When You Buy a Glorified Job, Not a Business

And so they have to make sure that the pricing they have when the hole is dug is the same as when you go install five months later, regardless of the fact that it's five months later. So I came in immediately. Was just like hemorrhaging money.

So that's a whole other thing I've never actually liked. You know, I've lost a little bit on real estate deals, but to just consistently bleed money every single month when you have five night resources. I genuinely have never experienced stress like that in my entire life.

Because we were so like our pricing versus my overhead was so out of balance. So like that's another thing, right? When you buy a business with debt, understand that debt is expensive.

I didn't understand that. I didn't even think about it. In, in. It's my opinion that the day you buy a business, even though you're buying a business that's been in operation and been the same way it's been for how many ever years, it's a fundamentally different business.

The day, the day you take ownership, it just is. And I found that to be the case right away the owner and say.

More about that Tato because maybe. Sorry if I interrupted you were about to but just because that is a theme of this podcast. The business I thought I bought is not the business I actually bought.

Do you mean that kind of about the business itself or simply the numbers are different because you've got a loan and your seller didn't or what?

Both. So there's the fact based things like numbers. I have debt, you know, I all of a sudden need more people. Right? The owner was, regardless of what he told you, the owner was involved in getting through every minute of the day.

And so now all of a sudden that resource is gone. And really it's a couple resources because that person had a lot of knowledge that now you need to replace with a couple unskilled people Also too owners who are at it for that amount of time find incredible efficiencies, efficiencies that are not realistic efficiencies such as the van doesn't need to go in for maintenance. Why would I do that?

That's silly. Are forklift. Why would I have a service contract? It's fine, I'll just kick it if it doesn't start. Things like that just are.

I call them efficiencies to be polite. But you, you show up and you're like oh my God, like all this stuff is, you know, decaying and not maintenance. And also too, like, I actually care about where I show up to work every day.