00;00;00;00 - 00;00;23;16

Unknown

Welcome to the Profit First for Real Estate Investors podcast. This series is the simple CFO Case Files, where our CFOs break down real client scenarios, financial systems and practical decisions from inside the business. Enjoy the episode.

00;00;23;18 - 00;00;53;19

Unknown

We're back here with the CFO Case Files. I'm Christina Gutierrez, and I'm here with the special guest, one of our CFOs, Michael Hansen, has been on here before with us. So if you've seen the previous episodes, you're familiar with his story and how he got involved with us. Today we are going to specifically dig into a special case, which is the specific client on to someone that's really happy and all the services that we provide and how our systems work together to make those relationships successful with our clients.

00;00;53;19 - 00;01;15;11

Unknown

But first, I wanted to dig into a little bit of who Michael Hansen is. So first I want to say, Michael, thank you for joining me on this episode today. Appreciate you being here. Oh, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me. But second, I want to dig in a little bit. So, as you know, if you've heard the first episode, Michael has been with us for a while.

00;01;15;11 - 00;01;36;25

Unknown

He's served in different capacities, and he's just been a huge part of what is from just training, creating processes and just being a really big part of us. So we just want to get an idea of who you are. Give us some information about your background a little bit more than last podcast, like, you know, when you started working with us, what you do outside of simple CFO, like who you are.

00;01;36;26 - 00;02;03;08

Unknown

Let's get into who Michael Hansen is. Yeah. Appreciate it. And yes, it seems like I you know, I don't know the exact amount of time, but I know that when we first started, we might have had 1 or 2 other CFOs plus David at that point. So is pretty much at the very beginning, just before David released his books is when I his book is when I came on board.

00;02;03;11 - 00;02;28;12

Unknown

And I remember that at that time we had about 13 or 14 clients at that point. And very soon after that, I, I think I was working with about 12 of those. So I dove right in and really kind of helped David. I tried my best to help him get to that next level, and I think that we did a really good job and it's really grown from that point.

00;02;28;13 - 00;02;58;09

Unknown

I mean, not necessarily because of me, but certainly I can just look back and see, my goodness, the amount of success we've had, not only attracting really, really professional CFOs and other teammates, but also just the the clients that we've had have just shifted. I mean, it just really shifted to and we, you know, and we try to help everyone from where they're at.

00;02;58;10 - 00;03;24;15

Unknown

Right. That's that's the key. It's not about have you reached a specific spot. So now you're qualified to work with simple CFO. Well but but we are definitely attracting a client that has reached a point where they've realized success, but they are just not ready to. They're not able to get to that next level for some reason. And that's that seems to be more of a common thread recently.

00;03;24;15 - 00;03;43;00

Unknown

So it's been really fun to see the the growth of simple CFO and just kind of be a part of it. And sometimes in the background, sometimes in the foreground. And however I can serve. That's where I'm here. So yeah. And we're glad you're we're glad you're here. So let's tell me a little. Tell me something about you.

00;03;43;01 - 00;04;13;00

Unknown

What do you do? What do you do? Aside from CFO work, who is Michael Hansen outside of CFO work and serving clients so well that you do? Yeah. And again, I do. So my area of expertise kind of I stand a lot on the finance side with CFO work and in my other in my other practices. And just from a work perspective, I am really I dive really, really deeply into operations.

00;04;13;00 - 00;04;46;24

Unknown

So I, I consult with a lot of my clients, both with simple CFO and outside of simple CFO in more operational kind of deals. And that's a business as far as my personal life. I enjoy spending time with my family. We just got back from the beach. We were there yesterday celebrating my son's birthday, and I have a new puppy that I'm training and she loves the beach, so we hike a lot and I just love the outdoors.

00;04;46;25 - 00;05;11;04

Unknown

I live in Oregon, so we have a really great opportunity to be outside and my office, which I'm here now, I'm looking at my screen, but above that I can look at on the forest. That's pretty much what I look at every single day. And I've got this nature trail that kind of comes right past my window, and everything from turkeys to deer to even bears on occasion will come by.

00;05;11;04 - 00;05;28;24

Unknown

And it's pretty, pretty fun. So that's me. I like that that's little short of the people that say they love the beach life, and they'd rather be sitting on the beach. You can get a piece of the outdoors while you're sitting doing work. I like that. Yeah, I think I would enjoy that too. So that's a good picture.

