The Smith Odom Podcast - DeLea Becker

DeLea Becker: Staying in Your Lane

“It’s not a bad thing to stand out. It’s quite glorious.” — DeLea Becker

Get to know special guest DeLea as she talks through, with confidence, the impact you can make when "staying in your lane". Additionally, DeLea gives insight into how to motivate children to take on family-owned businesses.

Key Takeaways from the Podcast:

Family Business as a Foundation for Generational Wealth: DeLea emphasizes the importance of family businesses in building and sustaining wealth over generations. Her construction company serves as the financial engine for her real estate ventures, highlighting the strategic role of a family business in creating a lasting legacy.

• Strategic Approach to Real Estate Investment: DeLea views real estate as a legacy, not just an investment. She employs a calculated approach to property acquisition and development, focusing on long-term gains and leveraging tax benefits like Opportunity Zones.

• Importance of Hard Work and Discipline: DeLea instills the values of hard work, discipline, and responsibility in her son and emphasizes their importance in successfully running a family business. She believes in setting clear expectations, providing the tools for success, and expecting results.

• Calculated Risk-Taking: While not risk-averse, DeLea emphasizes the importance of making informed decisions based on thorough research and long-term projections. She carefully evaluates potential risks and rewards before making any investment decisions.

• Commitment to Community Impact: DeLea is passionate about giving back to the community. She advocates for quality affordable housing and envisions developing mixed-use projects that combine housing with essential community services.
  

  Building Wealth Through Family Business:
  Insights from DeLea Becker

DeLea Becker, an established leader in commercial real estate, recently shared a rich tapestry of insights into wealth generation and family business during her appearance on the Smith Odom Podcast. This blog will unpack her journey, philosophies, and strategic decisions that offer a blueprint for building generational wealth through commercial real estate.

1. Raising the Next Generation in Family Business
“Hard is hard—you do hard things.” This guiding principle is central to how DeLea Becker prepares her son—and others—for the responsibilities of a family business. For DeLea, family businesses are not about following passions or pursuing independence; they are about honoring the family that raised you, showing gratitude, and carrying forward the work that sustains the family legacy.

DeLea believes in teaching the values of hard work, respect, and loyalty. “If you’re grateful for what this business has provided, you show that gratitude by stepping up to help grow it,” she explains. In her family, running the business is not optional—it’s a responsibility and a privilege. Her approach is clear: set expectations, provide the tools for success, and expect results.

2. Pioneering Generational Wealth Through Commercial Real Estate
One of DeLea's core philosophies is that real estate isn't just an investment—it's a legacy. She approaches every property as a business entity capable of passing down financial stability and entrepreneurial autonomy to the next generation. Her strategy involves calculated risks, long-term planning, and leveraging tax codes, such as Opportunity Zones, to maximize returns while minimizing liabilities.

3. Lessons from the 24-Acre Farm: Turning Setbacks into Opportunity
In 2017, DeLea and her husband purchased a 24-acre farm near the F1 racetrack, initially envisioning it as a future family residence. However, rapid population growth and changing demographics rendered their original plans unviable. Instead of selling the property, DeLea pivoted, transforming it into a strategic RV park development. This pivot not only showcased her ability to adapt but also highlighted her expertise in leveraging tax benefits like Opportunity Zones for long-term gains.

4. Family Business: The Cornerstone of DeLea’s Strategy
For DeLea Becker, the family business isn’t just a financial venture—it’s the backbone of everything her family has built. Beck-Reit & Sons, the construction company she runs with her husband, provides the resources and stability needed to pursue larger opportunities, such as acquiring and developing commercial real estate. It’s a tried-and-true model of wealth generation: one enterprise drives the success of another.

DeLea emphasizes the importance of structure and discipline in a family business. “Everyone has a role to play, and when you stick to your role, everything runs smoother,” she explains. This clear division of responsibilities allows her to focus on long-term strategy while her husband handles construction operations. By aligning the family’s efforts toward a shared goal, they minimize conflict and maximize results—creating not just a business, but a legacy for future generations.

By raising her son with these principles, she’s ensuring the skills and mindset needed to take over the construction company that has been the backbone of their family. “There’s no one in the world who has your back more than family,” DeLea emphasizes. For her, family businesses are not just about profit—they’re about shared purpose, loyalty, and preserving the family legacy for future generations.

5. The Role of Risk and Gut Instinct in Business Decisions
A recurring theme in DeLea’s philosophy is calculated risk-taking. While she describes herself as "not risk-averse," she highlights the importance of making decisions based on thorough research and long-term projections. For example, she meticulously plans her projects with an eye toward future market conditions, ensuring that every investment has the potential to thrive even in downturns.

6. Transforming Challenges into Learning Opportunities
DeLea's career is a testament to resilience and adaptability. She recounted a project in East Austin where unexpected structural issues forced her to pivot from renovation to demolition and redevelopment. While the initial setback seemed daunting, the experience deepened her expertise in managing complex developments and strengthened her resolve to face future challenges head-on.

7. Giving Back: Affordable Housing and Community Impact
Beyond personal and family wealth, DeLea is deeply committed to giving back. As a board member of the Strategic Housing Finance Corporation, she advocates for quality affordable housing that serves communities without compromising construction standards. Her vision for retirement includes developing mixed-use projects that combine affordable housing with supportive services like daycares, restaurants, and meeting spaces.

8. Building the Next Generation of Leaders
DeLea is equally passionate about preparing the next generation to carry the torch. She instills in her son and mentees the importance of discipline, resilience, and embracing hard work. For aspiring leaders, she advises focusing on math and science, staying open to calculated risks, and embracing challenges as opportunities for growth.

9. Why East Austin? The Heart of Strategic Growth
DeLea’s affinity for East Austin stems from her ability to identify areas with high growth potential. Since her first property purchase in the area in 2006, she has consistently sought opportunities in underdeveloped neighborhoods, taking calculated risks that have paid off as the community has flourished.

10. Leadership and Legacy
DeLea’s leadership style is rooted in action and accountability. While she acknowledges her limitations in managing large teams, her mentorship and example have inspired others in her field. She believes in putting her money where her mouth is, only advising clients to take actions she would take herself.

DeLea Becker’s journey demonstrates that generational wealth is about more than financial success—it’s about creating opportunities, building resilient businesses, and leaving a legacy that benefits future generations. Her appearance on the Smith Odom Podcast offers a masterclass in leveraging expertise, taking calculated risks, and staying committed to personal and professional growth.

For those seeking inspiration or a roadmap to success in commercial real estate, DeLea’s story is a beacon of possibility.

DeLea Becker an experienced Commercial Real Estate Owner discusses what it takes to lease vacant office space during the challenges of Work From Home

• Transcript

  Building Wealth Through Family Business: Insights from DeLea Becker's Smith Odom Podcast Appearance

  I was born in Austin, but I was raised in Dallas. What's the coolest part about having your birthday at South Fork Ranch? Oh! I didn't know that you deep dove. You just start with that. The coolest? It was all. Cause listen, I grew up, that was my parents favorite show. And we visited it two or three times, like just to go see it.

  And I remember my dad like being really excited about going to see that. Yeah. I did find that and I was like, I got to ask you this cause this is really cool. Yes. So I grew up watching Dallas and in college I watched it two times all the way through. And I watched the new series with my son who's now 17 all the way.

  Dynasty. Did I? No, we didn't do Dynasty. No. Dallas and Dynasty. No, there's a new series now that's based on Dallas, but it's called something else. Yeah. I think. Is it not? It's not? Because they did come out with a new Dynasty? Maybe I got it wrong. I think. I thought that was based on Dallas.

  I think they did. It was a couple of years ago. Okay. Because I was thinking, that's not that, the old one's better. Yeah. Same for Dallas. Yeah. Yeah. But. It's still Dallas and how was it? What did you do? What? What was it about? Oh my word. Okay, so I love to go to the roundabout. I love the show Dallas and my husband and I went there, it actually might have been his 50th birthday and I threw a surprise party for him with his friends at the Egyptian Mockingbird.

  What's it called? So good Italian food. And while we were there, I'm like, I'm dying to go tour this thing. Like I'd found out that you can go tour the Dallas South Fork Ranch. So we did. And I was there and you can throw events there. And I'm like, what? What? So I went to my husband's we're going to be here forever.

  So I walk up to the. Table where you talk to the event people, and said, I want to have my 40th birthday party here. What are my options? They showed me all of my options including the mansion the original house. They're like you can rent the whole original house I'm like, Whoa, what?

  And they're like, okay, you get it all. You get free rain. We have some places that are red roped off you. They don't want you in, but a lot of it. They unrope if you do your private party there. So that's how it all came about. I'm like, I am having my 40th birthday party here. I'm making everybody dress.

