope.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:49

Yeah, I have an 18-year-old. So, like out of all of our friends, but no, but I'll tell you, this is a really good piece of advice. All of our friends that are younger, that James's age, that are nine, almost all of them, that's their first kid. They're young, they're young parents, they're mid-30s, you know. I'm 52. I have an 18-year-old that's gone through the whole process. And they're all like, oh, the A-team, the B team, the C team. I I will tell you, I don't have to say anything anymore. My wife will whip at these parents, not in a mean way and say, let me just tell you something. Lee's year, he's 18. When Lee joined Elite at 13, he was on the C team. There was the B team in the A team. Then you work your way up if you're not there originally.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:30

She goes, the C team out of nine kids, she goes, six are playing in college.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:34

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:35

She goes the 18, two. Because they have more fun. And you don't know what your I tell parents your kid's 12.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:43

I know.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:44

Or he's 10 or he's nine. He's gonna have 17 iterations of himself in the next 10 years. Oh, I know. My son has changed so much in the last two or three months. Dude, in hoops, just learn how like if he's got just just dribble. Yeah. Just fucking dribble.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:00

That's what Joe Summer said. Just dribble.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:02

Just dribble. My my 15-year-old that plays at Lane, when he was three, four years old, went up and down the house dribbling. And my wife's like, the basketball, I go, don't touch it. Don't stop him. Do you get one of those quiet dribble balls? They work. We have a black, soft, quiet. It does work. It works.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:17

It works.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:17

It's not as good, but man, it works. And then get him dribble up. What's that? Dribble up is this is not a commercial for dribble up.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:26

Is this a Facebook ad I saw?

SPEAKER_02 1:12:27

Probably. It's a yellow ball. You put it on an iPad.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:31

Yes, I saw it.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:32

And you you you do this and it counts your dribbles. And it basically takes all the people dribbling around the nation and lets your know let your son know where they rank and how many dribbles they've done that day.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:42

Oh my God.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:43

My kid sat there, but my kid was you gotta be passionate.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:47

Right? Especially now 12, 13, 14. But man, tell him no matter what team he makes, it does not matter. And if the coach says to you, I had this conversation with another parent last night, at like 11 or 12 or 13, about no, I want to say about 10 years old. The head coach of our travel team, who I love at Play Hard, said, Hey, do you want him, do you want your kid to get 10 to 15 minutes on the A team, or do you want him to run the B team? Run the B team.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:16

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:17

Because him being on the A team is just me wanting to clout. It's not about me. No, he's gonna be a good one. It's not about the parent being like, oh, my kid's on this, or my no, he needs to play.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:26

And so he'll be like a leader and then be Yes. You're actually playing FB. Yes. You just gotta play. Because only five guys can play. That's it.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:34

So many parents are so obsessed about what level their kids are playing in their travel sport or in whatever it is. It does not matter. Just play. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:45

It's it's a game.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:46

Just play. And and make sure your kid never measures himself and says, oh, this person's this, this person. Everybody's different. Everybody changes at a different time. I was 5'3 as a freshman, I was six foot as a sophomore.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:00

What? That's a huge difference.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:01

I would cry every night in bed. Because you're hurting. I was in so much pain growing. Everybody grows differently. Yeah. Just learn.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:09

Like Scottie Pippen and Dennis Bradman. Yeah. They grew like seven. Six three to six college.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:14

Yeah. David Robinson. Oh, really? Went in at six, went to Navy 6'3 and left 6'10. Ended up 7'1.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:22

You just have to play. I there's just too much, there's way too much stuff emphasized on that. And that's like, and and no kids care about that. It's the parents that trip to their kids. And I'll tell you my my last piece of advice to everyone. I one what it took me about three years to unwind from this terrible act I did. But one time he got not cut, but he got demoted when he was really young, like in fourth grade from the A to the B team. And I put it on the program and not on my son. And I'm not saying, and I want to be specific about that. Never be like it's that person's fault. Be like, what can you do to be better?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:07