00;05;28;24 - 00;05;45;28

Unknown

Thank you for sharing that. Thank you for being vulnerable and sharing about yourself. Oh, absolutely. So when you're meeting with clients too, I know, and I like that you added that you do the operation side because we do lean on you a lot for coming in and helping people with operations, because I do feel like you have a good hold of it and you seem to help them.

00;05;45;28 - 00;06;06;23

Unknown

So what is it actually, when you when clients come in, they talk to you like and they have issues with either operation finance. What what do you what do you see in their business that they're feeling that they're running their business? Like maybe without an operational structure or without a financial structure, like how do you think they're pushing through when they come to us?

00;06;06;28 - 00;06;43;24

Unknown

Yeah, that's a great question. And you know, what I find is while every business is completely different, and that's what I love about this work, fractional work, getting to work with a lot of different types of businesses, as well as different sizes and approaches to business. The challenges I find, I mean, just having been here for a while and doing this work for many years, I find that the challenges are steeped in very similar, almost predictable places, even though they show up differently.

00;06;43;25 - 00;07;13;11

Unknown

And what I've come to the conclusion of, and, you know, I'm a little biased because I've always been very operation oriented. But what I've come to the conclusion that the common denominator is, is the vast majority of financial challenges that people come to us with that I end up uncovering are, in fact, not money problems. They're really mostly operational issues that are showing up in their bank account.

00;07;13;14 - 00;07;36;23

Unknown

And that is really, really common. And what do I mean by that? Well, for example, I have clients over the years, I've gotten to work with a lot of different types of clients, in particularly our multi entity clients that have been around for quite some time and that have realized a pretty significant level of success, and they're kind of at that level.

00;07;36;24 - 00;08;12;04

Unknown

And what I find is that their operations, meaning the processes, whether it be SOPs or what I call SLA service level agreements within themselves, what they hold themselves accountable to is what I call an SLA or a service level agreement have not grown with the business. So what they set up worked for them fantastic years ago. But you know, back when they were doing a half a million a year on the top line, now they're doing 3 million a year on the top line.

00;08;12;09 - 00;08;40;02

Unknown

It's not the same business yet. The operation never changed. So the the huge light bulb goes on and it's pretty, pretty consistent. We can go through and look at soup to nuts from the from the lead to the close and everything that happens in between. We just take a look at where all of those leaks tend to be operationally, and that's what's showing up in their bank account.

00;08;40;02 - 00;09;01;29

Unknown

And right up here they automatically went back. It must be a money problem, right? It must be either what I'm bringing in or what I'm sending out. True. No doubt about that. But the cause of them and the reason that it keeps showing up is usually operational. And that's why I lean very heavily on that side with virtually all of my clients.

00;09;02;01 - 00;09;23;10

Unknown

Yeah, absolutely. Because I feel like everything you do operationally ends up on the balance sheet of the. No. Everything turns into financial, because if you don't have cash, you don't run your business correctly financially, something's wrong and you just need to pinpoint what's happening. And if it is operationally like they say, the owners 90% of the time, or the bottleneck of the business, right?

00;09;23;11 - 00;09;50;12

Unknown

Because they do everything. They don't tell. They want to be a part, everything. They don't have the correct person in the right seat doing the things that they can't do. So everything you once did yourself, then trying to find the correct person if you don't train them properly or have a good agreement, goes out the window. Yeah. It's that it's also the it's the way we've always done it syndrome doesn't work for every business forever.

00;09;50;14 - 00;10;38;14

Unknown

Right. And that's something that people, you know a lot of times. So the two the two most emotionally charged conversations that I have with clients early on in particularly are the owners compensation conversation. But the real emotionally charged one is the expense analysis part. Okay. And what we find is that the expense analysis is the what I find, I should say, is the most emotionally charged conversation because they represent decisions that were made at one point, oftentimes good decisions at that point that have outlived their usefulness is the is the nice way to put it.

00;10;38;17 - 00;11;01;28

Unknown

So that's it. You know, it's it's it's the ones that were skipping over when we're saying which is where could I cut some fat off the, you know, off of this operation. And it's often we skip right over those, those decisions that were made for whatever reason. But we have some kind of hidden emotional attachment to them that, well, that's never going away.

