Hunter Terpenny: Being Poor is a Calling

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Were you struggling? Were you the Wim of whatever is is happening to you and around you, and you really don't have much control over it whatsoever. With every additional dollar that you accumulate, you gain a little bit more control over your reality. Hunter Terpenny this is a CPA and the founder of HUM Accounting. After years of watching entrepreneurs struggle with outdated accounting practices that left

them feeling confused and powerless, in 2021 after walking away from a funded tech He launched HUM with four clients. In under two years, they hit 100 businesses entirely through word of mouth. Because for Hunter, it's never just about managing numbers. It's about helping awesome people build awesome businesses that make the world better. Welcome to Money Stories where we have real conversations with founders about money meaning

and what the founder of HUM Account does. Hunter, you have a really incredible story. I'm excited to share it with my listeners. So why don't we just dig in from the beginning? How did you grow up with money and how did that drive you to become successful? I guess some of my earliest memories were really around the dynamic between my mom and dad. My mom worked part-time and was available for school drop-offs and pick ups and my dad

worked full-time most of my life. My dad was a public servant and worked in local government. � My mom worked at the hospital as a dietitian where I grew up in a small rural town in Virginia. When I was really young, it was never a topic of conversation. My friends who lived in neighborhoods and their parents didn't quite have all the same things

that we did, but their parents would be like, hey, we're going to go to the mall and their parents are like, okay, here's $50 to go to the mall and be like, your parents just handed you $50? What is that like? They're like, well, now we get to go play games and buy stuff at the mall. I'm like, oh, my parents have never handed me a dollar, ever. We have chores. We have to work the property. We have to do the bees and the chickens and the garden and all the things. No one's ever handed me the dollar before, but we've got all this awesome stuff and all this awesome experience. I know now looking back on it that that costs a lot of money. My dad worked really hard to give us that life and that experience as kids. I'd say that was the beginning of it. Then getting older and growing up into middle school, high school, and then transitioning

to college. I think one of the most formative early money relationship things that I had was my dad was a college athlete. He got a full-ride scholarship for swimming to Virginia Tech, which is also where I went to school. He wouldn't probably have gone to college if he didn't get that full ride. He kind of did the college thing and he didn't finish in four years. He actually took him 12 whole years to get one bachelor's degree in college, which I just telling that story because he was just a professional. He was 32 before he actually graduated with a bachelor's degree in college. Partially because he started industrials arts, switched to mechanical engineering and

then almost finished that one and then switched, so he just couldn't quite figure it out. Also, I think he was just having a good time. First four years the years were paid for and he always saw swimming as work at that point.ables like he's doing this for his degree, did as much as he needed to to keep his scholarship and that bathtwas it. Then through the rest of college, he really only took him that much longer because he really just had to go to school part time so that he could work and pay to live and go to school. He would work a double at the local gas station in

Virginia. And then after that, he got a job as the assistant town manager, town administrator, kind of like local local, local government guy. And then worked up and that guy retired and he became the town manager. You know, did fairly well as far as like what our community, what was relative our community. And you know, throughout all of that like based on his experience, one of his main goals was that that he was putting money aside for most of his adult life so that he could pay for his kids to go to college. And that was kind of one of his like biggest, most important goals to him because he didn't have that support. And then he had to do it the way he did and he just wanted to make sure that was possible for my sister and I. And were you aware of that growing up? Not until right basically like right before college and like right as college was starting

had no idea that like much. Much of this at all. And the reason that we became my sister and I became aware of it was because basically because of 2008. So I graduated high school in 2009. And 2008 like he didn, nobody was doing so he was trusting a money manager like a normal like it was a guy at the local bank. It wasn, it wasn't even you know, it wasn't even like an independent guy. I didn't work for a big insurance company and kind of some of the traditional stuff that we know exists. Just an investment advisor who probably had his series seven at the local bank that was in our hometown. That was it. And so 2008 just like wiped him out. And it was everything that he had saved for my sister and I to go to college and was like basically there. And then I had to take out student loans to be able to go to Virginia Tech like the next year. And then my sister ended up of choosing to go out of state.

And so he like my dad like reverse mortgage our house so that he could pay for her to go to college out of state. So just like kind of devastated him in a really wild way. What was it like those times? I mean, can you take me back back there? Like, like what was it like seeing him go through that? Yeah, I think I can take you back a little bit. But honestly, like I've probably blocked a lot of it like blocked a lot of the there's, you know, there's also like along with that. He was also kind of at the end of his his tenure with the town and and there was a lot of stuff. I mean, it's all interconnected, right? It was like it was converting into a lot of interesting dynamics with because he was he's an appointed official who works full time.

