Crafting a Legacy in Real Estate with Steve Shaw’s Vision and Grit | Episode 002 | 05-01-2024

Stepping off a predictable path requires resilience, vision, and good old-fashioned grit. Steve Shaw, owner and founder of Shaw Real Estate, embodies this spirit and shares his journey from a comfortable career at Merritt Properties to entrepreneurship. He explains the method behind his 'old man's portfolio,' his investment in industrial properties that thrive amid fluctuating interest rates. By prioritizing low leverage and value-added opportunities, Steve believes a disciplined approach not only weathers volatility but also sets a trajectory for steady growth.

He learned many of the lessons that benefit him today during his tenure as a D1  lacrosse player at the University of Delaware. The same competitive discipline and tenacity that drove Steve to athletic excellence fuels his business today. Steve describes how pivotal mentorships have shaped his character and integrity, values that are the bedrock of his career.

During the conversation, we have fun, too. Listen to how Steve's zest for tailgating and his renowned cheese steak recipe might seem a world away from real estate, but they are a testament to his attention to detail and the dedication he has applied throughout his life.

Sometimes, success is not just the right investment—It involves the people and principles you hold dear.

Hello everybody, welcome to From the Ground Up. My name is Leo Kelly, I'm the CEO of Verdence Capital Advisors and I have the pleasure of hosting From the Ground Up, which is a conversation with business owners and a conversation around their successes, around their struggles and how they got to where they are today. You're in for an absolute treat. Today. We're going to be talking with Steve Shaw from Shaw Real Estate.

Steve is someone I've known for a long time. He's a friend, he's a partner and someone I respect, but, most importantly, steve is an old fashioned grinder. We're going to hear an amazing story today about a successful career that really was on cruise control, and then a moment where Steve the light went on, the entrepreneurial light. He took risks out of the gate. He had incredible struggles that he had to overcome and he used the skills and the mindset he developed from a young age a successful athletic career to bring success to himself, to the family that he adores and to his philanthropic ventures, which he's so passionate about. This is going to be a great conversation. So, steve, welcome to From the Ground Up.

That sounds like I really did something. It was just stumbling along the way.

So I appreciate you being on and your story is really quite incredible. Maybe you could just start off by talking about your business and what you're doing every day and what makes you unique in the very, very crowded competitive marketplace.

So Shaw Real Estate is a local private firm. We have focused from basically the Beltway of DC to the Delaware line. We decided very early that we were going to try to create what I would call an old man's portfolio, old man portfolio being something that's low leveraged, that gives lots of optionality as time goes on and is a lower risk profile. So we did that by beginning to buy value add older industrial properties and repositioning those to be functional assets. We were very fortunate to get into that area of the market while the industrial market got really heated up, and so some I always say dumb luck is my best friend, and so we've worked hard to find properties that we really like. We have been incredibly fortunate to have partners private partners that have had faith in us and trusted us with their money, and so we've been developing what we feel is an old man's portfolio, which has been the acquisition or development of maybe 20 properties in that region, and so this is a perfect time to disclose that I am one of the investors in Steve's properties.

I'm a very happy partner with Steve and have been very impressed, and I too am an old man I was witnessed by the snow on the roof here and you're right, though your portfolio is something that putting capital behind feels like it's wealth building. Would that be accurate? Is that the goal?

Yeah, I would hope that it's always the goal. But we're not trying to hit triples in home runs, but if you hit doubles and triples, trying to hit singles, that turns out well. And so we have had solid, good solid equity returns. We also try to pay a hefty dividend and the real key is, as time goes on, with very low leverage deals, to have optionality. And what I mean is optionality is I've always said I don't have a plan that I want to exit a property in a certain period of time. I've always felt like the property or the asset tells you what to do with it and that if it's run its course, if you feel that the best thing is to sell, you should sell. But I didn't want to have the financial aspects of the deal affect whether we sell or not. It should certainly be the asset, but also I would love to create long-term recurring revenue, and so if we have an asset that has, our average debt is probably 45%, 40%.

That's a far cry from the giddy up and go real estate development world.

Yeah, I think that most people leverage up to get higher returns, but if you can perform at low leverage I think that's the way you want to be, so that 10 years from now, if the property has gone up 50% in value and your debt has gone down 20% and you have a very low leverage asset, you have the optionality to put debt on it and return money to your partners, pay off the mortgage, be very flexible with your tenants and create long-term recurring revenue, which is really the goal.

