504: How Has Inflation Impacted Small Business? (with David Belman)

Brian Nichols  0:00  
Instead of focusing on winning arguments, we're teaching the basic fundamentals of sales and marketing and how we can use them to win in the world of politics teaching you how to meet people where they're at on the issues they care about. Welcome to The Brian Nichols Show. Well, happy Tuesday there folks almost forgotten there was Brian Nichols here on The Brian Nichols Show. And thank you for joining us on of course, another fun filled episode. I am as always, your humble host and before we go ahead and get started want to give a shout out to not just today's sponsor, but the sponsor we have for the next three months. That is the expat money summit 2022 November 7 through November 11. Watch for a week reap the benefits for generations our friend McHale Thorpe from the expat money show and host of the expat money podcast and summit invites you to this free Yes, it is free Summit. Yes, it is November 7 through the 11th. interested please head to Brian Nichols show.com forward slash x pet and get your free tickets today, folks. I'm so excited for our Of course our funfilled guests. You know how that handles here in the show. We always have a fun filled guest and this guest happens to be returning guests and I wish we were talking about some more fun filled topics David Bellman from the home building hero podcast and Bellman Holmes returns the program. David, welcome back to the show.

David Belman  1:24  
Well, thank you so much Brian. It's good to be back I guess I did okay that I get a return invite it

Brian Nichols  1:29  
not only did you do Okay, your your conversation was one of the most talked about episodes I've heard of today because people number one, they saw the tweet, right, the infamous tweet the Rob Schneider retweeted

David Belman  1:39  
the tweet. Number. Yeah, right. screen shooting, right. Yeah, the

Brian Nichols  1:43  
whole thing I screenshotted. You it was a whole thing. He retweeted it. But it's about inflation, right. And we're talking about the price of lumber and how you had seen in the homebuilding industry, the price of lumber exponentially increasing. Well, fast forward to today. And we're seeing the conversation not just in the cost of building homes increasing but now it seems the cost of doing anything breathing is going up at exponential rates

David Belman  2:08  
as well for that now, next, right.

Brian Nichols  2:10  
He can't win. Don't even say it. I know you can't win. Well, how about this before we go into the doom and gloom David Bellman? reintroduce yourself here to The Brian Nichols Show audience? Who are you? What is home building hero podcast? And how can you help people with homes with a million homes?

David Belman  2:24  
Fantastic. Well, my name is David Bellman, I am a home builder from Wisconsin. And we also do land development, we do real estate work. And I also have a podcast of my own called the homebuilding hero. And we talk all about anything related to homes, from economics to trends. I just heard that a really cool technology Summit. So we're going to talk about some of that stuff down the road. So yeah, got a lot, a lot of interesting stuff. If you're ever in the market, to build a home, or remodel your home, it's a great place to check out because we've got all sorts of advice from beginning to end. So hopefully, my goal is I can't build a house all around the country, but I can help people around the country have a better build, there you

Brian Nichols  3:01  
go. Well, and you're not only doing that, but you're helping bridge the world of where we see politics sometimes get get stuck in in terms of moving things forward and conversation, the political conversation stops that. But you've been able to help foster that conversation by bridging the gap with business owners, entrepreneurs, I had a great time joining you. And the amazing crew up there at the young gun summit back in the winter, unfortunately, can't make it this. This next one. Okay. I know, wedding season. What can I say? But, I mean, with that being said, though, you're not

David Belman  3:36  
a lifestyle? You know, you got to do the wedding. Yeah, no.

Brian Nichols  3:39  
But um, you know, not only do you you're not only are you helping bridge that world, David, but you're also helping bring real issues that business owners entrepreneurs are experiencing, when they're trying to bring the solutions that they bring to the table that let's be real, are inherently outside of the realm of government and most times, right,

David Belman  3:59  
or, yeah, and that's one of the things that was neat about the last Young Guns conference. And that's another thing that I'm involved with, and we basically help business owners improve. And, and one of the things that I'm passionate about is trying to reduce regulation in industries and I'm tired and frustrated of government getting in our way all the time. And they've never shown that they can do anything efficiently. So, you know, I just tried to show that, hey, private industry can can do things and a lot of times a lot better and more effective. So part of that is having that conversation and then showing like in my industry for homebuilding. When you put all the regulation that you have in, in our industry, right now, it's adding $94,000 to the cost of a new home due to local state and federal regulation. And you talk about these young kids and they're going to work and trying to get money so they can buy a house and they can't afford it because the government's costing so much money before you even put a shovel on the ground. So I So that's what I'm really passionate about is really trying to help the housing affordability issue because it'll help everybody because housing is something that everybody should have access to.