  Like the 80s. Yeah, nice. I was gonna ask. Yeah, that's right. I did it. It's gotta be themed. I know. It was, oh, it was themed. Everybody had to come dressed like it was the 80s, and they had life size posters of all of the characters, so you got to take pictures with them. I had a photographer. We did sparklers on the front lawn.

  It was amazing. Nice. Was it all day? It was like 5 to 11. Oh, that's pretty good. By the time, by 11 you had seen it. You had been a part of it. I mean, I could have stayed longer. And we did get behind the red rope for some things. Those are not posted. Yeah. I'm known to break some rules. Nice. Yes. I think you have to.

  In order to be curious, in order to evolve, in order to get to where you are today. To get the picture. To get the picture. That's right. To get the picture. Claim the victory. Whatever you want to call it. Yes. As long as you do no harm. Very true. Very true. I sneak over, I take it very carefully, and then I sneak back.

  There you go. Yes. It was amazing. And I do believe they're turning it into a residential development. I don't know if they're closed yet. But if they're not. Yeah, it's been years since I've been out there, so I don't know. I mean, all that whole area out there is growing and developing.

  So I would imagine it's going to get swallowed up maybe by, I remember going out there as a kid because aunt Jackie, I have a, I have an aunt. She's pretty awesome. Her husband sold rifles, handmade rifles. And then some of the cast members had they knew them. And so we got a little tour, but it was a long time ago.

  I don't know. It was maybe seven or eight. Yeah. And I remember seeing it on TV and walking around thinking, Oh man, this is pretty awesome. Yeah. But we watched that every week. It was pretty, pretty amazing. It's still, I mean, I highly recommend going back and watching it. Everything that J. R. says is amazing.

  Yeah. I mean. It's one off. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. So what are you thinking about these days? What's what's on the forefront? Oh, you want to know what I'm doing? I'm in business. What's exciting you right now about what you have coming up? There's a lot of, there's a lot of directions that we're excited to explore all kind of organically.

  Okay. I mean, if you want to know what is exciting me today, it is, I have a 24 acre farm east of the F1 track. And the intention was that we would move there whenever my son graduated from high school. So we bought it in 2017 and in that time the demographics and amount of people have just exploded.

  Which is an incredible blessing. Like you, you don't want to complain, although you don't really want to lose your family farm either. We can go shoot guns and do everything that we want to do, ride motorcycles and everything. Shoot bow and arrow. So this started to occur. And last year we just said, there's no way we're going to move out there and live there permanently.

  And my husband was sad about losing his 3000 square foot fully air conditioned shop with a 1200 square foot apartment in the mezzanine that you've got that he's got out there. Gotcha. Okay. It's real nice. So I said Because we thought about selling it and it is in the opportunity zone, but we bought it in 2017.

  So we can't take advantage of that. And I looked around at what was going on, who's moving here. And I said let's just turn it into an RV park. Brilliant. Yeah. It's a perfect plan. And so that's what we're moving towards. Then the thing that I'm excited about is to take advantage of the opportunity zone.

  I can only own 20%. Okay. So I, but I determined this last week, but I need to go through all the threads and make sure I'm correct. I can form an LLC, and I buy into 20 percent of it, 80 percent of it to other owners. You as examples, and then it's the opportunity zone. So we go develop the RV park. We hold it for 10 years.

  Capital gains and recapture from Cossack are gone. Nice. Okay, nice. Nice. Yeah. Nice. So I'm very excited. Yeah. Because it's going to take some heavy deep thinking to figure it out. Is the, is it the programmatic deep thinking or is it the organization of business plan and how you maneuver through those logistics that you just talked about?

  It's mostly lining up loopholes in the tax code. That's right. So that's. Yes. It's the legal and the tax code. All right. That's what I love to do. This passion and this love, where did it all start? Remind us, or just not remind us, but tell us, I know that family business is a real interest that I want to dig into.

  Yes. There's a there's a lot of history about entrepreneurial activity in your family. And you could say, and my family is real similar. Some children, in that family or that lineage pick it up. Some don't right. And so what did, what do you, whenever you're growing up, how'd you start evolving into who you are?

  And then, cause we're real curious about that lineage of decisions and the, and how do you find that directionality, right? Is it very purposeful, which it seems like it is. Not for me. It has not been purposeful at all. I grew up thinking I was going to be a lawyer. I mean, that's really thought, that's what I wanted to do.

  Like I said, I have a legal mind. In some ways that brain is still there though. It absolutely is. Yes, the things that I have purview over, I know the law around the tax code I have purview over. I know the code yesterday. I fought property taxes on a building. I own in Harris County and I know Texas property code better than that guy because he Threw in, which was amazing.

  He said Ms. Becker, don't you understand that these tax dollars is what funds our roads and schools and everything, which I didn't respond because that's not factual and it has nothing to do with Texas property code. Yeah. But I was glad he said it because he's going from a different angle, which is not factual nor code.

  Yeah, therefore he will lose. Yeah Good point. It's a very good point. Yeah, so That is how I grew up. My life was a bit derailed We moved three times while I was in high school, so by the last time I was a junior, I went to Austin High, and I was just fed up and not really headed in any direction other than college.

  That was required of me. My parents, neither of them went to college, so my mom's you're going to college, and I said, yes, ma'am, and I didn't think much of it. Looking at somebody that is incredibly intentional, my husband, who turned 60 last week. Oh, congratulations. Thank you. I know, we made it 60 years.

  It's a big deal. Yeah. So he three years old, his birthday cake is a construction cake. He knew you wanted to be a contractor, he wanted to be in construction, and he never veered ever, never that's interesting. Yeah. Never. Yeah. Never. I'm don't want to say I'm all over the place, but I will look at something and go, I can do that.

  I'll take advantage of that opportunity. Never have I thought I would like to own an RV park. This is yes, I never thought that. And I don't even know if I would have ever thought to go buy land to do an RV park. It just so happened that now I have this piece of property. What I wanted to occur, Never.

  Is gone that opportunity makes no sense. So what can I do to take advantage of what I do know? I know opportunity zones 1030 ones. I know tax money, all of those things. So really, where I think I probably got the most direction was whenever I met and married my husband, and he Reitmeyer, who is the right of Beck, right?

  Becker plus Reitmeyer that You have a construction company that does government work, you take the financials and the money and you buy real estate, you have an engine, and this is what you buy, period, it's all about the real estate, but you've got to have an engine, not just money in the bank, that's harder to get a loan, but if you have, audited financials, banks love me, I mean, I'm like, here's my financials and they're third party audited yeah, that's really what set me on my direction. He makes the money and I go buy buildings. Yeah, you go. It's a perfect partnership. Yeah. Do you ever get involved in the construction business though? What does that look like? So we do tech start road and bridge repair. You will not find me on the side of a highway meeting with tech start.

  It's not my, it's not my expertise. That would be a bad idea for me. I think tech stop might be a little worried also, if I showed up you're like, Oh no, what I get involved in is more on the development side. We will buy a building and we'll say, okay, we did it in East Austin. We've done many in East Austin.

  We bought a, an old 1960s Ferrari repair shop, center block buildings, just amazing. I mean, it was incredible. So we bought that and we gutted it and turned it into offices where I officed and then I leased out the rest. Where I came in is all the city work and site plan exemption. And I wouldn't say that I was out in the field every day, managing the subcontractors.

  That's, I left that to my husband. I could, I mean, it's at any given morning I can be given orders to do something. Yeah, over coffee. Yeah, it's 5 30. You need to call so and so because I need to get the sign for the warehouse. Yeah I, sir. That's our mornings. It's lovely. So I do step in when needed.

  But mine is more permitting x permit expediting, putting together proformas. That's really where. We work incredibly well because we are yin and yang. When we don't work well is when we try to get in the other's purview. If I say, this is going to lease for 24 a square foot. And I thought of this last night, the two words, I cannot stand.

  And he doesn't say them often, but he will look at me and say, you're wrong. Is that a challenge? It usually puts me on my back foot and I think, am I wrong? Yeah. But then I will go do some more due diligence to come back and go, I'm not wrong. I'm right. I know I'm right. So if he stays out of my purview, then we're all good.

  He goes and does the construction. I take all of that. I do what, project what we can lease it for. What's it going to look like? When are we going to, we build and buy everything to hold forever. But I have a price on everything I own. Yeah. So if the day comes, it will sell. So I pencil out how it's going to look into the future.

  He figures out this and we stay out of each other's lane. Nice. What you talk about East Austin, what is, how did you develop the love for East Austin? Where that stemmed from? Again, this is, I've not had much direction, but God has put me where I'm supposed to be. We bought our first building at 1101 East 6th in 2006, and it was really not quite luck.