And then there's the entire town council and the mayor that are all elected officials. And but he basically like has seven bosses in his job. Right. And so it all came to a head kind of all at once in a really wild way where he was having a ton of issues with certain. Members of the town council. He, you know, was building a bunch of things like he he did as a civil engineer. He was like the town he did all of the the like he like helped with all the contrary. He probably had like four or five different jobs within the town that when he left, they had to replace. So anyway, it's it just we just watched him kind of like disappear almost like from. His work from my sister and I from my mom, like he just he just retreated honestly in a kind of a wild way.

Because again, I think if I look back on like the way he grew up, like I think that was something pretty common for his his dad as well. It's like that was a way that was just men don't have emotions, right? Like that's kind of a newer thing that we're all like finding a way to connect with. And so I was really tough. It was really tough to kind of like watch him just retreat. And yeah, and it just I think that made this kind of took I took this. I had a switch in my mind where I was like, I'm just never going to just never going to let that happen. Like I'm never going to let that happen to me. And I'm not I don't want that to happen to my family and anyone in my life that I build like significant meaningful relationships within the future.

Friends, chosen family, whatever you want to call it? I just can't let that can't let that happen again. You know, at this point, you've grown up never really thinking too much about money, maybe seeing some contrast with neighbors and recognizing perhaps you didn't have as much as others. But all of a sudden, your world kind of comes crashing down and you know, this is your college age years. What do you do with that pain at that point? You know, I think to put it in perspective, like I was still able to go to the

Right. Like at that point, it was like, it was very clear. It was like, oh my God, I'm watching this happen to someone close to me. I'm going to draw this line in the And it's only been since I've kind of matured in like my relationship with my father and my relationship with money and everyone around me's relationship with money have continued to mature over

it. Which totally makes sense for a young kid, right? You don't necessarily have the emotional tools. Most kids, especially of our generation, weren't that lucky to have those sort of processing tools to even know what to do with that. Absolutely. But you draw this line in the sand. How does that start to manifest into your life? Yeah, so I, it's funny. I'd already been on an kind of an interesting path. I think you know this, but I the first two years of college at college.,. Yeah. And if you, yeah, I mean, if you know me well enough, you, you'd know that there's versions of, that play, that play out in my current life all the time. So. But basically, you know, I also I also got into the business school at the.

Same time funny other kind of tangent story is that the local, because I grew up in that area of the local community. They have something called Virginia Tech does something called on site decision where they never had to actually apply and have to write an essay or do anything. Like they come to the local community, local towns, and they go to the high schools and, and they go run down the list and they look at your SAT scores. And. And your GBA. And they just check off like, yeah, you can come. No, you can't come. You can come. So while the while the rep from Virginia Tech is at my high, high school, they call me down to the office and they're like. And I'm like, what are we doing here? Is this are you guys like just here to beat me up? Like what's

like, no, no, but your SC or is in math are so good that, that we want you to join our engineering department because Virginia Tech has like a world, you know, world class engineering school. And I was like, oh, okay, cool. And they're like, if you take the dual enrollmenton English class. It gets you like technically college credit through the local community college, then and get a B or better, like we can replace your SAT scores. You got to work around it and then you can come to Virginia Tech. So I did. I took that class. I got a B minus and actually got in. Yeah. Anyway, so I, so that's where math is, it

was in the summer and came back and switched out of musical theater. And I was doing, I was in the business school already doing marketing. So I thought, well, if I don't cut it as a performer, it'd be an agent, like a talent agent. So I had put those two things together together, came back, switched out of theater and went in straight and took marketing and transition that into finance. And it took my first finance 101 class and learned the money calculation, which was like. This is it. This is like, 8th wonder of the world, right? Compound interest basically. Like, it's, this is this is the thing that. And obviously there's a lot more to it. And that, you know, my degree in finance and accounting, but I just decided that I was going to study it all the way from personal finance, through, you know, business corporate accounting stuff.