Brian Nichols  5:09  
Yeah, well, I mean, you need a place to call home a place to you know, have a bed a roof over your head at night. Like, it just seems so basic. And and we're talking about this not through government going out and mandating homes right now. But we're talking about actually going out and having the solutions inherently built in the marketplace, but making it easier. And that right there. $94,000.

David Belman  5:37  
Yes, that's a Wisconsin number. Well, actually, it's I mean, it's nationwide, that's about the average, but that's also what it would be in Wisconsin, so it's just overregulated. I mean, when it takes two years to get a subdivision approved, and you have to go through all this red tape, that's part of the problem, when you have to pay all these hookup fees that the municipality keeps, and then uses to make improvements, when the new homes are paying for themselves, like a new home pays for itself now, and it pays for itself 15 years down the road. So they're kind of targeting new construction to fix the mistakes of the past. And that's it's a failed policy, right? And so like, I've been even meeting with some elected officials, and some that are trying to get elected, and say, Hey, we have to fundamentally look at how we're doing business right now with you and change it. And I have one guy that I'm working with, I'm really excited about I hope he gets said he's running for lieutenant governor. And he's like, I want to go in and I want to start stripping this stuff out. And he's like, we got to start from scratch. I'm like, What's

Brian Nichols  6:40  
that gentleman's name? His name is William Martin. William, as he said, he sat at my table at the luncheon.

David Belman  6:45  
Yeah, you actually met well, so yeah, great guy. And he worked on the Department of Labor sites. So he understands how government's put together, he's been in private industry, like the people that have the practical type of experience, to run the government and run it effectively. And these are the kind of people we need to put in, in place in the future, in my opinion.

Brian Nichols  7:04  
Yeah. Well, and we, we talk about this a lot, where I was actually selling a program where it's an anarchist program, and they're overtly focusing on non political solutions, which I think a lot of us, you know, in the entrepreneurial, small business space, we're okay with, frankly, and we're talking about how you, you need to, even though, even though we don't like the way the game is being played right now, the other side is still playing the game, and they will use the bully pulpit, they will use the club of government to crack down on on others, we think it's wrong, we think you shouldn't use government to do those nasty things. Our political opponents don't have that same belief. And that is where I think it's it's imperative for us to engage in a political discourse. And this goes to a lot of the real issues we're seeing. And let's dig into some of these, David, because you're seeing it in the business world, specifically in the b2b as well as b2c world. And we talked about inflation from what you saw with the cost of lumber or the cost of building a house. And we're not even talking about the inflation and cost of government being involved in the conversation. But let's talk about the other areas, supply chain issues. We're seeing interest rates skyrocketing. So we're seeing all these little issues now hitting at once. What's that impact Ben, in your experience?