  Networking brings us all together. And then whenever you get to know somebody, they have you in mind whenever they have an opportunity and they need you. Does that make sense? So it is more likely now that I've met you in person, the next thing that comes up that needs an architect, you're going to be top of mind.

  You're welcome. You've actually been on my professional recommendation list for many years. Because you were recommended by Scott Magic. Oh, yeah. I know. Yeah. He actually went to the same school for a master's than I did, and it's a very small theoretical school in San Diego. I didn't even know he had a master's.

  Yeah. I don't know how I found that out, but I did. Anyway, it was very small, and not a whole lot of people come from there, interesting. I respect him, and so he recommended you, and you've been just on my list for a very long time. Susan Bins had found this building three blocks east of I 35 in 2006, and it was falling down.

  It was caving in, the roof was gone, and They, she wanted to buy it, but the bank wouldn't sign off on her doing it by herself. Somehow, Beckwright came into play, and we said, sure, we'll be happy, we'll be the general contractor, and then we'll take a portion of ownership. That was our first building. People thought we were crazy, because East Austin had not started to boom.

  This is a very strategic thing that we do to this day. We will buy buildings that don't make sense, don't pencil out for leasing, yet. Yeah, sure. We'll go do the work, we move our offices in. What do you see, though, to give you confidence to do that? What is it, if it doesn't pencil out, if it doesn't perform what are you seeing there that says, okay, we need to do this?

  Population growth. Utilities coming, what is going on in the area. Our latest one is two and a half acres in Salado, outside the city limits. Very good. Very important. We bought it in a 1031 exchange, did not plan on doing anything with it yet. So we were just going to let it sit there has a little old house on it.

  We're going to use it as our yard. So for construction equipment, my husband will always say, if you drive by our yard and see equipment there, that's bad. Yeah, it's a problem. We want the yard empty, but you got to have one just so you can maneuver everything around. So we're sitting on that. We bought it last a year ago and we are pulling.

  Water permits for our RV park in Bastrop County, and they got very delayed. That's all I'm going to say. Delayed by, it's been 14 months since we've been approved. They just haven't issued. We thought. Oh my, if this is happening in Bastrop County because of the massive growth, I'm assuming that's what it is.

  And Elon, God bless all of that. What if that happens in Salado? Let's turn our attention and move on this fast. Cause it's in the ETJ, we, let's go get our water and everything right now. So we maneuvered over to that. Why I loved the land and very happy to build 25, 000 square feet of warehouse on it right now.

  Yeah. Is population growth, central Texas. We have wastewater 300 feet away. We're going to put in septic, but we strategically designed that. So whenever sewer gets there, we tie in and we turn that into another 5, 000 square foot shop. We are using it as our offices, if you will. So if it doesn't lease out, Oh it doesn't harm us, but it will lease out.

  But let's say it doesn't. Let's say it doesn't lease out for two years. That's okay. We just sit there and we use it. We have the construction company, the yard, the offices. Everything's fine. And whenever the growth gets there, we will be there in the middle of it. Which is really what has happened in East Austin every single time.

  Because if you look at 1101 E6, you will say, how did you know? I mean, it was 18 years ago. Yeah. Like it looks like we were incredibly smart today. We just took a risk. Yeah. 18 years ago and luck and everything else caught up with us. Yeah. So generally we like to be in the path of progress, path of growth, or some other scenario.

  I bought a small building in San Antonio on West Commerce. It is on a corner, it's a center block building, it's just terrific. And San Antonio is a very stable demographic. People from San Antonio don't usually wake up and go, I just, let's move to California. No. They're very familial, they've been there for generations, and they stay.

  And I like that population. We've done, Quite a bit. There it is. It's a different. It's a different animal name. It's a completely different animal. But if you provide the retailer for that stable demographic, you're going to be just fine. Yeah. And I like that. It's safe. So I look at every opportunity.

  What am I going to get out of it? Yeah. But you also don't mind being on the fringe and because I guess what you're doing is you're developing a now a plan for the now and you're waiting for the future, right? So there's some risk that you're okay with and not knowing, but you have a pretty good gut feeling that this is going to, this is going to happen, whatever it is that you're doing.

  Yes. I, Mike is very honed in on that. I have said, I am not risk adverse and I probably take a lot more risk than most people, but it's super calculated. Yeah. And I have no doubt, I mean, I've seen the numbers in the projects. I have missed so much opportunity because I was too, I'm not sure. No, this is pie in the sky.

  I like a little bit more. Okay, if this ramps up slowly, it will work for me. So that's really how I judge everything. And I read or I heard, it was like a study where they had, A person and they might have done it with 20 people or 100 people and they said, you can have this tomorrow. You can have this in 10 years.

  Picture yourself in 10 years. The people 80 percent chose tomorrow. What they determined or proved up what other people have said is that people can't picture themselves down the road. I have a knack of picturing myself down the road. Yeah. Forecasting. I have everything planned up to my funeral.

  Yeah. Wow. And that's 80 percent planned. So can you talk a little bit about those things that you had planned and they didn't go the way that you thought they would go? I'm imagining that when that happens, You found opportunity elsewhere such as your 24 acres, right? But what we always talk about in our offices, our architecture, what we do is a, is almost like science.

  What you do could be like science as well. There's a list of failures that you get through in order to get to the success. And so one could say, some may give up during a hundred failures at a time, but you can forecast that success in a way that gives you optimism, that gives you the spirit of keep coming back and coming back.

  So then ultimately you're going to find that success if you keep trying. But where some of those, did you have some of those moments where you can think back, that's a learning lesson that I found out on this one. Okay. Yeah. So I'm very excited. And it'll, it will tie right into the RV park because a lot of what I do every day, and this I imagine is true for y'all as well.

  If I do 10 things, only one is going to land, but I have to do all 10 as if they're going to land. Yeah, that's right. I have to do the 10 as if they're going to land because oftentimes it's the one that I thought was a sure thing doesn't. And the one that was crazy, there's no way does. So you've got to spread your time out Assume they're all going to land work them each the RV park Opportunity zone came to mind because in 2016 we bought a building at Mainer and Rogge Lane East Austin.

  It was a 11, 000 square foot Little tiny, it's like neighborhood retail strip center. Yeah. Great. Just wonderful. Just wonderful. Where is Rogi? I'm imagining where that is. I'm trying to think of what a good, there's a church's chicken right in front of it. That probably doesn't, it is above Mueller, above the Mueller development.

  Okay. 78723, probably a mile east of Hanks. Okay. Huh. There's a bird flies. So we bought that with the intention of gutting it and renovating it and leaving it as is on the piece of property, which I want to say was half acre. All that was great until we realized, and I can't remember what the name of the roof is, but it's a 1970s roof where they lay this flat and then they pour concrete over it.

  Do you know what it's called? Concrete over it? Yeah, it's a lightweight concrete that's a couple inches thick. Yeah, over a decking, like a corrugated decking. I will find out. I know, yeah, because we cut into that before in set units. I don't know what it's called, but yes, I want to find that out.

  And I have it in my notes, but I won't pull out the phone. Yeah. But the building had let, it just been, it had rotted over the years because it was East Austin and it had been neglected for decades. And we've determined that there was so much damage structurally to the walls and the roof that we couldn't just take the roof off and replace it.

  We had to take the whole building down, whole building had to come down. So I'm like, this is not what I penciled out. And we had a partner to, we had a friend that's a residential agent. This property had crossed his desk before it went on the market. And he knew who to call. He's Oh, this is Russ Becker.

  So he called us. We bought it before it went on the market, but we had a partner and that's not always a bad thing. Not always a bad thing, unless things don't go as planned, and then you've got to get your partner on board, which is not always easy. We knew we had to tear it down. I had Scott Magic do an amazing, oh, I still want to build this building, it's just incredible.

  And it was in the Opportunity Zone. And this is now 2019, so the jobs act of the, that created the opportunity zone, which is you can take capital gains, put it in an opportunity zone, hold for 10 years, you sell, you pay none of that capital gains back. At the time, one of my clients was selling a building that they had probably 200, 000 basis in for 5.

  5 million. They were going to have enormous capital gains. I said you come in as me as partners, we'll do this Opportunity Zone. 18 months of research I did on the Opportunity Zone, and I had, I knew I could only own 20%. So that's all the government will allow me to own. I can't just sell it to myself.

  Yeah. So that's how we'd come to that. Lots of study, lots of research. I talked to my clients into it. They're like, this is fantastic. I go to my partner. I say, this is what we're going to do. Partner wanted a ginormous developer fee. Cause, he'd heard all these syndication things and I said that's really not how this is going to work out seeing as how our, my client is bringing 7 million and we're bringing the land, which absolutely has 20 percent value.

