The Way I See It:

I’ve long been obsessed with finding ways to build wealth and live a big life that I control. I started trading stocks when I was 16-years-old, and loved the idea of making money -- from anywhere -- with just my brain. Then, in college, I earned the coveted Wealth Management internship with Goldman Sachs, where I was exposed to high net worth individuals and bigger thinking. Following the internship, I began studying the real estate market in an investment group I participated in at Virginia Tech (Bonds and Securities Investing by Students) and fell in love with the fact that real estate is the largest economic multiplier. It touches everything.

After graduating from college, I became a tax policy analyst in Washington, D.C. for a quantitative think tank at Ernst & Young. Motivated by relatively meager pay and a desire to get out of my mom’s basement, I moved to Jacksonville, Florida with my girlfriend (and now wife), and became a real estate investment banker for Deutsche Bank, re-underwriting loans for large, single family rental aggregators like American Homes 4 Rent, Progress Homes, and Invitation Homes. It was an incredible learning experience, but after a pay-freeze at the bank due to global investigations, and a poor real estate buying experience when buying my own home, I took the leap into entrepreneurship by becoming a real estate agent. I was convinced I could provide better service than what I had received -- and I did.

I immediately jumped in to creating business opportunities, serving 66 families for $12.1M my first year, 74 families for $20.1M my second year, and 143 families for $36.4M my third year, breaking all local records and in record time. While living frugally on 12-15% of my gross income (and sometimes still acting like a college kid), I paid off all my debt (I started at a negative $80,000 net worth at age 24) and began investing in real estate with the goal of generating enough cash flow to cover all my living expenses. I knew that when I reached that point, I would have full financial freedom. Over those years, I was invited to speak at national conferences, I became one of the youngest paid coaches for the brokerage I worked with, and I traveled Florida teaching at various market centers the best practices for being a profitable and highly referred business owner.

Within 3.5 years of becoming an entrepreneur, at age 28, I became a net worth millionaire. With that benchmark came a strong desire to help others follow a similar path.

Limited by what I could teach at my prior brokerage, my wife, Brittany, and I decided to open our own, independent brokerage, Momentum Realty, and give away all the knowledge we had gained, while building an agent-centric brokerage model. It was an experiment in unconventional business practices that quickly exploded into a large, powerful brokerage.

Based on current volume, Momentum, which opened in January 2020, is now a Top 10 brokerage in Northeast Florida. My 2020 ventures did not end there. After co-founding Momentum, in Summer 2020 I stepped out of production as an agent and opened a mortgage branch with Integrity Mortgage Group. That business is also exploding in volume.

My goal continues to be helping others become millionaires through business partnerships. This website, my Wealth Builder newsletter, and my blog are also part of accomplishing that goal, serving as creative outlets for me to reflect on my business failures -- and eventual successes -- so that others can benefit by avoiding the pitfalls I’ve had to maneuver.

I enjoy inspiring others to think big, question everything, and build wealth. Life is too short, so let’s get on with it!

The 3 Things I Wish I Knew Back Then

I’m terrible at a plethora of things (like keeping my opinion to myself), but I’m very good at challenging the status quo, growing start-ups, and identifying and executing on opportunity in a fast-changing market. I can attribute my success to these three principles:

1) What If It Was Easy?

Most people say that life is hard. Working is hard. Business is hard. Making money is hard. That’s why they are called “jobs.” It’s not fun, right? Well, I think they are wrong. When you align what you do daily with your natural strengths, and choose to make them easy, these activities will, in fact, become easy. But that choice requires self-reflection, acknowledging information you don’t like, and then accepting the truth. You can get what you want when you operate from what you’re good at -- and then leverage out the rest. It’s easy when you choose to focus on your strengths.

2) Always Ask.

If you want it, ask for it. What’s the worst thing that can happen? They say no, and you move on to your next target. Always ask. My mom taught me this lesson.

3) Model Your Life Based On The Right Mentors for You

Who you choose to model your life after could be one of the most important decisions of your life. In the “infotainment” world that we live in today, there are many talking heads out there who lack validity. Follow the wrong person, and you risk losing it all. Your ability to discern what is real versus what is fake may be one of the most important skills you can have. Exhibit diligence, check facts and track records, and question everything. That’s the fastest way to become the architect of the life you want to build. Find those who have done it before you and connect with them. Then do it yourself.

The goal of this website is to help you create generational wealth.

Think Big. Question Everything. Build Wealth.