00;11;01;28 - 00;11;23;13

Unknown

And we skip right over it. And so that's that's what I mean by really diving into the operation. And what is still earning its keep is the point. So yeah. Yeah, that's a good way to put it. It's key. So it's you know, clients come to us for all different reasons and they may stay why they're coming to us or I think I need this, but until we dig into it, they don't truly know what they need.

00;11;23;15 - 00;11;41;20

Unknown

So let's, let's let's turn it to our review. So we always talk about reviews. So we've been on this huge push and we've gotten a ton of great reviews here at simple CFO. One of them happened to be more than one happens to be for you. But I'll take to one today that I think that we're going to spend this episode digging into.

00;11;41;21 - 00;12;05;22

Unknown

Okay, I'm going to go ahead and read it for everybody. It makes sense to read it. It was from our client that just says super satisfied. Michael is giving me the clarity I was looking for and helping me get a game plan. Very thankful. Thank you. So it's obviously putting some hard work into this client and providing pretty impactful guidance for them and leading them the right way.

00;12;05;23 - 00;12;22;29

Unknown

So without saying names, because we don't want to get into names on here, but tell me about this client that came in because I know you know who I'm referring to. Tell me about this client a little bit about what they do, because this will highlight a little bit different of what everyone's been hearing so far, because they're a different type of client.

00;12;22;29 - 00;12;41;20

Unknown

And there's a reason I'll let everybody know. There's a reason why we chose Michael Hansen for this client, because he has a lot of adversity and a skill and is able just to jump in. He's one of those CFOs, which I feel like we have a good group that can do that. He can just jump in and pinpoint a problem and attack the problem and just get going with them right away.

00;12;41;20 - 00;13;09;01

Unknown

So tell me the story of this client. Yeah. The first thing that I should mention is that uniquely, although a growing diversity of clients is starting to show up at simple CFO. At one point we were literally 100% real estate investors, which we love, love, love. I learned the real estate investing world after I joined David because I really didn't have a lot of exposure there.

00;13;09;08 - 00;13;33;11

Unknown

So I come with everything else. I've worked with a lot of different industries and a lot of different clients, and this specific client is not at all in a real estate investor. They are in a completely different industry and in fact are in the education business. So they run a school. And that's without giving names away or or names of businesses away.

00;13;33;11 - 00;13;58;04

Unknown

That's what I'll say about that. The other unique thing I wouldn't say it's unique, but the other thing that stands out about this client that I absolutely enjoy doing, not all people do, but I enjoy working with husband and wife. Teams come to us that are working together. They're not just one or the other running the business and the other one running the home.

00;13;58;04 - 00;14;23;00

Unknown

They are working together inside the business and that is a unique environment, not only to work in which I know my wife and I ran a successful business together for many years, decided at one point when we liquidated that business, that that would never happen again. And I and we are still very, very as a result of that.

00;14;23;00 - 00;14;50;26

Unknown

So that's probably a good decision for us, not for everyone, because it is a challenge. There's no doubt about it. There's an extra layer of emotion and certain bias that doesn't happen when they're not a married couple. So I enjoy that. Actually. I enjoy that aspect, working with married couples or couples that are committed in life together. And so that's really cool.

00;14;50;28 - 00;15;14;17

Unknown

This particular client is does work together with his spouse. And one of the things that we dove into, oh, and by the way, as often as the case, they have their different strengths, but they also have their different perspectives. So that was one of the really cool things. So I knew immediately that we needed to do an owner's comp conversation that was more than just an owner's comp conversation.

00;15;14;17 - 00;15;55;24

Unknown

It was more about bringing them together on how not only the business works financially, but how that affects them personally, and how their own personal life kind of inter meshes with the business. And so the ability to come in and speak really candidly but gracefully, with a couple that have way different spending dynamics and biases around money and he said, she said kind of energy.

00;15;55;26 - 00;16;29;13

Unknown

I feel like that is something that I excel at and really, really embrace because I've been there. I've been there, right? And I can really feel for both sides of the of the coin. And I try my very best to make sure, most importantly, that both sides are heard. And that has been really, I think initially, right, right off the bat, gave me a advantage in working with this client and getting by in.

00;16;29;14 - 00;16;57;05

Unknown

That's that's the point, right? Everyone wants a solution, but it takes a little bit to form trust and to make sure that the client feels like we are not there to espouse information that hopefully they pick up and we walk away. Oh, no. At least that's not how Michael runs his. And I know other simple CFO professionals become part of their business, almost part of their family.