  We didn't agree. So we sold it and that is fantastic. We sold it. We made some money. Everything is fine. We didn't 31'd into another building. All is well. So I shelved my 18 months of research. I have two huge binders on this opportunity zone, Scott Magic's designs, everything. And instead of feeling like I had failed, Or I'd wasted my time because that is my number one like, Oh no, I just wasted my time.

  Yeah. This is a time waster. I thought this, maybe this will come back someday, something will come of it. So we have cost seg two buildings, cost segregation and bonus depreciation is part of the jobs act as well. If you sell something that you cost segregated, you have to pay back that depreciation. It was taken off.

  It gets added to your taxes. If you will, you don't have to send them a check, but it's added to your income on your taxes, which is the same as a check when you pay your taxes. That's a problem. I have been going through the hoops to see. If, how I can get away from that recapture, the answer is a 1031 exchange.

  You can defer that recapture. Okay? So I'm going down this. Because I have a friend that buys car washes. And then cost sex bonus depreciation. I'm like, maybe I need to get in on this. But then I figured out that recapture. I'm like, I don't know how to avoid it. Something was said somewhere about the opportunity zone.

  And that, that washes away the capital gains and that recapture. And I thought, there's a whole lot of people that own car washes that don't realize what's coming at them. Interesting. And that's when I realized, I will take this opportunity zone thing that I spent 18 months on, and I'll go apply it here.

  So it was never wasted. Never wasted. And if that doesn't work out at the RV park, it doesn't mean I might not go do another one. Yeah, sure. Somewhere else. Yeah. Yeah, I think that knowledge gain is key, right? Because it's never, or The knowledge gain and the fact that I know this direction didn't work out.

  However, I gained this knowledge and I won't go that direction again, but I'm smarter this next time. I mean, simple, the fact of failure is a good thing. Absolutely. I don't like it. I don't like it at the time? At the time? I don't like it. How about 18 months later when you realize that opportunity?

  I agree. There you go. That's how I try to look at everything. And that is, it's knowledge and yesterday I heard the most amazing thing about leadership. It really wasn't about decision making, but it was like critical thinking and leadership Most executives, business owners, CIA operatives no, I'm sorry, take that out, they don't do it by gut.

  That, that was, that's what this talk was about. They don't do it by gut there's a way that they get around that. Your gut is based on experience and your gut is right 80 to 90 percent of the time. That's right. But what they said is, if that 10 to 20 percent is somebody's life, it's not an acceptable error.

  What is your percentage between when you make decisions, gut and numbers, and the pro forma? Since I do it over such a long period of time, I'm 100 percent right. Because time always catches it. So I never pencil anything out as, let's sell it in five years. Ever. Ever. We'll never sell it. We'll sell it in 50 years.

  How do you, we've talked about this a couple times, Jeremy and I, but how do you differ gut and emotion?

  Are those similar or different? Because you could say, Business decisions based on emotion are not pretty, particularly good decisions because they're based on emotion, but gut may be different. And maybe your emotion guides your gut. I, for the most part, I'm not an extremely emotional person. I know that sounds weird.

  I'm super calculated. Honest, you want the honest truth of how I deal with emotion because I don't like it. I don't like emotion. I have a morning routine. I sit for an hour very early in the morning and I read the Bible and I pray in my meditate. And whenever I have an emotion that is gnawing at me, I write it out.

  Yeah, I asked for relief and I write why it eating my lunch. Clients can eat my lunch. Something that's going on in the market. This is said my kid's not doing what I want him to do, and it bothers you. And they say it only hurts you. It's like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.

  Yes, because it's like eating your lunch, and I can't, and I'm trying to think of something else, do something important, and I'm like, It brings me back. Yeah. Yeah. I just, I can't stand it. So I really will. I call it pray write, but you call it journal. Yeah. And I write out all the ugly about it. Yeah. Yeah. I am mad about this.

  Yeah. They messed up this contract and this affects me. How and do to do and play it through. Yeah. Cause usually it's always about me. Yeah. Absolutely. It always comes back. Always comes back. And I just want to be relieved. Because I don't want to carry emotion around. Yeah, something we were talking about this last week, I think, and something I've been working on is, in construction, we deal with problems.

  That's what it is. We have to deal with problems. And it's hard sometimes not to get emotional about it. So my kind of go forward is I'm going to try to be really unemotional with strategy and dealing with problems. But be more emotional with empathy when it comes to leading the team, have having a little, because we were talking about a podcast we were listening to that say in a business sense, you've got to wipe out all emotion.

  But then we talked about this for a good hour. And it's that's not probably the best. Everybody's different. Everybody's got their own flavor. But, I think there is a need for emotion sometimes in leadership. Yeah we both strive. We both value culture right within our companies.

  And so whenever you're, whenever you have that, you can make calculated decisions based on money or project or timelines or however these formulated methods come together. But then when you're dealing with the other side of it, when you're managing people, sometimes that triggers an emotional.

  Side of it that you've got to deal with, whether it's yours or theirs or whatever. Yeah. And so to understand the difference and to apply those values on those different situations is really helpful to talk through. Yeah. I have enjoyed listening to your podcast about talking about it. And whenever I read the email leadership, I'm like, I'm not a good leader.

  Because I simply do not like emotion and I did really appreciate y'all talking about it. I think it's why your businesses are bigger. You have so many people and you get buy in because you do give them empathy. Yeah. You do care. You give them room to fail. Why would you say you're not a good leader?

  Because I wouldn't. Leading up to this, we've interacted with a few people that, Said, man, she really makes an impact with everybody around her. That's leadership. So I'm just curious. Why would you say you're not a good leader? I am a wonderful leader. If what you do has no impact on me.

  Okay. If you work for me and I'm a manager, I will tell you what to do. I will tell you how to do it. I do not want to follow up. If I have to follow up, that means you didn't do it. Yeah. And I'm already. Perturbed that is the one emotion I have annoyance. So the managing is way out there for me. I think also people right or wrong.

  I think they really underestimate what commercial real estate what we do. I mean, I'm working with your money. Yeah. Do you care if I make a couple mistakes? Yeah. You do. Yeah. You care a lot. That's right. I build what you design. I care if you got it right a lot because I'm going to own it. And that means and I built it.

  So I'm liability. There's all of that. If you design it and you build it, I care that you got it right. Yeah. All of that. So I always lead with that. We have to get this right. And I've had people, I had an assistant once that said, but to leave people make mistakes. No, not if you check it 10 times, you check it 10 times, then I'll check it once and then we're good.

  That's how things get out the door. This is not a sales job. This is people's money. It is their assets. It's their family wealth. It's their business. They put their businesses in it. It's incredibly important to them. And most everybody I work with does exactly what I do. They own a business. They buy a building.

  They put their business in it. Maybe they keep doing that. I always operate from, I do it exactly how I would do it, for them, and that brings them extreme value. Leadership out in the world, I do believe I have that, because I am very much, I put my money where my mouth is, I do not tell you to do anything that I don't do.

  Yeah. If I say buy this land and do an RV park, I'm not doing this so I get a commission. I literally know this is going to work. This is a winner and maybe it will be bad for three years in the next recession. Yeah. But hold it long enough. Yeah. So I can lead in that way. I think I'm very good at mentoring from the standpoint of somebody can come to me and say, I've got this problem and I say, go do this and this, as long as they don't work for me, it works great when they work for me and they don't do it and there's a problem, I'm quick to say, I told you what to do.

  How many people do you have working for you? I have two brokers that work for me at Beckerite Commercial. And then our construction company has 25 employees. My husband's much better with people. I mean, you can define when you ask someone what a leader is, right? You're going to, if you ask 10 people, you're going to get 10 different answers, but I would imagine that the people that you that are under you and your companies they follow you for a reason.

  They're there for a reason. They're learning. They're learning by your actions. They're learning by your commitment. They're learning by your success. All of these things. They want to learn. And so whether you tell them how to do their job or you, you get perturbed if there's an error.

  So what like that's a small prize to for the education that you're giving them Absolutely, and I will say so I have jim roark that works for me and michelle anderson And both of them Absolutely understand the value that I bring. Jim Rohwert does quite a bit more tenant rep than I do. As in, I rarely do it, but occasionally.

  If I really enjoy you, we are friends, I know you're going to do what I say when I say it, I might represent you. If it was you, and you said, Dilley, I really need to do this. And I'm like, okay, are you going to do what I say when I say tenant rep? Don't ask questions. We're going to get through this.

  And you said, yes, ma'am, then I would. So Jim and I will banter in a team meeting about an LLY that he's putting in a lease that he's negotiating something that's going on. And he always takes the tenant side and I take the landlord side. And he's but what about putting this in lease? I'm like, I would mark that out.