Biggest mistake I ever made. Because then he, for three years, he was a victim.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:12

Oh yeah. And that's uh a mentality we have in our country right now. And I'm like, oh my God, I'm gonna fall into this.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:19

I made him a victim. Yeah. And it takes like two years to get out of that victim mentality and be like, no.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:25

Especially when you see it everywhere else, too.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:28

It's really tough. Yeah. Don't make your kid a victim.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:31

I am nobody's victim. I mean But just don't make your kid a victim.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:35

It's very easy because you want to protect your kid. Yeah. And victimhood is the easiest. That's why it's so amazing, and that's why they use it. It's brilliant. It is. It's not your fault. You're perfect. Victimhood is so perfect of a movement.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:49

I'm not like that. I'm like, you know what? I'm like, suck it up. Yeah. That's my favorite thing to say to my kid when he's crying. I'm like, listen, suck it up.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:56

You're okay. There's a I since you got messed up, I'm gonna get you something. I'm gonna get you something to put to I and I have it, and I'm next time I see you, I'll give it to you. I'll drop it off to your office. But there's a quote from Jerry Rice that hangs in my gym, and my kid has honest nightstands. And it says, I do what others don't want to do, so then I can do what others can't do.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:17

Well, that's awesome. That's our generation. Yes, that's our generation. That's like it's up to you. Yeah. The hawk fly or an eagle or whatever it is.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:28

It's a Jerry Rice quote. It's the best quote. I gave it to every single player after our season was over at travel.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:35

That's great.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:35

And I was like, it's up to you who you want to be as a player. That's it.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:39

I one time peed in a year only next to Jerry Rice.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:42

He's the greatest football player ever.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:44

My closest to greatness, I think.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:45

You didn't give him a hug with your pants down?

SPEAKER_01 1:16:47

No, but no, I didn't. No. Did you take a peek? You probably did. I try I was like, you know, a little curious, but I mean, you can say he might be the best player, you know, NFL player of all time. If he is using the argument, for sure. I mean, more of a Walter Payton guy because I'm biased.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:02

I mean Jerry Rice is up there stuffing the argument.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:05

When you look at the records, he's like Wayne Gretzky.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:08

This is years ago. I was dating a girl who was friends with Warren Moon's girlfriend. Okay. Warren Moon had this all-star tournament, bowling tournament in Vegas. And we went to Vegas with Warren Moon in Vegas. Like he everywhere he walks, they just move out of the way. He's like, it's Warren Moon.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:26

You see, I'm like, that's Warren Moon. And we went to this thing. It was Jerry Rice, Steve Young, Ed Tutal Jones was there, Clyde Drexler, like these incredible athletes. We were just hanging around because I was like with Warren's group. We hung out with these guys. It was it was incredible. Like Steve Young is my size.

unknown 1:17:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:45

No bigger than me. And that guy is a Hall of Fame recorder. And the runs he's done, it's unbelievable.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:50

Like you see these guys like Steve Young. That's Steve Young. That's a normal-looking guy.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:54

They can process it. They can process.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:57

Yeah. That was uh the one of the coolest sports.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:59

They process.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:01

All right. We're gonna we're over.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:02

We're over time. We're done. We're done. No. Sorry.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:05

I can talk forever. I can too. Yeah. A five-hour talk, like in Joe Rogan style.

Final Word: Go To Funerals

SPEAKER_02 1:18:11

All right. Thank you so much, Vince. I appreciate the time. I had a blast. We'll be dropping this in this July, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:18:18

Yes, it is still July, July 26th.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:20

First week of August, and and and that's that. Appreciate it. Don't forget to subscribe, download, and we'll see you soon. Thanks again, Vince.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:30

One more thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:31

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:31

Go to funerals.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:32

Yes, go to funerals.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:34

Go to funerals.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:35

Thanks so much.