David Belman  8:27  
So one of the biggest issues that we face right now as a homebuilder is the supply chain issue. And this really started right when the the pandemic kind of hit and open back up again. homebuilding just took off. And so one of the things that happened was, as a builder, we signed a bunch of work, and we're excited to finally have some some new jobs coming in and things. But then what happened was, as you're building these jobs and starting these, they were taking longer, and then all sudden, overnight, things would just change. So for example, my window company used to be a four week order to get Windows. Well, all of a sudden, overnight, they got a hold of us and like Well, yeah, those windows, it's going to be like 12 to 14 weeks now to get those same windows. And so you can have a house that's like framed up, and it's all sudden now you can't get Windows and it's just sitting there out in the open, getting wet and all these things. So it's bad for construction, then it screws up your whole schedule. And then, you know, because they're taking so long, everything's starting to get more expensive. And it's not just windows, it's the supply chain on things like refrigerators. If you want to get like a really nice high end refrigerator, you could be waiting 14 months for a refrigerator YZ so like those are some of the things that you know, we're seeing there's other stuff like anything manufactured like trusses, those are 12 weeks. Cabinets are 12 to 14 weeks. So a normal build is like six months now we're looking at you know, nine months to a year for a a normal home and some of these custom builders that I've been talking to, they're like a year and a half built. Now they're like two to three years to build some of these homes. And so that's one issue is the supply chain. But then you also have this inflation thing happening. And it's ridiculous. Like, we talked about the lumber thing last year and a circle back and that real quick. When we first talked like lumber, per 1000, board feet, typically is around $400 for 1000. board feet, that's like the normal baseline pricing will last me when we talked. And when I got fed up, it was $1,400 per 1000 board feet. And that's like a 30 to $40,000 hit on a single home. Well, those numbers went down a little bit in fall. And then in early, well, I'd say April ish, they shot back up even higher, they were $1,700 per 1000 board feet here and 2022. Now they've come back down a bit. But it's like it keeps going up. And then it comes down a little bit and it keeps going up. So the trend line is we're still paying way more for lumber than we ever have. And it's it's unsustainable.

Brian Nichols  11:11  
It made me so when you're talking about the fridge, I laughed, and I apologize for laughing because it made me think of I'm a huge office fan for anybody who forgets. And there's the one part where Michael just walks in one day, and he's like, Pam, I'm going to be a father. And he's like, I'm gonna adopt a child. And then Pam starts walking through the process. And she's like explaining how long it's gonna take me goes. I mean, if I don't want to, I'm not going to want to kiddin in 16 months, or whatever the line is. And that was me, I was like, I want if I was gonna want to do it with a new fridge, and in 14 months, that's well,

David Belman  11:40  
that's what's happening to is people are ordering this stuff. And then yeah, six months later, they're changing their mind like, Well, yeah, I don't need that anymore. My financial situation changed. And now No, take this with a grain of salt, you can go to the store right now and buy a refrigerator. Okay, but you're not going to get the specific one with this. Like, if you want the fancy subzero with all the doodads in it. Yeah, you're going to order that and you're going to wait 14 months for that. You could go into a store right now and buy a standard stainless steel one, you may not get the brand you want or this specific feature, you could potentially walk out with one today. But most people when they're building a home, especially a million dollar a half million dollar house, they kind of want that they want. Yep. And so that's an issue. And then the fuel pricing is just huge as well. So I mean, you see in gas prices in my area at $5 a gallon, I started to calculate I'm like, how many trips do we take to a job site? And then how many trips would you know, my trades take and just being conservative, not even using diesel and diesel mileage? I was like we're at like $2,000 just for standard trips back and forth to a job site on one house. And so it's like, that's just more money out the window that people have to pay that just then you start to figure out the diesel vehicles and stuff. I mean, it could be up to five $6,000 Because of fuel.

Brian Nichols  12:55  
Wow. Wow. So what I wanted to ask next is we're going to dig into, so you can't get the fancy doodads on your fridge and stuff right now. Right? That might be the one for 14 months. But do we see this impacting more of the more basic stuff before we get there, we want to give a shout out. And by shadow. I mean, it's a special plug, because it's my plug, head over to Brian Nichols show.com. You can sign up for our morning sales huddle, when you do, I will go ahead and send over a copy of my new ebook, four easy steps you can implement now to sell liberty to friends and family. Go get your free copy today. And by the way, you'll go ahead and get yours truly in your inbox once per week with a real sales tips that I taught my sales teams that helped lead to their success. I can do the same for you. Brian Nichols, show.com, you can sign up today. So David, let's kind of dig into that again. Where do you where do you see this heading? Do you see this heading and impacting? You know, other areas? Like just regular fridges? Do we actually see the supply chain issue hit down the road? And I asked that because I had a gentleman on the show. He's the CEO of a large tungsten company, he's talking about the issue they're seeing with semiconductors in the car world. And that that's just the tip of the iceberg with what we're gonna see there. So I'm asking that because do you see this being an issue with what you've seen being you know, for the long term, even in the not so fancy shmancy? You know, bells and whistles, types of features that we're looking for in the new homes, but even more of the basic stuff. We've