Yeah, and would you say that's your niche in the real estate world? I would say so, but it's also creating revenue.

Yeah, I think long-term recurring revenue is certainly the game plan. I also feel like I've really tried to stay out of the fair way of institutional capital. So what I don't buy is I don't buy and build a million-foot building that every pension fund and private real estate firm wants to be involved with. I try to find assets that are a little bit more clumsy, take a little bit more work, that aren't down the fair way for institutional folks.

Well, and here we are in 2024. In 2022 and 23, we saw the fastest rise in interest rates in percentage terms we've ever seen. We saw that, essentially, interest rates go from zero to the 10-year or 5% and it completely upended the commercial property market, but not for you.

Yeah, we've been very fortunate. We still find transactions that we like, and so I've always felt like when you have an opportunity to go and fix your debt and lock it in for a long period of time, you just do it, and it's not about getting rid of that opportunity or foregoing the opportunity to increase your returns by having debt fall. It's risk when you take the interest rate risk off the table and lock things in and pay down mortgages over 10 years. That's a powerful place to be and I think my perspective also is because I'm 60, I've seen average interest rates be eight, nine, 10, 12%, and when you can lock in a five or 6% interest rate for a long period of time, you don't bemoan the fact that it used to be four.

Right, that's right. Well, for anybody listening and not watching, Steve at 60 looks like what we all wish. We looked like at 35.

Which I felt like that.

But that's a part of who you are. Right, that's part of the discipline. You get up every day, I know you work out, you keep yourself in shape. You're disciplined in your approach to your business, right, that's all part of it, right?

Yeah, I think that early on in life you get in a system that works for you and for me, that is you gotta take care of yourself, you gotta take care of your family, you gotta be charitable, you gotta have the three prong stool, and for me that is have a great family life and take care of your family and do everything you can possibly do for them. Number two work your ass off in your building excuse me, in building your business, and outwork everyone that's around you. And the third of the stool is be charitable and figure out what you're gonna do for the greater community and how you're gonna help people. And those three things are what I try to focus on every day.

So for the young entrepreneurs out there, takeaway number one I know from the ground up we talk about the fact that we love to give a few takeaway, something you can put in your pocket. There it was the three pronged approach. That's takeaway number one. I mean that really that's a very sound way to guide yourself through life right Take care of family, outwork everybody and then give back for the blessings that you've received.

It's very, very simple. I'm not too smart, so I like to keep things simple, All right so this is my first pushback.

I know you have this extraordinary career and that you're lucky and what you may or may not notice to you on this show, luck is something we talk about, right? Luck is one of my great pet peeves in life Because what you know, my view, luck is the recognition of an extraordinary opportunity which most people don't recognize them right. They come, they pass by us and they just go. And then, even if you recognize it, it's the willingness to take on the risk that it takes to take advantage of that opportunity, right, just identifying it, understanding it, being willing to chase after it and then work your tail off to bring that to fruition. And then, at the end of all that, the outside world who missed it in the first place looks at you and say, god, what a lucky guy Look how well he did right, right, and it's okay to feel lucky.

You know, I feel lucky. I married the woman I married. I feel lucky to have three awesome kids. I feel lucky to have all the friends that I have that I adore. But when you're talking about how you get lucky starts with hard work and you grind it out and you outwork people. And so I remember when my friend, Scott Brickman, who's a super successful landscaping guy, who started the biggest landscaping company in America and he's been my friend for over 30 years, and he said I've been watching you for 25 years and you grind it out, you put your head down and you go make things happen and you do good for what you're doing in your family. But one of these days you're gonna pick your head up and you're gonna look around to see what the other opportunities are and you're gonna see billboards in your face telling you what to do. So when you're ready, pick your head up and look around and see the billboards and they will tell you what to do.

That's it. That's it the moment, right the moment. That's great and, by the way, I know your wife and your kids and, yes, you are lucky, I'm married up. That's great, and you started the grind. This is a great story For those who did not go to the University of Delaware or not in the Lacrosse community, which is a big deal around here and outside of Baltimore, maryland. Steve went to the University of Delaware and had an lacrosse successful career and he was a grinder. He was a face-off guy. He got down in the dirt, faced off against another strong individual and had to win the face-off over and over and over again. Matter of fact, you did it so many times. You set a college record. Can you tell us about that? I know you don't like to, but I'm gonna make you.