00;16;57;06 - 00;17;26;29

Unknown

I mean, that's how serious we take it. We would have it no other way. And there's a lot of lovely practitioners out there that can stay very much separated. And that's great for some. For our clients generally, I think they appreciate that we take a personal, a personal responsibility for what we say and what we suggest and the outcomes that are there.

00;17;27;00 - 00;17;59;09

Unknown

And so that's been particularly in this particular case, this client, early on, I was able to gain trust with both the husband and the wife. And I think that's helped a lot. So that's that's at least how we got started. The other aspect was that there was a lot of personal, I'll just rip the band aid off and say a lot of shame around debt and around what that means for them.

00;17;59;09 - 00;18;25;20

Unknown

And I find this often is the case, especially in businesses where husband and wife are working together. There is, for some reason, a significant amount of either shame or fear that comes out when it comes to the amount of debt that they're carrying. And one of the successful strategies that I have is to help people realize to a certain extent.

00;18;25;20 - 00;18;49;00

Unknown

And again, this is an it's not to be used. I say this because this is what it gets translated into. Sometimes it's not an excuse to incur more debt and to spend more money just because it happens to be coming out of the business account, okay. However, business debt is a different animal than personal debt, okay? It's a way different animal.

00;18;49;00 - 00;19;23;05

Unknown

And to help people understand the similarities and differences of that really helps them utilize both debt and or leverage in order in a healthy way that helps them really grow their business and become successful and healthy in their business. That they may or may that they're they're using the same kind of measurement that they used when they had quasi irresponsible spending in their personal life that led to debt that they can't, that they're now servicing.

00;19;23;10 - 00;19;51;29

Unknown

Right. That doesn't mean that every business decision turns out the way we wanted it to, and that we end up servicing debt. That just didn't work out right. It just didn't work out as we anticipated. But if we lump those same, first of all, perhaps we shouldn't have those feelings at all. But if we lump that same approach that we have to our personal side into our business, oftentimes we find that the business is locked down, right?

00;19;52;00 - 00;20;19;16

Unknown

It can't move forward. And now you've got shame on the personal side, shame on the business side, and there's a roadblock there. So what I try and help people do is understand the difference, understand where we have healthy debt currently and where we have a debt that is hung on from a either a decision or a result. It's not always a decision.

00;20;19;16 - 00;21;05;08

Unknown

It's sometimes we can't control it. Things happen, especially in the real estate investing world, right? Things happen and they just didn't work out. So we have to have a plan to keep the business running, but service that debt as best we can and eliminate it when the time is right. So those are things that on this particular side, the client, I was able to get them to really separate those decisions and start to make, even on their personal side, better choices about how they thought about their circumstances was probably, I think, the biggest victory that we we had really early on that just lent them, gave them permission to really embrace some of the other

00;21;05;08 - 00;21;29;01

Unknown

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00;21;29;02 - 00;21;57;11

Unknown

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00;21;57;11 - 00;22;24;20

Unknown

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00;22;24;20 - 00;22;46;20

Unknown

Com go get them make more profit. All right back to the episode. That's smart I like how you laid that foundation because it's truth to say that every client that comes in, we don't just pull up in their balance sheet and their income statement and say, let's start looking at these. Let's do this. We still have to we have to take that time to get to know them, to really dig in.

00;22;46;20 - 00;23;04;12

Unknown

And what you notice when they first came in was their debt load. The difference of husband and wife working together because you had been through that yourself, that you knew that that may be an obstacle that you had to overcome first. They may not have came in like in a sales call that probably wasn't even something they hinted to when he helped.

00;23;04;12 - 00;23;32;22

Unknown

Because we're husband and wife, not many people hint to that, even if they know it's a problem. But by you being intuitive and knowing yourself and from other clients, you were able to, you know, pick that apart and start there before you jumped into financials, which is very intimidating to talk to people about anyway. So you just take it step by step of evaluating where they're at, what they need, where can I jump in immediately and then start talking about financials.

00;23;32;24 - 00;23;57;21

Unknown

So yeah. Yeah, yeah, I like I like that you were able to do that with them and really like that's that's a powerful story because now I think you've gotten into financial stuff. And then they have bookkeeping, which everyone knows you need bookkeeping to know where your numbers are. And if I'm not mistaken, they they came in and used our bookkeeping department.