David Belman  14:22  
seen it already on basic products. I mean, there was a while where we couldn't get paint, like regular latex paint, you think there'd be a million gallons of that laying around everywhere, right? I mean, you could paint for decades you could never an issue, right? And no, you couldn't get paint and we you'd have to either buy this one specialty upgraded paint just to get paint to finish a house or you just had to wait and then they're restricting sales. So well. We'll only give you for the job you need tomorrow and you have to come back again and we'll see if we can get you something for the next day. Let's not help people do business. It's not efficient. So you know those kinds of things. I had my Heating contractor. He was like trolling all the sites like the Home Depot's in the world and they don't normally buy stuff from there. They were looking for the specialty parts. It's a little like baffle that goes in, when you connect a furnace to a ductwork. And they were buying these like crazy and sweeping websites, because they couldn't get them from their suppliers. We actually had to order faucets from amazon for one house, because we couldn't get faucets. If you want certain things like matte black, which is really popular right now as a finish. I mean, you're waiting, you know, six months to get these type of faucets, I've actually had to as I built homes, I actually had to buy some cheaper faucets, put them into the home so we can move the people in. And then like two months later, when the new stuff comes in, we pull these faucets out, go throw them in another house. So we can get an occupancy permit, move someone else in until the regular stuff comes in. So we've had to really adapt. But I see this thing continuing. Because until our leadership actually wakes up and tries to actually do something and solve the problem. It's going to continue and it's top down. It's all these regulations in the ports. And like in California, they you know, they make all the truckers be vaccinated, a lot of them don't want to be vaccinated, you have all these things were laid in California, you have to have a truck that's at least it can be no older than three years old. It's a truck in and out of California. Well, if you're a trucker, and you're in demand, and you can truck all around the country. Why would you go to California when you have to deal with all these regulations? Forget it. I'll try to, you know, Nebraska or whatever, where they'll let me do whatever I want to do.

Brian Nichols  16:36  
While it? Yeah, it's something I don't think we're gonna see. Not only do I don't not think we're gonna see an end anytime soon. I think it's just getting started, I don't think we really realized what happens. And I did an episode on this back in April of 2020. I don't think we realize what happens when you just hit pause on everything.

David Belman  17:00  
Yeah, the article is from pausing, right, and then you know, disrupting the workforce. And like a production line. It's only as efficient as it's moving constantly, right? Well, you know, when we'd still are not really, we have people that don't want to go back to work and all that kind of stuff. So that's a whole nother part of it. But part of it is just bad policy. And then, you know, I was in Savannah, Georgia, it's the, I think the third largest port in the United States. And it was an amazing this was last fall. And a big ship came in a container ship came in, and people were standing on the sidewalks by the road cheering because a ship came in the port. And we're like, This is madness, right. And the interesting thing about that is the only direct shipped to rail yard in the entire country. And I have somebody else that was on the trip with me had said they saw 70 Plus ships, they were counting them, they lost count in the ocean, just docked around waiting to try and get in. They couldn't offload them fast enough and get them out. This is a huge problem. And you have to wonder, is this manufactured? Are they trying to create this issue? And that's what I'm not sure about. And it's boy, if that's the case, we really got some serious things to be concerned about.

Brian Nichols  18:16  
Wake up folks trying to get active. And I was just talking about this again today in the show there with with my friend Trisha, like if you have been on the sidelines, and you've been like, Hey, listen, I don't want to get involved with politics. Well, if the two past two years have not shown you that politics doesn't care, if you do not get involved with it will absolutely 100% Get involved with you, whether you like it or not. So it's time to get on.