Yeah, very lucky. I adore my teammates and my teammates are still my best friends. But I was fortunate enough to when I lacrosse college I didn't even know it, but I had set the NCAA face-off record that stood for about 25 years, which was a lot of ground balls, a lot of face-offs. I think we senior year won 77% of our face-offs. But that's a team effort. You don't win those things by yourself. It's six men going after a ball and so it's just like everything else you get down, you pick up the ball. It seems simple, but you just pick up the ball and you give it to others and let them do good things with it.

Yeah, so a direct translation right From that work ethic. Right, how do you paint that comparison between your business? Because you didn't just walk in one day and say, hey, I've got quick hands, I can get ground balls, I can win face-offs.

No, it just kind of happened and I found that I was good at picking up the ball off the ground and I had a mental state that I thought was good for that. I always felt like the ball was mine and so when it was on the ground it was mine and I was gonna get it and no one was gonna keep me from getting it. And I just think tenacity whether it's trying to be a good dad, or trying to be good at what you do every day, or trying to make a difference in somebody else's life, or trying to be a really good friend and support people that kind of tenacity is really important and I feel like I'm just really lucky that I've always felt like I had this inner drive to be tenacious.

Well, there's a direct parallel here, right? So when you talk about your career and people talk about your career, right it's. You did that so well. You were the best at your craft. You weren't worried about how many goals you scored, right, you weren't worried about you, just did your job and you did it the best you could to help the team around you. And that translates directly to hey, I'm not trying to do a 70% leverage deal and hit home runs until what happens until 2022 happens, right, and interest rates shoot up and all the people that are over-levered are scrambling around wondering what's gonna happen with their business. And here you are You're still just getting ground balls. You're still just looking for deals. You're still grinding reoccurring revenue out. I think there's a parallel there that I think people should think about. Right, be the grinder.

I also think that challenges in life expose character right, and so I was very fortunate that the first 15 years of me being in commercial real estate, the commercial real estate was awful. Yeah, okay, like you know, merit properties almost failed as one of the biggest private real estate developers in the area. And, looking back, if you said why didn't merit properties fail? Because it could have, it's because Leroy Merritt was a man of his word.

And that doesn't start the day that the shit hit the fan. That started 50 years earlier when he started building buildings and was a broad block layer and did what he said he was gonna do. And so I just feel like I've always been fortunate to be surrounded by people that I could watch, that their word meant everything and their effort meant everything and how they took care of people meant everything. And so when he got in a difficult situation, the bankers were more willing to work with him because he stood behind his word and he said I'll take care of this and I will do it right. And he lost a lot of money doing it right, but what he had is he had himself and he had his word and he had his ethics, and you don't create your reputation on that day you created that reputation starting when you were 16.

That's right, that's right. So I gotta say all the time right, when you're even an athlete, it's going back to your athletic career. You don't get strong by lifting one heavy weight. You get strong just by doing it over and over, and so he was a great mentor for you. He was incredible.

He wasn't a father figure, he was more like the cool uncle, but he was a great man and he quietly took care of others all the time and I just love that.

Great. And is he the guy who inspired? Because I know you like to do mentoring. Yes, you talk to a lot of young folks. You talk to kids from Delaware, but you also talk to other kids I know you love doing that. Is that where you took your inspiration?

I think I took my. That inspiration was from really two people my father, who my father said to me very early on I really didn't have anybody to talk to about my business career who could help guide me and I could bounce things off of. I had to go and learn it all myself every time Right. And the other one was a guy named Bill McGurk. And Bill McGurk was an immensely successful guy in Baltimore. He was chairman of the Baltimore Sun, mercantile and Hopkins Hospital and had 15 children and lived on a farm up in Harper County and he was really one of my first out of family mentors and taught me so much and I always felt that he inspired me to be better than I really was.

So take away. Number two for our successful business folks is have those conversations right. Have those conversations and bring the young kids in and give them your story and help them kind of develop their story. I think that's great. So let's go back to Shaw. What would you tell, as a mentor, young Steve Shaw at Merritt? You eventually went into business. Would you tell young Steve Shaw to have done it sooner.

That's really amazing Cause I talked to a lot of young people and they'll say well, I've been in the brokerage business for three years, so I think it's time to go out on my own Right. And I was in business with two developers for almost 30 years before I left Right and I felt I always feel like I'm my most challenging critic and I felt like I really needed to know everything I could know about the development business. And I had gone through some very, very difficult times and saw how bad financing hurts you and how just bad markets hurt you, that you have no fault of your own, and so I felt like I, in looking back, I have no regrets that I waited 30 years to leave Merritt. Merritt was an amazing place to be. It was a special culture and a special company and they gave me a lot more than I gave them, but I tried to give them all I could every day.