  He's but it's not fair. I'm like, I don't care. Like we, we banter back and forth. He walks away learning something, I walk away learning something, because he'll say, but what have we put in this? And I'm like, oh, I could live with that. He's they'll like that. I'm like, that's great. So we learn a great deal from each other.

  Michelle came over from Pete Dwyer and Maynor. And I do believe that she came over because I am well known as a woman in commercial real estate and she wanted to be around that and learn from it and get value from it, which she has. So one of the first things I taught her. I try to teach everybody this, don't take clients that aren't realistic.

  Don't take them. Sure. Yeah. Ego pride. Yeah. If Dorchee's Tacos calls me, of course I have to take Dorchee's. They're so amazing. But what if they're not realistic? Yeah. What if they're going to waste my time? Yeah. Sure. Sure. So we have now had two clients, so one of them was an older client that I had since 2012 who had bought land in East Austin to build a building.

  Okay. She did not get to the end where she collected enough money to do said building and business and she called me to solve a land. And I said, Oh, I'd be happy to. Here's my high, medium and low. It takes me two weeks to price a property because I have to make a lot of calls. Yeah. We are a non we're a nondisclosure state, so there's not a lot of comps on the market, and you don't get comps from people unless you know them.

  I can't call Joe Bob that I've never met and ask him for a comp. But I can call Michael Bullard, right? Him and I have a very close relationship. We talk back door all the time. So it takes me two weeks to price something, and I said, Here cliente. High, medium, and low. I will take it at medium or I'll take it at low and I won't take it a dollar over medium because it will be a waste of my time.

  If we price it to medium, I'll have it under contract in 90 days and sold in 120, maybe a little more than 120. If we price it low, I'll have it under contract in 10 days and sold by the end of the month. High, it'll be on the market at least a year, if not longer. And you won't get your price. Unless we wait five.

  And she came back and said, I want high. And I said good luck to you. I don't have the time. And Michelle was working with it on me, with me. I said, Michelle, will you partner with me and help me with this land listing? And she's are you sure we shouldn't take it? I'm like, no. She's are you sure?

  I'm like, no. Do not know so we walked away and there is an agent that hasn't they been sitting on it for more than a year when they've called me to buy it and then when I said I thank you so much I don't desire to buy that piece of property I was actually the. Broker that she bought it with and she called me to list it and I said it was too high and she's oh you send me your pricing, which I think it's worth.

  No, I spent three weeks figuring that out because land's even harder. The correct way to price land is what can you build on it? Take in construction costs, what can you lease it for at the end? And that's a complex process that most brokers don't know all the ins and outs of. Yeah. So I don't give away my numbers.

  And also those are my comps that I got from my friends that it's all back door. Yeah. It doesn't see the public's eye. Yeah. That's interesting. I it reminds me, I had a mentor that I was having coffee with a few months ago and he made the comment that he's a professional athlete when it comes to business.

  And I didn't, and I left that thinking, man, I should have followed up to see what he really meant by that. But I thought about that a lot over the last couple of months. And when I think about what a professional athlete is it's somebody that has practiced their craft and has become the best in the world at that particular position or whatever else.

  And I thought, that's a unique view when you're thinking about business, do people really practice certain things inside of that, that make them, maybe not the best in the world but the best in their niche. What is that for you? Cause I've heard you talking about the tax part that really well.

  Have you focused intentionally on being the best at a certain element? Or what do you think that is for you? I would say this is commercial brokerage. A professional athlete is generally at the top one percent. Yeah. I'm in the top one percent in 1 to 5 million building, office, retail, warehouse, Austin, Texas, up to 20, 000 square feet.

  Period. Period. I'm not a professional at downtown buildings. Yeah. I can figure it out, but you shouldn't call me to sell your skyscraper. I mean, that's J L R C B R E. Not my lane. Not where you want me. When'd you figure that out? Ooh, I would say that I get very clear every single day.

  Yeah. As I do deals with other people. That I will say are absolutely incompetent. And I have found that, man, I Wow. I didn't realize I projected as I think a lot of people do that commercial real estate brokers are extremely experienced with decades of closed deals and transactions behind them.

  Yes. But that doesn't mean they know everything or even that much. A lot of them are very surface level and that works. I came up with a thing there's experienced and then there's an expert. Yeah. An expert is experienced and experience does not equal expertise. How do you get to the expert stage? What do you practice?

  What do you focus on? What do you try to tweak daily or weekly to get to that expert status? Stay in your lane. That's very much, my husband says it, stay in your lane. We do text out rotor and bridge repair. We do up to one and a half million dollar construction contracts.

  They're generally 75 days, we're in and out, we'd like to do it in 60, that's how you make money. And we have three crews and we have them going at all times. We don't put all of our eggs in one basket, we only do text type, we only do text type, we only do text type, we only do text type. We could go, oh, how about we bid this shiny bauble.

  And we don't, that's just I've learned it, whoa, is that in my lane? Now it doesn't mean that I can't spread my expertise, Opportunity Zone is, learning all of that and doing a development is it's, I'm widening my road, but I'm still on the same road, so I very much focus on my lane. And I just took a listing two weeks ago, and it's land in East Austin, and I thought, this is this is my lane.

  Yeah. This, I can do this in my sleep, if you will. Yeah. Whereas, if you call me, one of our friends is looking to buy a building in Liberty Hill, that's really not my lane. Again, if he was buying it for his business, then it might be something that I would want to handle. But he's just looking at everything and do and I'm like that's not really where I do all my business.

  It's not my lane. Mhm. Now, if I was going to buy the building, I'd make it my lane. Yeah. That's how I become the expert and I know, I say this all the time, I don't know everything. There's so much I don't know, but my tiny little box this is, I know everything in that box. Yeah. Nobody's going to beat me out of my box.

  Sure. It's my little, so welcome to my little, that's cool. Welcome to my tiny box. Yeah. The, I'm still, interested in the trajectory of the things that you're involved with, right? In terms of the board, in terms of the different memberships, in terms of the businesses. And it seems though that those.

  Mayor maybe they don't that I guess this is a question do they stay within your lane or are you finding the these avenues because you're interested and either the people the education or the give back or whatever it is right so there is as we. As we begin perfecting aircraft i think our minds tend to wonder in a way that allows us to.

  To fall outside of our lane, so to speak, in order to find a new thing, how do you start maneuvering in the community? Cause I know you're very active. How do you begin maneuvering in our city or our community or other communities in order to keep perfecting?

  Does that make sense? Yes, it does. A lot of it is very strategic very honed in strategy. Got my license in 2012 and I said, okay, we're gonna go do commercial. I wanted nothing to do with residential I don't have the personality for it and it would be miserable for everybody. I really just intended to buy buildings for me I didn't want to have I didn't want to have emotion and other people's Commentary but I did actually fall in love with working with people When they're the right people.

  It's very enjoyable. And also, I can't buy all the buildings that I want to buy, so if I find something and you can buy it, I'm excited. It's by, it's like it's mine. Yeah, that's right. I get to share in your building. So whenever I started we, if you're a realtor, you have to be a member of a board.

  So residential is ABOR, Austin Board of Realtors. In Texas, we have three commercial boards. So we have Central Texas Commercial Association of Realtors, and it's over 26 counties. That's what I joined, and I got very active very quickly. They asked me to be on the board of directors, I think within six months, which I was honored.

  And I said, yes, I don't know what you need me to do, but I will do this. Also incredibly respectful people were on that board that just, heroes, amazing people. I mean, Brian Pittman that had started Independence Title was on the board, right? To get a seat next to that is. Is really something So I was very active on the board and I rose up they pegged me to be president, which I was in 2019 I saw one of the ex presidents.

  He was the president whenever I was put on the board in 2013 And we were joking. He's yeah, didn't he get you a bunch of business and just make you a bunch of money? And then we both laughed hysterically. And I said, no, but what it did is it gave me an incredible reputation and everybody knows who I am.

  And that was important to me because when I started, I was a 36 year old white blonde girl that everybody pretty much discredited. I would. This doesn't happen very often, and I'm very quick to correct people, but very much in the beginning, I'd say I owned a construction company with my husband. They'd go, Oh, your husband owns a construction company?

  I'm sorry, are you trying to put me in my place? So I knew I needed to build up the reputation in the community and doing something of that caliber and showing that you put in the work that you're here doing the thing. You're knowledgeable. You have this network. I emailed Brian Pittman. Tuesday, he responded five minutes later.

  I don't email him all the time, but that means a lot to me. I joined Commercial Real Estate Women because I put my money where my mouth is. It's an organization built for women in commercial real estate. For me not to be a member would almost be a slight. I've been a member of CCIM. I am off and on. I don't, I've taken some of the classes that I cared about what I was going to learn.