And I just wanted to, I didn't know where I was going to fall from a career perspective. Like you were saying like young kids, college age kids, you know of college, college, college, college, college, you know, it. teacher at my high school. She was like, you're good at this. You should try like, okay, cool. I guess that's what we do. We just pick something and figure it out. So anyway, all that to say, I just really needed to have a command and control over that like kind of huge element of my life and realize that from that pretty early age. Because you know, it's a medium like it's not like money in my mind like money doesn't have any of its own value. And I think, you know, culturally obviously it does, but when it gets down to like,

you know, brass tax, like it is truly just an efficient medium of exchange for goods and services, experiences, all kinds of stuff. And so I just really needed to be able to control that for myself. How does that, I mean, it sounds like you had this deep interest in finance from personal to corporate. How does that start to play out in your life? I mean, you know, it's not lost on me that you were watching your dad kind of become a shell of himself based on money you draw a line in the sand, that I'm going to control this very important and real aspect of life. How does that play out for you? Yeah, well, I mean, I'll just take you

protected from what happened, right? And not that he would have been fully ins And that was where I thought I wanted to go cut to, you know, around graduation, all of our professors telling us like you got to go, independent firm, you got to go RIA, you got to do it right. And then there's the handful of us that are like, like, you, you know,

and it just chewed me up, and spit it out. And like within eight months, I it's, you know, the whole it seems like the whole business, business, business model is built to, to get a bunch of young, hungry people in, and then kind of strip them of all their family members who might need annuity or insurance products, even if they don't actually need them. It's the f****** racket. Excuse my language, but you can. Yeah. Okay, cool. Awesome. So, so anyway, so I did that for eight months. I absolutely hated it. It was not the version that I was excited about. I became a glorified life insurance salesman. And I was like, I gotta get I gotta get out of here., so if that, you know, as a major pendulum swing, basically just had discounted being in finance at that point. I was like, okay, well,

I tried the thing that was it, and I'm. I'm, I'm done. I. I moved back in with my dad. He and my mom had split at that point and I washed dishes at a vegetarian restaurant for six months, making seven, 25 an hour, staying up until two in the morning washing dishes, and saved up about $800 and then gotten my truck and drove to California because from the time I had been there, I really loved Southern California, but I didn't want anything doing the entertainment industry. And I lived in my truck for almost three years at the beach in Southern California, like between Venice and Santa Monica to Penga all the way up to Ventura County line and up into like Malibu and Calabasas and just totally. Did the dirtbag thing. I was rock climbing on the weekends in the Eastern Sierras and

, up through Mammoth and into Yosemite. I was surfing in Southern California most of the time and I had, you know, less than $. $100 in my, I don't even know if I had a bank account. I just had $100 in cash in my truck at any given time over those first few months at least. And then a couple while I was surfing, I met a couple that was working or that lived in Malabu.

I met them in Malibu and I chucked them in in the mail and deal with the state and the IRS and, you know, started doing their bookkeeping, super simple, like, met their CPA who is in in Calabasas and to dirtbag life. So you you're on the personal finance track. You go to New York and get this you think you're on one track. You've seen the picture of me with my buzz cut in the in the suit. Yeah, you're really doing it. That's a shell of a human right there, dude.

And then you go live in your truck for three years. Like, were you struggling? Were you free? Was it both? Like, what's that like? That was completely free. Yeah. No struggle. No struggle really at all that that entire time. Like, it's funny. I have a good friend who has done some similar things and one of her favorite quotes that I don't know whether it's hers or she heard it somewhere else, but she says that like being poor is a calling and I don't think that means in every in every way that you can use the, the word poor, but in the way that we were choosing to live with very little means and be completely free. I think that the way I think about that, if you you are, if you have no money, you are basically just at the whim of whatever is happening to you and around you and you

really don't have much control over it whatsoever with every additional dollar that you accumulate, you gain a little bit more control over your reality. And so certain people and we all know these kinds of people on either end of the spectrum are only willing to handle certain are only willing to handle certain amounts of feeling out of control. And so those people do things for money that not everybody is maybe willing or excited about doing. And that's what I feel like the way and so we do things regardless of what it means, what the repercussions are, what the ripple effect is, and we do them because we must because we have families on our side that we have to take care of and this and you know that the rationalization can go anywhere. But so anyway, I think it was extremely

liberating. I literally had a climbing rack and a bag in my car. I had a futon mattress in the back of my Toyota forerunner that was had 400,000 miles on it like I had a surfboard on top like I just that was it. And then I was started making little bits of money doing bookkeeping stuff that like kept the gas tank full and you know kept groceries in the truck and you know I had I may I was making friends throughout I'd like to do a little couch surfing, I do some house sitting, you know those kinds of things like I was building relationships, making friends like doing doing stuff. Just the contrast is so wild though from you know this point that you just took us through we were like money's never going to be you know my master. I'm going to make sure I never end up like my dad. And then all of a sudden you take that