Yeah, that's great and, as you know, I had the same right. I was at Merrill for a long time and I thought I'd retire there and it was a great company. Then Bank of America bought him out and that was the catalyst to change and I don't think I would tell young Leo to do anything different. Right, I gained enough experience to know how to do it on my own and the time was right. So the time was right for you at a moment. Tell me about that moment. What was the catalyst and what were those early days like? What were the early challenges? Is that where you look at? Was there a moment where you look back, as we did when we were 120 hours a week trying to bring clients over from Merrill to our new business, where you're looking to say, deep breath, okay, okay, walk me through that early transition.

Yeah, so I was 50 years old, I've been with Merrill for, I guess, 27 years and I said I don't know if I can look in the mirror number one when I've been with Merrill for 37 years and say I didn't try it myself. So that was number one. Number two is and I've talked about this with my wife I have dear members of my family. My parents are we're getting older. I have one sister. My sister excuse me, my wife has siblings and I thought if something ever happens to any of them and they need financial help or some form of assistance, they're gonna look at me and I'm not doing enough with my skill set. I gotta be able to send my kids to any college they wanna go to. I gotta be able to take care of my aging parents if they need help. I gotta be able to step up and I'm not doing the best with what I can, so I gotta go out and give it a shot and go do it myself. So that's a responsibility, yeah, and I feel responsible for my family and friends and the things I love, and so I wanna be someone that can be helpful when needed.

So how about those early days? Talk about those early days, so not a lot of sleep. One of the things I think we had talked about at one point in time was what's the difference between being at merit and having your own business? And the one thing that's different is the day never ends, right, never, right, absolutely. And so you sleep and as soon as you get out of REM, man, your mind starts going and you're downstairs making a list of 80 things you need to do the next day at 3.30 in the morning, and so I think that's great and it was invigorating and I feel like my testosterone.

It felt like I was in a game every day. You know, I was getting knocked around and I was gonna knock some people around. I was gonna go after it every day. I was in a game Ground balls. Yeah, my friend said to me Steve, the great thing about businesses is just like lacrosse. Every day, you put your uniform on, you go out there and knock the shit out of people and you're like, oh, I'm gonna go out and get my stuff, and you have a beer when it's over and you take a shower and you go home and then you do it all again the next day, tomorrow.

So, and I think that's true. So, but I you know and I you had challenges over there. Yeah, I feel like the big wake up call for me was I had been, I'd left and I didn't have any deals, I didn't have any partners, I didn't have any idea. I just got started. And one of the most amazing things is I came home on a Friday and I said to my wife get a glass of wine, sweetie. We got three kids in private school and I'm quitting on Monday. And so you know what she said. She said I am so excited to watch you because you're like a cage lion and when you get out of the cage you're gonna do great things.

Oh, that's it.

That's what's needed that kind of support is really, really special, and so she's been there every day through it in such a very positive way. She's an amazing lady. So a week into my decision to leave, I go, I find a deal. It's a great deal. I put under contract and I have somebody who's begging to be my partner and they go out of town. They come back and then they said, oh, oh, nevermind, I'm not gonna be your partner. Oh, about that critical capital that he needs. And this was a really quick deal.

And so I kind of sat there, I was in this office by myself and I was like, oh my God, this is what it's like I had at my old firm. I had independence and I had a $100 million line and did what I thought was right and it was relatively easy, right. Well, that was over, and so I had to go find a partner. And I found a partner and it ended up being a great transaction. But I also found in that first year that the challenges kind of kept coming in, that for some reason I had a little health scare and they thought I had some kind of artery issue and I had to go in for an emergency procedure. And it ended up being nothing, but it was a little scary. It made me write letters to my family just because I but kind of helped me focus and stay focused.

And then, shortly after that, one of my main partners committed suicide and he was an amazing, amazing man that I deeply loved, and so I had a bunch of kind of shocking things happen very early on that, just you know, all those kinds of things just helped you stay and remain focused and remain focused on what's important and what's important as your family, and what's important is doing the right thing and taking care of partners, and I feel like my.