  I took a development class when I was doing the Opportunity Zone on Rogi. Yeah. Because there's what I know how to do and there's textbook so I can explain it to my investors. Sure. What my husband and I do is in my spreadsheet on the back of a napkin, we wing it on God. It's not all written up pretty in a pitch deck, but when you're taking 7 million of somebody else's money, they really do want an extra level.

  Sure. So that's why I took. To present that properly. Exactly, and I, it's fine, I can rise to that level. So I do always do the April, it's April 11th, if y'all want to sign up, CCIM Skeet Shoot. Ooh, all right. It's very good. And, because I do a lot of business with those brokers, I do admire the organization.

  I just spread a little thin. My latest board, which is hilarious, I, it's a God thing. That's why it's hilarious. I go to Mount Zion Church in East Austin. That's 150 year old historically black church. And I love it. It is literally heaven on earth. And one of the deacons emailed me and said, Dali, we would like for you to apply to be on this board.

  Now it said strategic Housing Finance Corporation. I had no idea what it was. Maybe you do. This is the funny. Oh, and my pastor was, Reverend Horton was copied in and I saw, finance? Okay. Church not asking me to babysit? Yes. I am happy to do service work that is in my lane. See, because usually the church is we'd like you to park cars.

  This is not, or schools, or we'd like you to come volunteer. Can I just send you a check? I'm very good at that because I respect and I'm grateful for the schools and all of the parents that do go volunteer. It's just not my lane. I'm not really good at it. So I read the email. And I responded back, yes, I will do this.

  I had no idea what it was. . I had to send in an application and so I go to fill out the application. I'm like, what is this thing? So I start researching. I Google it, I'm Googling. Yeah. And it is a funding mechanism, if you will for affordable housing. Oh yeah. The funny part is I don't do multifamily.

  I don't like multifamily construction. There's a lot that I'm like, oh, but clearly this is what God wants me to do. So I apply for it. I interview with the Travis County commissioners and I get put on the board and that's what I do. I, we have our board meeting once a month. It's next Wednesday, no, next Thursday live because it's public open records and we get presented projects.

  And we decided we want to partner. We come in as the GP and the general contractor, which is very interesting. Here's why we allow. So there's about 10 of these housing finance corporation style mechanisms for Central Texas, Travis County, because like we're strategic housing finance corporation, Austin Has one of their own.

  So if it's in Austin proper, they generally get it. It's outside of proper strategic gets it. We will partner with you on your project. The reason why we're the general contractor is so that we, it's no sales tax. We're GP, so we own it and there's no property taxes. That's how then owner developer is able to reduce rents.

  Interesting. It is very interesting. I didn't, I don't know that I knew about that. I didn't. Mount Zion. Mount Zion Church. They're not involved with it. The deacon Robert Wilmer is, was on the board. And they had an open seat over some stuff that had gone on and they were shaking things up. So he asked me to serve and I said yes before I knew what I was doing.

  That's interesting. This will have to be another conversation. It's gonna, this would extend probably into another hour. We're involved with ARA, so Austin Revitalization Authority, Greg Smith, and I've been real fascinated about East Austin, the history, and their purpose is bringing African American families back to East Austin, right?

  That's really, so they fund small businesses they do multi family, they buy properties. So anything that they do, I've said we're in. Whatever you do, we're in. And so there's we're in. In the moment, we're we're shortlisted on RFP called Block 16 and 18 on East 11th Street. It's an empty block behind oh gosh Franklin's, and then not GNDC.

  It's owned by the city. Oh, it's city. Okay. GNDC. No they're the other shortlist. So it's us. And so we're in competition, right? Okay. I gotcha. We're the two teams. Yes. At any rate, there's a long bit of history, underground history that I'm real fascinated about. And, it's unfortunate that it has gotten political in its own way, but the sheer purpose is affordable, commercial, cultural arts center, affordable housing, like it's a large project that we're one of the two hopefully to get it, but at any rate, what you're saying is I'm surprised that those two worlds haven't collided yet.

  And maybe they haven't. And I'm sure that the two people, that you're involved with and I'm involved with also understand their lanes perhaps. But at any rate that, that was really not a sheer purpose or a discussion other than, Oh, I want to know more. I'm happy to. Learn with you.

  Yeah, that was the thing. So what I have found in my life And it's why whenever I do my morning time with God, I read the Bible and I meditate on what I read my brain loves to claw into things if you don't give it something to claw into it's it's Very upset and it's all over the place But if you give it a meaty thing, like I don't understand this, but I, or I understand a little bit and I start to claw in, that's really what I'm doing on the affordable housing as well.

  Yeah. How do we use government money? Yeah. How do we use it? There's so many, there's so many ways, but there's, but it's also regulated like what I think is a way may not be a way. So then I got to pull back and go, okay, let's go at it from this way. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And what I've done the thing that I'm adding to strategic right now, I've been on the board for, I think, 10 months, is construction quality.

  Nobody's been paying attention to that. Oh, yes. It probably makes sense in that world, right? But it doesn't make sense in the real world. That's right. If you, this is how I feel. This is how I feel about everything that I own, but especially if I'm taking government money, which is your taxpayer money, because you've got to pay more taxes to cover what didn't bring in taxes, to be clear.

  And I don't build it to stand for 50 years. Is that good for our clients, the people that are relying on affordability? If it leaks in five years, if there are problems because it was inferior quality, the inspections weren't done correctly, it was thrown up to save money. That's not good. I think it's doing a disservice To that community that needs affordable housing is doing a disservice to the construction community it is doing a disservice to our City of austin travis county another thing Clearly, I'm very passionate about this one.

  Don't call it green if we've got to tear it down in 20 years. There is so much landfill in that. Build it right the first time. Here's another avenue that we probably talk about it for another month, and Jeremy and I have been talking about it quite a bit, is the multifamily world, which you, Said you're not particularly interested in it's such a broken industry because of that fact and then you can bracket that industry in a way that you can find you can find an opening that has not been filled in the opening, meaning that.

  If, whether you're taking government or private money should make no difference, right? But there's a quality that, that we're not seeing in a four to 100 unit range, right? And you could say that from 100 to 300 or 400 because those are all. Players that get money in a different way than the 50, the four to 200.

  And so there is a hole in our system. I believe that is interesting because no one's doing it. No one's doing it well from a construction perspective. You could argue no one's doing it from a design perspective or a financial perspective, and that's a horror. It's a, this is. infill thing that, that we're, our city is missing.

  There's a lot of cities are missing and you can narrow it down to a sense of quality. And I was going to say, just the sheer desire to deliver a good product. And And I think that it, we're going to be seeing more of it because we are seeing now that our people are moving out to Leander and all of these other cities that potentially can't get water, right?

  They can't get infrastructure. They can't get all these things. But what are we doing here in order to resolve this situation of housing? And I don't know. Maybe there's an avenue for you there. It sounds like you're, it said, it sounds like you're headed that way. I I'm applying what I know, I'm applying my lane, and I believe that's why I'm meant to be there.

  And that's what I'm doing right now. I will say again, Very planned person. I'm a very planned person. I plan A, plan B, plan C, plan D to do. Our farm is actually plan B farms. If plan A doesn't work in Cuernavaca, we got plan B. Now we're working on D, C, E, F, all the way. When people talk about, oh my gosh, we went to this Christmas party, and a lot of the people were in their 50s and 60s, and they kept saying, what are you going to do when you retire?

  And we're like, what are you talking about? I'm not retiring. Now, will I work 60 hour weeks when I'm 80? I don't think so. I don't think so, but I'm not going to commit to, I won't, that's true. My plan is to somewhere around 65 to 70 dial back to 20 hours a week. And my hope and my intention is that I will go do developments that do nothing for me, but give back.

  Nice. Okay. No. I go do the construction. I'm going to take money for the construction, but I probably will add overhead other than paying, but my knowledge comes free. I'm not going to charge a consulting fee. I'm going to do the development and one of my ideas, which is why the affordability. The affordable housing and how you use government money and tax strategies does very much intrigue me is I'd really love to do A let's just say it's a five story building.

  The top four floors are multifamily so I can get all those things and Those people that live there I might Pick a set of people, whatever that set it, it might be senior citizens. Okay. Let's say it's artists, whatever that is, which I believe I can do. If I do it owned by a nonprofit, then I can dictate that the first floor is a restaurant where those people can work.

  It is daycare. It is meeting rooms. I would like 12 step meeting rooms there on site. Should we serve our population that lives above it? We're utilizing those tax breaks to fund this on the first floor that they don't pay for. Yeah. And here's where I came up with the idea of this restaurant and I would love to take y'all.

  There's a place called Comfort Cafe in Smithville. Was there Sunday? Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's one of our favorite places to go eat breakfast. Exactly. Yeah. So they have people in recovery that work there because here's what happens if you're new in recovery. You're fresh out of prison. It is hard to get a job.