to a completely different extreme of money won't control me. I'm just not going to have any. Right well and totally dude. I mean it's funny because even now like, even where I'm at now with a business that's doing well like a couple of kids, a wife like all of the all the things that most people do you know right out of college and do really quickly like I now have all those things. But still like even and I support people who feel differently obviously about money because we have clients all over the spectrum with money relationships but like for me like the whole reason to have money and to continue accumulating it is so that I don't have to think about it. It's the whole that's the whole game is just that I never have to worry or think about I watch my dad worry and think about it and grip to it and then get totally devastated by it. It's like there are instruments and strategies and all kinds of stuff that

you can do that just you just never have to think about and like there are things that I don't have to think about now with the current amount of resource and income that I have that I used to have to think about a lot and there are things that I'm also excited about continuing to solve for in the future that I'm currently thinking about that I don't want to right you know one of my other favorite like mental models to talk about or build for people is like the amount of money or resource that you have is directly related to going to put food on the table for your kids or for your family or even for yourself but as that resource amount starts to expand it's like oh maybe now we can

start looking at things on a monthly basis. Maybe we're going to plan yearly like tax strategy right and we're going to think about our W-2 and how much we're putting away for our retirement for our kids it's like okay now we've left the year and now we're looking at like our kids go into college in 15 years right and then you think about like the wealthiest people that we know and that come that are in some of the circles that we're in like dude they think about generations some of the wealthiest wealthiest people in the world think about about like existential like human survival right like it's crazy like your concept or like your structure of and like and that that kind of like mindset or that like mapping it like changes how you interact with your world on a day-to-day basis and that's been one of the most fascinating concepts for me ever it's just

everybody's somewhere different on that spectrum and how much that changes the way their brain works this period of your life where you go live in your truck right is sort of the ultimate non-, attachment to money let's go see if I can really survive this way I imagine what you get on the backside of that is an incredible amount of resourcefulness like how does that play into your entrepreneurial endeavors now dude resourcefulness and and I would say like just like long-lasting perspective like there are like I was having this conversation with somebody in Cabo just recently like when I really get to zoom out and I'm not like in in my in the trenches like working on something or dealing with a specific problem or

something like that when I really take a step back which those big events really do for me in a really positive way it's like I've already I've already made it whatever everyone's got a different definition of like made it right but like we are in a beautiful house in a really nice neighborhood in Fort Collins Colorado my we're paying for my son to go to preschool my wife isn't bringing in that much income other than the random photography things that she's doing when she feels like it and wants to like we also have additional support from that doesn't mean that I don't still have goals and dreams and desires but like that I think again I will get back to your question about resourcefulness but like

the perspective both from where I grew up and how like what I saw and learned there with my dad and then also yeah being in California and it was like we humans are very resilient and need very very little like we've we've got we've all got stories not just about money but about like what it means to be to be living a meaningful or good life a productive life a good life of whatever you want to call it and all of that has ripple effects into what you think you need and like the word need is also really interesting because everyone defines it differently but man like yeah I mean resourcefulness in the sense I guess that like I just I always I always it does feel more it's hard to answer

the resourceful question because I always it does actually feel more like perspective is like or I always had what I needed like there was never a moment where my car didn gas or I didn't have like a single bag of groceries in the front seat like my bed was in the back the weather's always nice in Southern California I never was like like cold or worried about it like and was there ever a moment when you decided that you were done with a dirtbag life or was it just kind of a slow gradual build UK you know you started taking on these bookkeeping jobs you kind of just transition out there naturally or was what was there was there another line in the sand it was it was it was twofold so actually the answer is it was both there. Was slow there was a slow crawl out

basically basically the reason it was three years is because when I drove drove to California actually it was the first half of the trip was with my sister because she was four years younger than me she went to high school I graduated Virginia Tech when she graduated a high She finished in three years didn't do a full fourth year again I, I think probably because of the money thing right? She just knew that she could get through it more quickly to get a place together like you can't just come move in with me because I don't live

anywhere So at that point it was like okay now that's a little bit of like additional expense requirement so like you know talk to the CPA that I'm, working with kind of give him some ideas he's like cool yeah like we got more projects so just it was very much like it felt fairly like seamless and easy just because I had these good relationships built where like I could I could tap that's where I I was the resourcefulness is not the resourcefulness really came from building relationships because I think that like when you don't have resource like that or resource in any capacity or control over your situation or your environment the resource that I did have was really great strong relationships like people who would let the