The thing that's most important to me is that my partners feel that their money is more important than mine, and so I feel like if every day, I take care of my partner's money more and more importantly than mine, then that's what they're hiring me to do is do the best I can. And I tell you that's one thing that I think we have a lot in common, because you care so much about your partners and their investment of faith in you and your team and your group, and I think that's why the culture of your firm is so special and I've had a chance to watch it and be part of it, and it's. I think there's a lot of similarities there. I only have three people, but I feel like the culture's the same.

Appreciate that. Thank you so much. Yeah, I'll say it, I'm lucky. Yeah, in fact I've got good partners. Fact, it's a wonderful thing. Wow, I mean wow. So that year one, I mean that's amazing.

Right that you just head down, right, just keep yeah, just keep your head down and keep focusing, and really the three transactions that we created in that first year are our most successful, and so that was fortunate. But Well, get you focused, right, yeah.

And, by the way, this is gonna sound strange, but it was a gift, right, it was a gift that you had to scare, but it turned out to be nothing. But it gave you a moment, right, it gave you a moment of clarity that you could have a moment with your family to talk about what they mean to you and you could be open and honest. And then it turns out to be nothing and, boy, talk about creating focus in your life to drive. I mean, I can only imagine what that. I can only imagine right after the moment where you found out how that was just absolute rocket fuel into what you were trying to do.

No question about it. I think it also. I've always felt in my life that I wanna make sure I wanna be 100% sure that everyone in my life knows exactly how I feel about them.

Yeah, you do that.

That there's no question that my friends, my family, the people I am with, really completely understand what I think about them, and one of my life rules is when you think it and it's positive, say it.

Yeah, you're a very, very positive person. It's one of the things that's so attractive to pull people into you. Michele, I just wanna say I love you. I think you're fantastic.

I was waiting for that. I was waiting for that moment, so I appreciate that you brought me in, yeah me too.

Steve has that impact on people. So in 10 years so I know your son just started working for you and I know you still have one who's in school getting ready to come out you have another door that's very successful in the real estate world as well. What's that like? And it's a two-part question Tell me about that. I have it. I have three kids. I would love for my kids to be in the business one day. It's a tricky road to walk and a path to walk, but it does make you excited about the future of what you're building. My partners as well. They have kids and I think there's something about people that want their kids to be a part of. It says something about how much they love what they do Not always right, cause there's some businesses you can't transition.

But tell me about that and maybe transition the question from that. And what does Shaw Real Estate look like in 10 years? What is your vision? Because, that's right, great entrepreneurs they see clearly what they're going to, even though other people can't. I would say the flaw of great entrepreneurs and I was told this by a very, really smart guy who made me think about myself in a different way and he said Leo, you know you're constantly looking out and you see clearly out to the future. He says you see it as clearly as if it's right in front of you. He said and not everybody sees it the same way and you have to be more patient with that. And I know that you see out. Talk to me about that.

I am, as I said, very fortunate, and my son was working in New York for three years as a bond trader and or trader and he came and said is there a place for me at your company? And he had interned for me in my company in the summers a couple, a couple times and understood our business and and I realize myself and one other person really does not make a firm and that you have to have more people, you have to have longevity, you have to have people who could run the business if if you weren't there. And so your partner, dylan, is fantastic, dylan's terrific, and and so I felt like I have to grow a firm instead of just having myself and Dylan. And so adding Ryan is is phenomenal. I mean, he's a grinder. So he was, he's a grinder and everything he's done, and I would say that he he and my kids have, and Susan, have inspired me To work harder, because they work so hard every day what they do and so trees apples and trees.

Yeah. So it's just, it's just a powerful thing to watch them, because they've inspired me and they've wanted me to work harder by watching them and watching them and watching how hard they work for what they, for what they strive for. Where do I see? I've always said let the real estate happen. You know, I think it's a bad thing to say, you know, in 10 years I want to have two million square feet and 40 deals instead of 20, because you can kind of force deals that might not be the right things for you. And so I feel like I'm very fortunate right now that when I find a real estate asset that I like, then that's the one we go after. But there is no, there's no forced funding, there's no. We have to get $100 million out or something like that, and so it's. It's been been very fortunate.

And I would also say somebody said to me a long time ago I never thought of it how do you source deals? And I thought I was like oh my God, like again, I just have an amazing group of people out in the market who, who present ideas and present opportunities, and then we step through. And what makes us different, I think, is that we want people that we do business with to look good, so we don't wait to last minute to try to screw people. We tell everybody where we are on a transaction all the time, and and and are very clear with that. We want, we want everyone to succeed and, and that means you know that means paying brokers immediately, in all time.