00;23;57;25 - 00;24;38;10

Unknown

Yes. In fact, that has been another victory because having been around simple CFO for quite some time, we've had different approaches to how we handle bookkeeping from, hey, that's not our deal will support your bookkeeper, but that's it to referring to out into the marketplace to good bookkeepers that we've worked with personally to now we we not only have available, but I think having work, I don't know how many bookkeepers I've worked with in my career, but I can tell you that our team is a huge benefit to have.

00;24;38;12 - 00;25;05;22

Unknown

They not only speak our language so they understand how to work productively with CFO. That's huge, because not all bookkeepers know how to do that or have the confidence to do so effectively. When somebody has the CFO hat on and all we're trying to do is help, but they have some kind of strange bias. In fact, it's like an intimidation.

00;25;05;23 - 00;25;31;25

Unknown

Yeah, like like we're trying to take their job or kick them out of their seat, which. Yeah, which they obviously do not need to be. But it happens. And so to have a team that has huge mad skills on the bookkeeping side, but also communication wise and confidence to know that their CFO is a huge resource to them and a support to them to help them shine.

00;25;31;25 - 00;26;05;25

Unknown

And they also help, you know, our CFO team show up in a more professional manner, too. So that's really it's a great teamwork. And I, you know, part of what we do when we first come in, of course, is to evaluate their entire business and to just kind of when we do their financial clarity assessment. Right. Part of that is to assess their team and to find out is this one of those operational things that never grew with you?

00;26;05;25 - 00;26;36;16

Unknown

Meaning, did you start with a entry level bookkeeper, have grown past their really skill set, and do they need to be either trained up? We're not just here to clean house and and do that, but do they have the ability to accept a higher level of instruction? Are they open to that? I have one client I work with now, which I've spent the last year doing that with their bookkeeper, and now I would personally.

00;26;36;19 - 00;27;06;06

Unknown

We have our own bookkeeping team, but I would personally refer to her now, whereas in the very beginning it was a challenge, right? I mean, she's super sweet person and a and a skilled bookkeeper, but not at the level that was going to support where this investor wanted to go. Right? So we've since helped get her there. And part of that is what I've learned through our bookkeeping team, and what communication works with bookkeepers and what doesn't work with bookkeepers.

00;27;06;06 - 00;27;44;03

Unknown

And not everyone's the same. But there is a certain dance that we that we do that is helpful. So anyway, that's yeah, I couldn't speak more highly of our bookkeeping team. It's a standalone service even. I mean, they are they are for anyone that is considering or in need of bookkeeping not to look at our team would be, in my opinion, a mistake because they are cost effective, but they are super professional and their communication is second to none.

00;27;44;06 - 00;28;10;28

Unknown

So that's a great compliment. Hopefully they watch this and see that, or might just snip it and tell them, because I know they do work hard. And there's about I think we have about 14 of them now. But it's not it's it's how the the whole department is organized. And our bookkeeping manager that's on there and a bookkeeping director is there teamwork and being able to come up with processes and procedures and everything's noted and making sure communication is on point.

00;28;11;00 - 00;28;29;09

Unknown

So I'm glad that that has worked for you. I know other CFOs have said it's worked really well for them as well, and it's nice to have it in one place because you can just ping them and figure out what's going on and get an answer like this, because they communicate to, well, whereas some people are like, well, I'm already off, we're off for the week and you can't.

00;28;29;10 - 00;28;45;05

Unknown

It takes a little bit to get an answer so that that's great to hear, and I'm glad that you were able to move them over seamlessly and get their bookkeeping up to date, because most people don't think about accounting until their taxes are due. You know, unless you have a CFO on your team. That's why a lot of people come.

00;28;45;06 - 00;29;03;19

Unknown

They their CEO brain is, I only look at my finance. As long as I have money in the bank, I only look at my financials that one time of year when I have to hand it over to my CPA. And so we try to get people in the habit of looking at it weekly. Monthly. You know, that's why that that's another question.

00;29;03;26 - 00;29;24;13

Unknown

Makes me think of another question of like some people just to see CEOs. That and I'm, I've been teaching this to other groups that we teach to. And I'm trying to get people into the habit of looking at their financials more regularly. And we use two meetings a month. That's our basic package. We like to have two meetings a month to keep momentum going.