people, have gots you right and I think that's something I learned a lot from growing up and like that came with me from from growing up in the south like in kind of rural Appalachia but anyway so you know just, had a couple conversations with him and he's like hey man like if you want to do more than the bookkeeping you want to come in on an hourly basis and help me out during

but I was like if I'm going to do that and eventually be a financial professional and get back around to this thing that I you know really kind of withdrew from from my experience in DC and all of that like you know some letters behind my name would probably much more difficult now that I had an apartment it was easy to create a space to actually and you know be more intentional about that and had obviously plenty of time to study and take those and so it just became this kind of like incremental knowing and then I'd say

that the real shift was when I met Meg my wife and wives don't like dirtbags they're not necessarily signing up for dirtbag life. Dude wives are not signing up for dirt girlfriends love dirtbags dirt girlfriends love dirtbags like like in the beginning and even after I new as like oh this is a because partly because I was a young dirtbag like that's just who I was

and something just shift like I different it's so interesting. I want to go back to something

you said of like you know you've made it. Hmm. When did you know. Well also before I answer that kind of caveat to that is like I don't I don't know that or hold that 100 percent of the time right like when when in this conversation it's easy to to remember because we're zooming all the way out. Right in in Cabo when we're with our when we're with our people and like we're all doing the full zoom out thing like Easiest perspective in the world to keep but when I'm dealing with Employee issues clients are leaving we got cash flow holes like the the normal entrepreneur stuff. I Don't feel that I'm like this is not made it like this sucks This is hard and I need to solve for that and get to a different place So I say that just to kind of you know It's a really critical perspective Because I think so often we think that there's some magical finish line and then we're never gonna be in pain anymore

You know, I had that version when I. I sold my company. I was like, oh I've done it. Yeah, and it turns out. I was just getting started. Yeah, no more suffering. Yeah, ever ever, ever again, ever again But made it as a perspective, you know, I think there are so many of us founders that Wouldn't know made it if it hit us over the head because we're so zoomed into more and growing and you know, it's easy to get lost in the problems of Scaling a company. Yep, right. And so how do you balance that perspective like when you're in it? How do you zoom back out? Yeah? Well, it's I mean dude to your point like it's it's relative, right like making it is Is a relative it's a it's a generally relative statement

Like I've it when I when I am able to zoom all the way out The reason that zooming out is an important part of that process is because what I mean is I've made it relative to how I grew up, right? Like there's more to that sentence, right? It's like I made it relative to what I thought was possible When I was a child or when I was in college or what I like I have made it so much further than Any of those previous times if I if I look that far back. Yeah living in a van down by the river exactly dude exactly But of I look Six months ago or one year ago. I haven't made anything I've made very little progress Relative to that like period of time that's again not to get like too existential But that like time expansion contraction. Contraction

In my daily routine life with two young kids and the business and all the daily and weekly problems that come up in the business and those kinds of things like Like I don't generally feel like I've made it. So I then schedule or structure these like Bigger like, you know, we go a couple Times a year we go on these big adventure trips together. What It was a couple times a year we go to these big events with a couple hundred people and like we have these are the zoomouts that I need to like properly schedule because There's a lead- up on the front end that I think is positive like emotionally positive and then Then there's the kind of like like tail end as well That's also emotionally positive and if they're properly spaced throughout a given year the year or period of time Like that really is what I. I think that's that feels like that nice kind of ebb and flow because if I stay with that perspective all the time

Then I don't like the other side of that coin is that I don't take any real Kind of like fervor or gusto or energy into my business to continue building it Which I do have long-term goals to do right like that won't happen happen. If I'm constantly like I'm so frustrated by what's happened. you, just you're expected to work and what that does to the rest of

Of your life is So anyway All that to say like I think that those those bigger those bigger zoomouts those bigger trips whether they're like with our with our Community whether they're with my wife or whatever they are like just have to do that that step back in that separation I mean, I think I think what you're really hitting out here is the ability to hold paradox And I think this is one of the most things can be true right that like this is one of the most critical skills for for any entrepreneur because You know on one hand, you're living your dream life like you're doing it, right? You've got the beautiful family the house like it's totally it's all working out And you have big goals right and I think the the trap the entrepreneurial trap is

Is thinking only one of those matters right? Yes is focusing only on the big goals and And it's this this nuance this inhabiting of paradox where you all the I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be yep Yep, how do you think about holding that paradox like like like what does that look like in your life?