That means taking care of our contractors and having them loyal, leave or merit you still. We say you want your contractors to want to do business with you and you do that by paying them well and on time, he said. He said you know it's not, it's not your money. Once somebody's done the work, it's theirs and they don't like you holding their money. So I feel like his, his way has, has always been my way and and he has been in my ear every single moment of the day since I left Merit and started my own firm, because he just always wanted to do the right thing.

I have a. Can I interject one thing to Steve, something that you said to us as we were making our decision on this building and I think you probably had the same conversation with other people and that is emotion is one thing, numbers are another. The numbers either work or they don't, and some people can get really balled up into the emotional side of things, and I think that's probably true not only for your business but many others, as people make that very emotional decision to go out on their own.

I think it's so true. I had someone say to me recently who's a partner? You know what you walk away Every once in a while you'll tell us about a deal and we're working towards a deal and then all of a sudden you'll tell us you walked away because something happened that you didn't like and that you have to have the ability to walk away. I mean it's the exact same thing and what you do every day, leo. I mean you know you can have nine of the 10 things right and the 10th thing is wrong and it's wrong. I mean I've watched dear friends who bought assets that just had one thing wrong, like there wasn't enough parking, and that made the project unsuccessful. So you have to be true to the things you believe make or break your assets. So I think we have a lot of similarities there.

Okay, I have one more point, and I think this is going to tell the world out there who Steve Shaw is, and I think this is. Does it have to do with Italian food? It almost so. If you don't know it, steve is a world-class tailgater, and Steve tell me about a cheese steak. Oh God, I mean, how? What is the right way to make a cheese steak? Because, I mean, you have a passion for it. I think it translates to family and real estate and everything else.

I think if you're going to do something, you got to do it right. And when you ask me that question I got chills. Okay. So number one I'm fortunate enough to have about a 250 pound berserba meat slicer that I haul out and put in my kitchen and I lightly freeze about 15 pounds of ribeye. I slice it so thin you could read the New York Times on it if you really wanted to read the New York Times.

Like the old Sully putty, you just paste it down, yeah.

And so we slice that up, we take it the night before a tailgate and we saute it on a flat top at home with banana peppers, pepper jack cheese and provolone salt pepper, a little spice, and then we put it in tins and the next day we pick up 40. Um, wah-wah, um, amarosa rolls from Philadelphia. And we go to the tailgate and we heat those babies up on a flat top with some more cheese on it, um, and, and put it on an Amarosa roll and cut it up fresh. And that's how you make a cheese stick. You keep it simple and uh, and you got to produce. But I don't like, you know, I really don't like to fool around with that. I don't like to do it any other way than the way I think is the right way to do it.

So, for everybody out there, I'm going to finish on that note. If you want to know why Steve Shaw is successful, if you want to know why I am a proud partner in Steve Shaw's uh, business um, you just heard it, because his passion for cheese steaks is parallel to his passion for his business, to the charitable work in the community does and to his family. And, um, I couldn't couldn't be more proud to be a partner or, more importantly, a friend. Steve, just congratulations on a magnificent career, thank you, and I?

I think the friendships you know, you get your family and you pick your friends and um, I think surrounding yourself with great people um is really the key to life, because they? Um inspire you to great things. I sat at a table and um, this is maybe 10 years ago when I I was with Scott Brickman and my dear friend Brooks Pierce, and they were talking about how they each started their own business, and I sat there and I said to myself, man, you got to take the leap Right, you got to have faith in yourself and and um, you know, god will help you one way or another get through this. But um, um, again, it's um, it's having taking a leap of faith and believing in yourself and your family and your friends, um, and all that you do every day.

Yeah Well, lord knows, we've both been through that. That's uh, when you, when you, when you do it and you're focused and you work hard pretty rewarding on the other end.

It's amazing it's it's been life changing in a million different ways.

That's wonderful. Well, I want to thank Steve Shaw for coming in today and giving us some insights. Um, this was a great, great conversation and I really appreciate having it. I want to thank everybody for listening and or watching, uh, from the ground up, and again, uh, as I make sure my thumbs up from shell, I'm going to encourage everybody to subscribe, um, on all the major sources Spotify, apple. I miss anything.

YouTube.

YouTube, of course on our website. You can also uh see every episode on our website and every episode on our website, and I you know, obviously this is going to be a good one. Steve, thanks very much for coming.

You all are awesome. See you next time.