David Belman  18:43  
Like, I'm not like conspiracy theory guy, but I will tell you after some of the stuff I've seen, it's just like, I'm getting to the point where, you know, I can't not say anything anymore. And like even just people in my office and I'm talking to you, I'm like, I'm gonna tell people what I feel and, you know, some of the stuff that I'm seeing, it just doesn't make sense. And it's not right. And, you know, this whole baby formula thing, you know, if you've been following that, that's just ridiculous as well. And, you know, what kind of advanced country that we have that we can't even get baby formula on the shelves. And then they've got millions of pallets of it down by the border, right. And so they have it there. And then all of a sudden, Mr. Bill Gates comes out woods, you know, a week ago with this new synthetic formula, and it's like, okay, this is a manufactured crisis, in my opinion, if I've ever seen one. And again, I could be wrong in that. But that's what that's sure what it looks like. You know, if it looks like a duck and talks like a duck, quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck.

Brian Nichols  19:39  
Oh, stop it. David. You're not a biologist. You don't know. Well, let's not go to biology. David Bellman. It's been a pleasure. Do me a favor. Obviously. We want folks to go ahead and continue the conversation. So we know the podcast, it's home building hero where you can go ahead and you have things like what 380 some odd episodes out there. It's Insane you've been so productive and then giving people actionable advice, but where can folks go ahead and find you on social media if they want to go ahead and continue the conversation as well? Sure. Absolutely.

David Belman  20:09  
LinkedIn is my preferred platform I'm on there quite often so if you just look me up it's David Bellman just one Alan Dolman and you can find me on LinkedIn. I do post a lot of stuff about homebuilding and the industry and things like that. I do dabble on Twitter, but pretty toxic here. So I'm debating about my Twitter experience, but it's David Dolman to the number two for my Twitter handle if you want to check me out there. Otherwise, definitely check out the homebuilding hero podcast if you want any information about the housing market and housing industry.

Brian Nichols  20:39  
Perfect. Well, folks, if you enjoy the episode, please do me a favor. Go ahead and give today's episode a share. And when you do, please go ahead and give Mr. Belman a shout and tell him that yours truly sent him there and yes, you can see it scrolling at the bottom of your screen. Please go ahead. And if you're interested in learning how you can reclaim your freedom from chaos and uncertainty, please had the Brian Nichols show.com forward slash expat to learn more about the expat money forum summit 2022 But with that being said, it's Brian Nichols signing off. You're on The Brian Nichols Show for the one and only David Bellman from Bellman homes. We'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for listening to The Brian Nichols Show. Find more episodes at the Brian Nichols show.com Enjoying the audio version of the show, then you'll love our YouTube channel. Be sure to head over there and subscribe. If you're new to The Brian Nichols Show, be sure to head to your favorite podcast catcher and click download all unplayed episodes so you don't miss one of our nearly 500 episodes that will be sure to leave you educated, enlightened and informed. If you got value from today's episode. Can you do me a favor and Edie the Brian Nichols show.com forward slash support and leave us a $5 donation and by the way, have you given the show a five star review yet? If not, head to Apple podcasts and tell folks why you listen to the program and don't forget to tell your friends to subscribe to follow me on social media at be Nichols liberty and again, if you'd be so kind please consider making a donation to The Brian Nichols Show at Brian show.com forward slash support. The Brian Nichols Show is supported by viewers like you. Thank you to our patrons Darryl Schmitz, Michael Lima, Michel Mankiewicz, Cody John's Trent Acosta and the we're libertarians network. Faced with an uncertain future many business owners and technology professionals don't have time needed to invest in their business technology strategies and as a result are afraid of their technology getting outdated and putting their company and customers information at risk. The digital future is already here. But with all different choices in the marketplace, it's difficult to know which one will be the best fit for you in your strategic vision. Imagine having the peace of mind that your business is backed by the right technology investments that are tailored for your specific needs. Hi, I'm Brian Nichols and I've helped countless business owners and technology professionals just like you helping you make informed decisions about what technologies are best to invest in for your business voice bandwidth, cybersecurity, business continuity juggling all the aspects of business technology is messy. Let me help at the Brian Nichols show.com forward slash out and sign up for a free one on one consultation with yours truly to dig deep into where you see your company headed and how we can align your business technology towards those goals. Again, that's Brian Nichols show.com forward slash ELP to get your simplified business technology started today

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