  And sometimes you need a little time to get stable on your feet. It's like a, it's like a toddler. You're a toddler coming out of prison, but you're a 50 year old man and you're supposed to just hit the ground running. And the world has changed. So you need a little time to get your footing.

  So that is, that's my dream. And I'll go do 2 or 10. And that'll be my retirement. That's cool. They've got a farm, where the recovering folks or they work on the farm and they produce, vegetables and other stuff. And that's what they use in the restaurant. Yeah.

  It's phenomenal. We go there maybe once a month. It's awesome. Yeah. So awesome. Yeah. So I want to take what they've done. That's cool. And recreate it with the, with all the skills that I have gotten. I had this realization. You clearly all have heard I am a Christ follower. I'm not pushy about it, but I am vocal about my faith.

  It was 2020 before the pandemic. It was January and I was sitting down to my morning routine and I thought to myself, God did not give me all this experience, failures, knowledge, ability. Things have lined up all these years for me to just go get richer. I don't think he did. So what am I supposed to do?

  Because I don't think I'm supposed to just do nothing and give it all away. I have this head. I've got this head. I can go do these things. What if I go do these complicated things that most people don't do because they need to make money with it? I don't need to make money with it. When I'm 80. 75. It's my retirement plan.

  Yeah. Yeah. Very. I love it. I think that as we wrap this up, I think that this is going to have to be one of many different episodes. Yeah. I agree. Because clearly we have things to talk about. Yeah. Yes. And I, and we were both excited. We're both a little bit nervous. We were. We were. Oh, good. And so I think that if you would come back, that'd be awesome.

  I would come back cause here's the funny thing. Like Robert Wilmer, Deacon Wilmer asked me to be on the board without me knowing anything. When I got the email that asked me to be on this, I said yes before I even knew what y'all talked about. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Beautiful. I knew your reputation and I wanted to be in the room with you.

  And that's why I started watching. I'm like, Oh man, let's make sure what I'm going to be talking about. They might be talking about something that I have no experience in, right? Deep, deep oil, deep ocean oil drilling. And I disagreed. I'm like, Oh no, here we go. I'm going to sharpen it. And that may be next time.

  We. If you want to, I can start studying. I do have one more question that you do have experience in. I've got three daughters, two of which that are out of the house. One's married and working and has a little business. And the other one that's in college. What advice would you give me on how to support them?

  In a really good way to go into business and really thrive and succeed. What should I be doing as a father? Okay, number one. Oh gosh, I have so much. Okay. You are the owner of your construction company. Yeah. Tell me what it is again. Citadel. Citadel, do you have other owners? Excellent. Which one of your daughters is taking it over?

  That's a great question. Probably my youngest one. Excellent. Let's start training her right now. Hold it. How old is she? She's 15. Wonderful. Okay. Is she taking math and science? She is. Excellent. She's gonna go get an engineering degree. Or she can do construction management, A& M, I'm fine with that.

  She can do both. They have a dual degree. Cool! What? Oh, I didn't know that. They do. And that's the smartest way to go, because straight up architecture, no kids, you're gonna do development. That is so incredible. And do the dual degree. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. You're gonna go home and tell her that. And you're gonna say, D'Lee Becker said you're going to.

  You're going to take over this family business. How do I help her develop the confidence to really get out there and do that? By no means does my husband sit around and tell me I'm great. In fact, he likes to withhold the compliments. He's very withholding. He's everybody else blow smoke up your skirt.

  I don't need to. I don't need you to either. I'm great. Occasionally, I do get compliments. What he has done for me, and this is so significant, is he just makes me go do it. So the biggest project in Austin that I have done single handedly, if you will, because I did everything from managing it, leasing, first of all kicking out all the tenants, and then gutting it, renovating it.

  We had to go through an easement process with the city of Austin. That was 18 months through the city council. So much. It was a four year project. Then we, Beckwright GC'd it because the bids from the other contractors were wonky and high, and my husband said, this is such a disaster of a building. It was 112 years old and crumbling.

  It had never been structurally done in the beginning. It was eaten up with termites. It was very bad shape. So it was going to be a lot of problems. So we did GC for me. When we got to the end of it, he said, which four and a half years, He looked at me across the morning cup of coffee call this person, do this.

  And by the way, you should be really proud of yourself. You've done something that maybe 5% of people in Austin have done. Wow. Well done. Yeah. And he walked away and it meant a lot. Yeah, sure. It meant a lot. And I put that little thing in my pocket. I'm like, I'm gonna carry that with me forever. So in the beginning though.

  I didn't want to do the project. He's just go do it. Just. It was very interesting. They wanted me to renovate their building. And I said no, I have no desire to do that. And then I found out that they owned a lot of other buildings. And so my husband said, go to them and say, I will do this if I get to lease and manage all of your buildings forever.

  And they said, that'd be great. This is great for us. So he made me do hard things. That's why I said I would have your daughter. I put my son Crockett in advanced math and a reason fifth grade. He didn't want to do it. I said, you're going to do it. I'll give you a tutor. You're going to have a tutor every week.

  This is going to be your life. You're going to get in the habit. Hard is hard. You do hard. That's right. That's really, and you tell him you can do it. Not in a, Oh, you're the best. You're the smartest. You can do it. She's not trying to be a WNBA basketball player where she has to be the 1 percent to do it.

  But if she goes and gets all that education. Which, college teaches you a lot more than just the education you need. She could probably skip college and come work for you and get there faster. Yeah. But that's up to you and her. Yeah. But if you get her in the habit of doing hard, right now, do hard.

  I feel, I'm sure people will disagree with me for construction, development, math and science are superior. I can, not that I can learn to write well, but it's not, The meat of what I do every day. So if I'm strong in this can lag. I don't need to write a poem. I cannot rhyme. Failing at that.

  And. That's really it. I don't think that I grew up being told I was limited. My mother ended her banking career after 35 years and she'd gone from teller at a bank at 17 to a controller, which is like the, Chief operating officer, chief accounting officer. And she did all of that with two kids, a husband that was never home, and she went and got her degree like online, but back then they mailed it back and forth.

  So I watched my mom do it, what most people didn't do. And the most amazing thing, and I've been planning on posting it for women's month, my mother never did it. complained. I didn't hear anything about wage gap until I got much older and out of the house and asked, I said, do that. I asked my mom, I'm like, mom, do you think there was a wage gap with you?

  And she's D'Lea, I was the controller. I saw the books. No, there wasn't a wage gap for me. She did explain though, that there are women that often Choose jobs that offer a lot more flexibility, right? They need to be able to take off to take the kids to the dentist. They want to do these things, which are incredibly valuable, and I'm sure their kids end up way more successful and stable than me.

  I played basketball for eight years. My mother never went to a game. If I got out of school at 3 30 and I didn't have a ride home that I had organized, I sat there till 5 30. My mom didn't leave work early. That wasn't the career that she had or the ability to do it. And she loved her job and she didn't care.

  Yeah. She, If she showed up late, it was never, I'm sorry. Yeah. I say sorry to my kid. I'm so sorry. I'm late, but I am usually like really late. Yeah. My mom's just let's go. Yeah. So that I was a huge deal for me. Yeah. I now know as an adult, the fact of it doesn't matter if the world's not fair.

  Yeah. Go do it. Go do the hard things. Yeah. And the harder the thing, I'm not going to say the quicker, the expert you are, But the more noticeable your expertise is. Yeah, I agree with that. Because most people give up here. This is comfortable. This is good enough. Yeah. Comfort. That's the killer. Comfort.

  That's, I mean, really, that's how I'd raise my kids is we're not okay with comfort. We do hard. But I will back off and say for a daughter, my son who's 17, he's but mom, what if I, Marry a woman and we have four kids and she doesn't want to work, but that is fantastic. I will support that. I support women doing what they want to do.

  Yeah. I'm not telling everybody to go get in the job force. Who's going to raise the kids? Yeah. That's hard enough. Oh, that's terrible. It is such a hard job. It is such a hard job. Y'all don't know. So amen to the women that want to stay home and raise the kids because they are the backbone of America.

  They're raising our workforce. For God bless them. Yeah. So know your kid. Yeah. If your daughter is, that's where she's headed, support it. And fantastic. Me and your mom are here to help you. When you start having babies, we'll move in next door. Yeah. And, but one of your kids, this is why I brought up family business.

  My grandfather started a custom harvesting business in 1947. And all of his sons worked in it, and all of his grandkids worked in it. You weren't asked if you wanted to. You were not asked. There was no asking. I didn't work in it because I was the daughter. I was the grandbaby. I was the only little girl, and I wasn't required.