Let's say I got a job as an account like I'm a CPA. I got a job making $150,000 a year I was working at a big four accounting firm if the requirement for my job Was to travel four times a year for a week at a time to ? Be with clients or whatever it was That would not be a difficult thing. With within like the structure of my family, right like to to get the money that I have agreed to receive for the question that I am trading is that's a part of the equation, right? Entrepreneurs don't have that and so every time we choose to leave it's a every time every time you leave it's a choice Right now and then you and then every time you're back with the wrestling match Is the value not just business value or ROI?

But like every time I leave is the value that I'm that is being created by my my leaving worth the cost at At home or whatever of me going emotional mental spiritual Monetary whatever all the things right and so it just it's this interesting thing that I thought was important to bring up in the entrepreneur community because you know Maybe those things lead to business that ends up taking care of things that you wouldn't would have had to solve for in a day But you can't like you can't do the cost-benefit analysis of that equation, right? So like I don't know I don don't think that answers your question But like it's a it's a that's my that's kind of my version of the paradox at this point of like two things are true Like I want to be I love my kids and the age and stage that they're at and I love being with my wife as many minutes of every day

As I possibly can but I also have other s*** that I'm that I need for my whole being and That means making the hard decision in one place to do it right like I think it's it so I guess what I'm feeling or saying is that like that paradox exists in In my mind like in almost all of the areas of our lives, right? Like I do like maybe one other way is to say like To have the opportunity for this to be a problem is like is it is a blessing then that's privilege And So, my... So, s******* gear is just a, right? Like you you're in the back end in the back end of a lot of businesses as飛, as a book to frame an accountant. How do you see this broader money story playing out across the way

entrepreneurs relate to money and seeing so many businesses? Man, so many places to go from. From that question. I, I was just taking taking a beat to let it like, fully settle into me. The I mean, dude, every, every single person, let's say we have, you know, around 100 clients, every single person, like these businesses are just as unique as the people who own them. Right, right? Like, when you get to bigger business, everything gets standardized. You've got gap accounting, report, like reporting requirements, you got like, you know, everything, everything after operations has been solved for becomes an investing and financing activity like really just becomes about dollars becomes about debt and leverage and investments.

At some point, that's business at a certain level, none of these businesses have anything like that. And like, you see the ripple effect. Throughout their operations, throughout their current accounting systems, like literally everything has to do like it comes from, and I think that's why as like a 100% extrovert, fairly, what I would again, not to my own horn, but like emotionally intelligent human. That's where I connect with entrepreneurs the most that make them excited about working with HUM

things to learn through that process was that specifically for functional medicine doctors, like they, they are entrepreneurs. Just like the rest The rest of us, these individuals who are trying to figure out how in four, they can practice medicine in, in the rest of us, like in four and a half days a week, and then run a seven figure business in a half a day a week, that's tough, right? And then, and then you see the ripple effect of that of like the frustration with how their teams are functioning the frustration with how much money they do or don't have or their understanding of where it's going or what's happening to it, like, all of these like downstream ripple effects that take hold on the entire business infrastructure or ecosystem.

And they don't want to stop practicing, it's like in the interesting cases for entrepreneurs because they didn't really necessarily choose the entrepreneurial journey. Like maybe a e-commerce founder or like you or I did, right? Like they were forced into it because they didn't want to take insurance anymore, right? So, you know, that just, that just being one example, like it's Well, I'll give you another great example, which is, if you're listening to this podcast, you know, I've built a career in the second half of my life on understanding my relationship to money. So you might think that guy is dialed, but also one of, my definitions of how much money is enough is so I don't have to worry about it, which, you know, is really cool. And I've built a life where that's mostly true, but the shadow side of that as it

comes out is like, I'm probably your most avoid until it becomes an actual problem in my life. Cause responding to those, no matter how much work I do, no matter how much therapy I've done around my money story, responding to bookkeeping emails feels like worrying about money for me. And it's a daily ongoing struggle, right? And so my personal relationship with money that I'm still healing, and that's one of the reasons why I had this podcast is that it manifests as avoidance in my business. And you've got a hundred clients playing out some version of their moneystory and you get to see all of that happening in real time. Yeah. And it's, it's interesting because it's been the absolutely the most difficult thing for us to solve for that.