00;29;24;14 - 00;29;49;18

Unknown

So I'm going to ask you, as an operation financial person, why do you think these meetings are so important? Like why do you think two is better than just one or every other month or every quarter? Why do you think these meetings are so good to have with our clients? Yeah. Great question. If I had to put it in a nutshell, it's because finance translates to different things for different folks.

00;29;49;18 - 00;30;18;15

Unknown

But the common denominator here is that most people have consumed finance or financial knowledge in terms of compliance. Okay. Meaning their taxes. Okay. Is everything in order so that my accountant won't scream at me or charge me $200 an hour to clean my books up every year? Right. I want that done. Well, that's fantastic. And yes, it should be.

00;30;18;15 - 00;30;41;16

Unknown

But what we find is that regardless of if it's if your books and or your finances are looked at purely from a compliance perspective, there's only really two people that are happy and they don't include the owner. One of them is the CPA and one of them is Uncle Sam. Okay. That's it. If we take a different approach and say, guess what?

00;30;41;16 - 00;31;10;17

Unknown

If I set my books up to read like a children's storybook, and instead of a medical journal that no one can understand, and. I can do so in a way that is primarily focused on the management and strategic planning of my business. I promise you that those same two individuals that were happy with the compliance focused approach will be equally as happy.

00;31;10;20 - 00;31;35;09

Unknown

Yet in fact, it will be more happy. Why? They will be doing the books on a more successful business, because there's more visibility into what's actually going on, not just the reporting that satisfies Uncle Sam and and the account and the tax preparer, I should say, because we have a lot of CPAs that are amazing at strategic as well.

00;31;35;12 - 00;32;03;00

Unknown

But we're talking about just the tax preparation portion is kind of the limit of the whole financial picture that a lot of people come to us with. They understand that their their financials are important, meaning their profit and loss and their balance sheet. And some have a varying degree of ability to read them. Fewer have the ability to read them and use that information in order to make strategic decisions short and long term.

00;32;03;05 - 00;32;28;06

Unknown

And that's where our services come in, is we really teach people how to do that. They don't have to become financial experts, but they certainly have to see their financial data, which is what bookkeeping does. It creates data in order to be used for the strategic management of your business. That's what they're there for. So we help translate that.

00;32;28;06 - 00;32;57;07

Unknown

I think that's the biggest thing that hiring a CFO does is help bridge that gap between that between them. So that's yeah, definitely. And keeping those monthly meetings and understanding KPIs and what you're looking at doesn't mean you have to understand it. Yeah. You have to know. Sorry you asked the frequency question. And to do that, to do that requires more than just an occasional okay, well I'm running.

00;32;57;10 - 00;33;22;02

Unknown

Yeah, I've got that meeting again this month. So tell me what I did last month and let me get back to what I really want to do. The cadence of having a more meetings more often weekly, bi weekly or whatever you've signed up for is really about that habit. Getting in the habit of what to look at, when, and what decisions to be made on a regular basis.

00;33;22;03 - 00;33;47;00

Unknown

It doesn't have to be complicated, but it does have to be. It has to be at a cadence that makes sense for that business. So definitely. And we don't want to complicate it, right. Which is why we read yellow green. We tell you exactly what to do. We translate the information to you so it makes sense. And then we kind of just say, you go do this, you go do that, you know, and make sure that they don't have to fully understand and be able to look at it.

00;33;47;00 - 00;34;11;00

Unknown

But it's good to keep an eye on it. As a CEO, you know, that's you have your goals. So yeah, thank you for answering that. That's something that, you know, I know that people say a lot of times like I'm too busy to meet, but it's so important to keep that momentum going and to meet with your CFO regularly, not just so you can understand it 100%, but so you know what levers you're pulling and what you're doing in your business, operationally or financially.

00;34;11;00 - 00;34;35;27

Unknown

I'll say that since you're such an operational person. So yeah, I appreciate you being here. I would say since you if you like both aspects, what would you say to an owner that feels like it's all operations or they're too small, they're too early, they don't know what they're running or maybe two in the week, two in the weeds.

00;34;35;27 - 00;34;45;28

Unknown

What would you say to CEOs business owners like that?

00;34;46;00 - 00;35;16;26

Unknown

Well, the 100% of every client that I've ever worked with, I, I have to say that the operations are important. What is most important is to get their cash under control. So once cash is under control. Okay. And by the way, cash. So you know we do profit first. That is our cash flow methodology of choice right. There's others.