  What everybody got out of it, everybody can fix an engine. Break down an engine, tear down an 18 wheeler. They can drive 18 wheelers. They can load up heavy equipment. They can do hard things in the heat. I mean, 114 outside harvest. They leave the two days after school in May, they get back two days before school starts in September back then.

  And they worked 18 hour days. That's what you did and everybody was proud like oh i'm going to work for my grandfather like it was this huge amount of proud pride it feels like people have lost now yeah i ask other business centers which kid is taking over oh none of my kids want to do this what. So crocket i started this whatever he was about.

  Seventh grade i told them you're taking over the construction company this is what you're doing and if you don't want to that's fine don't come home for christmas. It's not that I won't love you, I will. It's just, if, this is how I explained it to him, if you are grateful and appreciate and respect your parents, if you are grateful that I sent you to eight years of Camp Longhorn, if you are grateful for the audience.

  100 pairs of football cleats and I bought you if you are grateful for the, I didn't throw out math tutors. That was on me. That's my requirement. But all of the things that I have done to raise him was on the back of my husband and that construction company. So for you to say it's not my passion is very disrespectful to us.

  You don't value this. Now he has two outs. He can go into politics or go into the NFL. But he quit playing football in his freshman year, so NFL's out. Yeah. But that's, I just, I laid the groundwork. I'll say he is very capable. He's in the hard math and the hard science. Because if he weren't capable, that would be one thing.

  Yeah. If he just, If it wasn't going to suit him, if he was much more of a poet that, cause you, you're not going to go out onto a text dot job site and be a poet with them. You've got to be, I say a cowboy. My, my husband carries again, all of our employees do because we're out in the middle of nowhere and, safety from other people, safety from snakes, all of that.

  So you've got to be of the mindset that this is what you do. Yeah. So I've raised him up that way and very. That's nice. Yeah. Good. That's what I would do. And one of your daughters can absolutely take over your business. Yeah. And dominate. Sure. Yeah. Because that's the thing. It's not a bad thing to stand out.

  Yeah. Yeah. It's quite glorious. Yeah. And you just own it. And the wonderful thing about it is the more you do, the more, the easier it gets. The easier it is. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. Huh. Thank you. You're welcome. That was good. I'd love to talk to any of them. Okay. I might take you up on that.

  Okay. We will go to Comfort Cafe. Okay. Yeah. I know. It's a date. All right. Yeah, I think this was really wonderful. Yeah. This was. Thank you so much. This was very good. Grateful that you had me. Truly honored. And I hope that I added some value to your podcast. As long as you come back. You know you'll have.

  Yeah. Anytime. Yeah. Okay. This has to happen again. Maybe a couple of times. Maybe more than a couple of times. Anytime. I mean, I'm game. I really, again, I, and I've known your reputation for a long time. I, of course, deep dove you, enjoyed everything that I found out. Thank you. And whenever I listened to the episode, I'm sure a lot of episodes talk about it, but no leadership in how you do work with your staff.

  Honestly, I think I was in the shower one day whenever I was listening to it and I'm like, this is why they're good at it. And I'm not. I'm not good at that, but it's so valuable. I mean, I see it and I'm so jealous, if that makes sense, like that's how much I respect it and how much I know what a skill and an asset it is.

  And I know I don't have it, but I'm glad you do, like I'm happy for you also. Yeah. Thank you. Appreciate that. I I don't know. It, it is. I it's hard work. It is hard work. But to apply that in a business sense that's what we were talking about is , you lack of better words.

  How do you profit from these decisions? How do you profit for going that extra mile? Is it the long game? Is it, these are real interesting things to dissect and understand that some of these decisions don't necessarily pencil in a way that. Has cash flow relation here's what I do believe it is long game.

  I know now we're going into episode two, right?

  Yeah, I know that my capacity is limited because I can't do If there's, if I've got a pie and this is all I can do, I'm limited to that pie. If I could raise up a number two, my pie gets bigger. Even if it's one pie and they're a half a pie, but then what if I'm really good and I get another half a pie?

  Then what if I'm really good and they both get half a pie? Yeah, sure. Yeah, that is. I do think it has to go slow because you got to make sure that half a pie can handle. Because what I found, then it concerns me, and I will say, I was super stuffed up. My husband got cancer in 2019. He got prostate cancer.

  By the grace of God, nine months later, it had disappeared. Disappeared. Again, very faithful person. I have got a lot of proof of miracles in my life that you can't explain with science. Yeah. I had four brokers working for me, six interns, two assistants. Okay, and I was president of CT car 650 member organization that takes a lot of time you're herding cats in that.

  These are all extremely busy professional people and you need them to volunteer like so you're like do this and like I will do it, they'll do it, but then they Yeah, what you're fine with except for if you're running the thing you're like, this is my show and it's gotta come off like I planned so I, oh man, it was hilarious because I still remember pulling out of the parking lot.

  I fired four people in a day and the final straw was people would come into my office and they'd say, how's Russ? And I'm like, he's good. And they're like, we're thinking of him. We're praying for him. And I'm like, I'm really grateful. Thank you so much. I've got this lease. Can you redline it? And I've got this and this person won't call me back.

  I need you to do this. And it had happened, it had probably been happening for a month and I hadn't noticed till this last person came in and did this to me and I'm like, I don't work for you. This is not okay. I've got to go deal with this. This is important. Y'all's problems are not my, this is.

  And I fired. Or let, I told brokers that this was not the place for them. They needed to go. Fire two assistants. I'm like, I don't, this isn't working. You're creating more work for me because they were only doing a quarter of the pie when I needed them to do half. And I had to absorb that quarter.

  So all of a sudden, my pie is now, I got, Two pies and only one me and it's overwhelming, I'm going to make a mistake. That's the big one. I don't. Oh. Yeah. It's interesting. Jeremy brought up the fact that, professional athletes and are you a professional or do you consider yourself, but oftentimes even, most recently I think about draft picks, like I think about the draft, right?

  Because. Our world these days sometimes is so temporary whenever you think about staff, right? And your point is, I think is maybe where you're getting at is you've gotta find people that will stay within your lane, right? That will help you make money, that will help you succeed, that will help you do what, whatever it is you're in business for.

  And if that doesn't happen, you've got to let them go and then find someone else that does. And so how do you make those, then you're not you're bypassing this emotional state, which is particularly interested in culture. And you're making a business decision that's calculated in a way that will help you move to the next step.

  So the but I say that because I often think about, as we have bigger and more and all this stuff going on you're placing people in the right position at the right time and allow them to excel and allow this project to excel, to allow us to make money and get to the next step.

  Simply put, but there's like this sometimes I'll think, oh yeah, we're just like we're doing the draft. We're doing draft picks. Yeah, sure. It is. And draft picks don't always work out. That's right. They don't always perform at the top level. But then you trade. But then you trade. Then you trade.

  Yeah. And sometimes the quicker you trade, the better. Absolutely. Oh yes. Quick to fire, And I know, I'm gonna get us out of here, but I will, this is how this wraps up family business in the most perfect package ever. My son, who's 17, and last year he was 16, and I, he was being short tempered, short fused, disrespectful, just, instead of, yes sir, it was what, like you'd say something 10 times and then you'd be like, And he'd be like, I didn't hear you.

  We're like you nodded your head. And my husband had reached the end of his patience. And he told Crockett, he said, son, you're going to be respectful to me and your mother because there's no one in the world that has your back more than us. That's right. That is true. It was so significant. And I went and I thought about this.

  A family business. There's no one in the world that has my back more than my husband. No matter what. No one. I have made mistakes or acted inappropriately, and he has stood behind me and said, this is what I gotta do. She's my wife. And that's a really incredible thing that is hard to get in an employee.

  When I said I'm risk averse, but the amazing thing is I got, I've got this behind me. I can take more chances, a lot more chances because my number, we'll say he's my number two. Hudson's on number two. He's not going to say, I don't like company culture. I'm out of here. Or I got a better job. Or I'm moving.

  I'm gonna buy an RV and hit the road. Or more, I mean, we had a supervisor that was, I have no doubt, going to be phenomenal. He'd been with us, I think, six months whenever he found out his three year old had cancer. Devastating. I mean, that is not something you're like, Oh, it was, oh, but number two is gone.

  All that training, all that time do, and empty hole. So mostly I just tried to focus on what I can do. That way if it slaps back on me, I can handle it. And it, but it has limited my growth. I've just. Decided to be okay with it, but then jealous of other people that are growing. Sometimes grass is always greener.

  I'm going to cheer you on. I'm going to cheer you on. Maybe we can learn from each other. We will. You're in my orbit now. As Holly will explain. Once you're in it, you can't get out. Some days you're going to be like, Why is she letting me go? I'm excited. Thank you. Thank you for having me.

  This was really good. Really good.