I don't think or like our service is like, maybe it's maybe you have to pay a premium, which most people in your like, we've got other people just like you. And they're like, oh, yeah, I'll pay the premium so that you don. You don't have to so that I don't have to touch it or think about it or worry about all the way to the other end where people are like, no, this is important to my mental and emotional health to be this and understanding and have someone to call on and talk to and do that proactively. Yeah-man. It's it's unbelievably difficult because everyone is everyone's their own edge. Case like there is no standard. There's no standard formula risk tolerance, I think is a big one

that I get a lot of insight into from across all of our clients. And how that man, how that risk tolerance manifests in the way that their teams are structured, the way that they their relationship with their with their team, the relationship with their vendors or service

don't have a whole lot of room will send it through the roof. Because they just trust that everything is going to work out and I like, you know, it's funny, I think I tend more to that side and, you know, it's nice having up about actual romantic partner like my wife who has created some more balance in our life, which has been beneficial to our business. And then you've got people on the other spectrum that doesn't matter. We can't get that even in the market because they're like, nope, staying in cash, not going to do it. And there's, you know, a bunch in there and we're not going to do anything with it because we're not putting any of it at risk. It's wild, like, like I said, like not just the businesses themselves and how they're structured, but the ripple effect of that on their lives and their relationships and all the people are that all of those things are just as unique

as the individuals, like there's no, you know, particular single money story that that ties people together. But you know, there's flavors, right? There's the high, risk, high reward mindset, which I'm a I'm a little familiar with, right? All the way to that other end of. of like shove it under the mattress. Yeah. And you know, it's just it's wild for me, because we have similar perspectives into people's finances, seeing how this situation, like, you know, your dad watching and pull away cause the people's personal relationship with money shows up in their business everywhere, literally, everywhere. I'd say one of the, you know, that, I mean, you know, even. Even within the people that we work with actually,

our, you know, our ICPs,, our ICP's avatars are slightly different, obviously, but within the entrepreneur community, one of things that I find super fascinating is that you do there are people the spectrum of high risk to low this exists within that ecosystem, but we're still like of the top 5% of all humans in terms of risk profile, right, because we we've gone out to start businesses in the first place, which is a pretty interesting fact, but one of the things that I find fascinating is that the, I think it's necessary to the entrepreneurial journey that the confidence in your own ability and what you can produce and the return on that production are higher than anywhere else, but I think one of the things that can often kind of, I

think, again, the time, the time, the time perspective is that you can lose the idea that the we're not going to want, we're not going to want to hold on to this exact business or this version of the business forever and so what I find people not doing that I'm constantly trying to tote people about is like, I know that your art that you believe that your are your own business is better and that every dollar you take, you're trying to double back down into your business because of that potential ROI, but if you don't like as you grow and your business and it doesn't you don't have to do the like, oh yeah, I got a stocks and bonds portfolio, but like you have to diversify in some way or that risk, you're starting to even out like outpace that what I would call like a healthy amount

of risk even for your personality type, right? I'm not saying there's an objectively healthy type of risk or amount of risk. I'm just saying that like for you that that starts to get pushed and one of the places we see that is people stop making decisions, right? Like they don't have the right data in their businesses and they start they like hit, hit this glass ceiling where like they kind of stall out and they don't really understand why and it's like, well, you're about to make decisions that you don't have the right data for and they're going to create more risk than you've ever created before in your business, whether it's a dollar amount or a number of people amount or clients relationship, whatever it is, like you're just your body's not going to let you do that and that's been a really interesting thing to try to like help people kind of

sort through as we've watched them hit those ceilings and then help them try to figure out how to, you know, break through it. What do you tell somebody like that? Like if you see somebody with all of their chips in the business, bumping up against this natural growth ceiling and they're about to go for it and take on a risk that they may not understand. How do you talk them off the ledge? What do you do in that situation? I think I try to, without doing any like really heavy lifting as far as like technical work wise, I try to help them do the thought experiment of like the most likely potential outcomes because if we run, if together, we run all the way down the rabbit hole in the most

not that all three of those are the same all the way to like this would be the most ideal outcome for this. If you've run down the gamut and you still do it. Great, dude, it's your life like do the thing, do the thing. But what people are I think looking like what I want to provide to people not just within our client base but my friends in my community specifically within our clients what people are actually paying for us to do is help them not make the decisions but give them the information and or confidence to make those types of decisions. So I think the thought experiment is super, super helpful and valuable. And, yeah, I had another thought, but it's escaped me. As we start to, to wrap up, this is, this is so fascinating. I'm sure we could jam on out on this for hours, but based on everything

that you've seen from, from clients and in your own personal journey, what is wealth now and what, and, and what makes a rich life for you? Wealth to me means waking up every single day with the full autonomy to choose exactly what is the most meaningful and impactful for me to be able to do that day. And that is across across all of the aspects of my life. Like I really do like what I'm working on and building within my business. Like I enjoy it. It's fun. I'm not doing it just because it will create resource that then becomes a medium for other experiences and things that I can accumulate in my life.