00;35;16;26 - 00;35;20;13

Unknown

We choose profit first.

00;35;20;16 - 00;35;46;12

Unknown

Profit first does not require clean books or all it requires is a bank account. Money coming in and money going out. That's what cash management requires. And that's what profit first really requires. So the refreshing thing is, is that regardless, you know, a lot of a lot of owners will come in a little bit intimidated because they know that their books aren't clean.

00;35;46;12 - 00;36;16;18

Unknown

They know that they're not presenting the data in a way that is helpful, like you bring someone else in to look at it. That's right. And we and we say, that's fantastic because that's what we're here to do. So don't worry about cleaning it up. And by the way, let's set it aside because what we want I want at least at least my approach, my approach is I want to get your daily and weekly cash as tight as we can get it.

00;36;16;18 - 00;36;41;21

Unknown

I want you to know what's coming in this week and what's going out this week. That's where I focus. I use the financials as a not only a measurement tool for success, but also as to dive in to find solutions to some of the holes that we that we discover when we focus on cash. So when we have cash leaking, now it's time to dig into the financials.

00;36;41;28 - 00;37;14;22

Unknown

The financials need cleaning. Great. Let's clean them. But let's continue focusing on cash. Let's get cash moving in and out in a way that is nurturing to the business and not nurturing to the problems. Right. So we kind of change the focus. So that's at least for me. That is my focus both figuring out operations and managing cash and making sure that we have a very good understanding of every dime that comes in and dime it physically goes out where it's categorized.

00;37;14;22 - 00;37;42;02

Unknown

Happiness go, okay, that that will come in time. And that's part of the cleanup that we do. That's part of working with the bookkeepers. It's all of that. But I'm really mostly interested in cash and cash out for the very first, at least month, sometimes 60 days. It takes us to get that really under control, and also to examine some of the recurring decisions that affect why there isn't enough cash at the end of the week or the end of the month.

00;37;42;05 - 00;38;09;02

Unknown

Right. So those are that's a great way to say it. Yeah, because some of these decisions are causing the cash problem. That's when I say when I say operations are the problem showing up in your bank account. That's what I mean by that. Or more about the decisions and or the behavior that we have taken for granted that are draining cash for lack of a lack of a better way.

00;38;09;02 - 00;38;34;18

Unknown

And sometimes people interpret that to be spending money. Not necessarily. So there we go. That is a great way to say it. I that is the best outro I've ever heard, but it's so true. I mean, just wrapped up in exactly what we do. And I wrote this down, and I'm not one that like taking notes while doing a podcast because I'm really intently listening.

00;38;34;18 - 00;38;53;16

Unknown

But something you said earlier that it's like it's the perfect thing. You said that's how seriously we take it that we're a part of your family. So I love that because I think it's so true. And the culture, the values, what we encompass here at simple CFO really does like that's how we take our relationships with each other.

00;38;53;20 - 00;39;26;07

Unknown

We are family, even though we all work remote and we all work with different types of clients like we meet so regularly and we just find a way to. We take everything we do seriously, and we really are family. And that's what we do with all of our clients that come aboard. So if you're listening right now and you're any of this conversation resonates with you or any of the clients that Michael mentioned, and you just you think that's me or I really want to talk to someone about this and or you feel like you don't want to be vulnerable, like, give it a try, be vulnerable, pick the phone up like we want you

00;39;26;07 - 00;39;45;14

Unknown

to get to your goals. We take it very seriously and just head over to you can book a discovery call. You can click on this message or on this podcast, and just book a call and figure out if our services are right for you. Anything that you need from bookkeeping to CFO to tax and tax strategy, head over simple CFO.

00;39;45;14 - 00;40;06;11

Unknown

Com thank you Michael for being here. This podcast was great. I appreciate all of your insight. We appreciate all the work that you do for simple CFO. And I'm just super grateful to have you here. So thank you as am I. Thank you. And we'll see you guys in the next episode. Thanks for listening to the simple CFO Case Files on the Profit First for Real Estate Investors podcast.

00;40;06;14 - 00;40;20;19

Unknown

If you found this helpful, make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss our guest interviews featuring other real estate investors and our Profit first chats with David Richter. If you're ready to bring clarity and structure to the finances in your business, visit profit. To apply for a free financial discovery, call with our team.