I actually enjoy it. And I like, I don't think that there's a number of dollars where I would stop doing the things that we call work, right? I like building stuff. I have like a very, my dad was an engineer. Like I have very like engineers tinkerer kind of mind. The wealth, like I guess using that word. Like the richness of my relationship with my kids because I have intentionally chosen not to work as much as I could have while they're like preschool age. Basically like my kids are two and four and a half like always going to go to kindergarten in the fall and Scotty will be two years behind him. And so like I can see a reality where like I work more at that point. But I've really focused on making sure that we are comfortable and stable

as a family, but not at the detriment of that of really any minutes possible for spending time with them and my wife and just having this like container. So I think, I think the answer is that it change like, I guess the first answer I gave was objective, but that right now that's my current version is like I know that even the goals that I have for building the business and growing I'm not moving at a pace that I, you know, when I'm in the hole, I'm like comfortable with necessarily, but it was it was a choice. Like I'm no victim to any situation, like

to build and grind, you can pop out and wait a minute. What are we really doing here? What am I doing all this for? Totally, right? And, yes, meaningful the work is really cool. But being with your toddler is cooler. So cool. And I can make money anytime into the future. As far as things stay similar to the way they are now. But man, I'm never going to get any of those days back. Yeah, I love that. If you could leave our listeners who are, you know, typically similar to us, maybe they're running a seven figure business, eight-figure business. What would you tell them about, about money that maybe you wish you knew when you were starting out or that you see as a common pitfall?

Do the longest version of the thought experiment that you possibly can to figure out how much you think you need. Because I can almost guarantee you, that it's what you think right now is way more than if you did the full thought experiment, all the way to making a spreadsheet and putting all the of things on it and then total it up at the bottom. Like, what you you think you need for the life that you want is most likely orders of magnitude bigger than what it actually is. If you go all the way down the rabbit hole and like put the details and the pieces in place to build the life that you want. Like, don't, don't think about it like I need 30 million dollars.

Like, what are the thing and what is that and not, and not just how much because you just pick a dollar amount, it's still totally arbitrary, whether it's 30 million dollars or it's $3,000 dollars a week. Like it doesn't matter. But what are those $3,000 doing? Like what what do you do like take the time, go down the rabbit hole, work that equation and then work backwards from that equation once you've got it defined. But if you just like threw a number out there because of what everyone on Instagram is telling you and what you've seen your community or people around you doing or what like it, it's all b*******. Like, everybody's doing it for different reasons. Like go do the thought experiment and do it in a a silo, do it by yourself. And I bet you'll be very, very surprised. Yeah. I mean, this is, this is a subject near and dear to

my heart because one of the fundamental things I try to do in my work is help people answer the question of how much is enough. And my experience overlaps completely, completely what you just said. You know, people who are in the position of working with they're typically higher earners, right? But when we run this thought experiment, they're either at. thought experiment, they're either at, or within striking distance of already having enough to live the life they want to live, total right. And now you get to back into bigger questions of like, okay, what are we really doing here? If I've already met this threshold, by the way, we're not the kind of people that just give up and right up in the sunset, typically. But what am I doing here? And how can I start to shift things so that I'm actually increasing my life, you know, and the impact of my life rather than just scaling for more?

100%. I don't know, what what a pleasure. Thank you for coming on if people want to get in touch, where can they find you, where can they learn more about about humming what you're doing. Yeah, hum accounting.com or just hunter at hum accounting.com will get me. If you need me, I can give you my info too. And yeah. Yeah. Love it, man. Well, thanks so much for being on. Thanks for sharing your stories. It's been a pleasure, man. I love your little dirtbag heart. So I appreciate it's not going anywhere. It's not going anywhere. I'm going to raise it into my children. Awesome, man. Thanks for listening to this episode of Money Stories. And I hope this conversation, sparks something for you. If you're craving more conversations like this, then I want to invite you to check out Unbreakable Wealth. It's a private community and

where we write your money story and lead a life on your own terms. Apply now at the link below. And if you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe and leave a review.