81. John Houston – JH Family of Companies - Building a Business on the Foundation of Faith

Aaron Ackerman:

My podcast partner and I have this saying that virtually all businesses have at least one near-death experience. And it doesn't seem like quitting is in your nature, or getting discouraged to the point that you want to give up. From Hogan Taylor, I'm Aaron Ackerman, and this is How That Happened, a business and innovation success podcast. On each episode of the show, we sit down with business and community leaders behind thriving organizations, to learn how business and innovation success actually happens.

Joining me on the show today is John Houston. John founded Houston Custom Homes in 2005. And if I've got my facts right, built and sold six houses, the first year of the company. Last year, Houston Homes built oh 650 homes. So that is almost two houses for every single day of the year. We're going to come back and talk about that in just a minute. John has also founded several other successful companies related to the home building real, estate industry, including Trinity Oak's Mortgage and several others. In addition to leading the JH family of companies, John has a beautiful family. He's very active in philanthropy and ministry. And somehow with all of that, John found the time to recently write a book, the recently released Finding My Way Home, which has a forward by John Maxwell. He writes a blog. He's a keynote speaker and the occasional podcast guest. John, thank you so much for joining me today.

John Houston:

Hey, Aaron, I'm excited to be here.

Aaron Ackerman:

Well, one thing I want to find out, is how you get so much done. So hopefully we'll unpack that a little bit as we talk, but I want to go back to the beginning, John. I know you've talked openly about your childhood, which was unique, probably different from a lot of people's childhood, but if you don't mind, talk just a little bit about what it was like growing up, and how that experience has shaped you as a grown man, as a leader, and everything in your life?

John Houston:

Yeah. I appreciate you having me. And when I was 11, and my brother was 15, our parents sat us down and said, "Hey, we're going to get a divorce." And when they got a divorce, man, we lived in Waco, Texas, my mom ended up moving to Nashville, and my dad ended up moving to Houston. So that's how we got into business actually, because my brother had to start a landscaping company for us really to survive. So through that, that's really how we learned how to be in entrepreneurship. So those years were really hard. They were tough, but God was really blessing what we were doing. So in just a few years, we had over 220 yards that we were doing about every 10 days. By the time we graduated high school, or by the time I graduated high school in 1990, we had really grown that business.

And actually, it'd become very successful. As well as we had added, or I'd added a janitorial cleaning company at night. And so that's really how we began to actually make it. Well for me, although that was a blessing, and I realized that I was entrepreneurial, what ended up happening, was that actually went to my head. And I became, honestly, very cocky and arrogant. So really I thought I was way smarter than my friend's parents and almost any other adult in the reality, was because I was making so much more money than they were. And so God has a funny way of, at least in my life, He has a funny way of holiness. And so having no idea that I wasn't actually as smart as I thought, I ended up meeting my wife, praise God, who at the time was 15, and I was 20.

We ended up getting married Christmas break of her senior year in high school. And thank God that God brought her into my life, because she brought a lot more stability. Her family was really grounded, and that was really the first time, being around her and her family was really the first time I ever really started seeing what it actually looked like to be a family, what it looked like to actually be a husband, to be a man. And what should that actually look like? And so that rolled into us going to college.

I'd love to say the story got beautiful from there, but that's when really all the crap hit the fan. And all those years of being in business, and I thought I was really smart, is me, and we ended up losing everything we had had, had to file bankruptcy. And for me, I'm not trying to preach to anybody, this is just our story.

Aaron Ackerman:

Sure.

John Houston:

For me, that's when I actually fully dedicated my life to the Lord, and said, "Me and God." Man, this has just been a crazy life. It has not looked like I thought it was going to look like, from my parents getting divorced, from us being on our own. By then, my mom had overdosed, and took her own life. My wife's brother had ended up taking his own life. And so we had just seen a lot of trauma. At that point, losing our financial security as well, was about the only thing left that I thought brought some security. And then when we lost that, I was like, "Man, there's got to be a better way." And so that's when I dedicated my life to the Lord, and said, "Me and God, I'm going to be all in, whatever you tell me to do, that's what I'm going to do."

So I say that's really where our life began to change, but it's not when our financial situation began to change. I had a lot to learn, and be humbled through the process of realizing, "Man, I'm not the sharpest dude in the room." I still tell people that now, "Man, I'm just the guy that gets up every day and says, 'Man, I'm going to do my best to follow Jesus and love people today.'" I'm very much a visionary. And so really if God wouldn't have brought and surrounded me with great people, for example, at Lee at Hogan Taylor to help us get better, we wouldn't be where we are today. So in other words, in my life, man, it's really just, it takes the Lord, and it takes a lot of other people that are a lot smarter than I am. And that's how we got here. So it makes it fun though, because I don't have to do this on my own, and I don't have to do it by myself. And so that's what motivates me and gets me out of bed every day.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, well just a lot of amazing stuff in there. That's an awesome testimony, and I'm sure people who know you, would say you're being a little humble. I think you probably are one of the smartest guys in the room, most of the time. So just going back, I mean, it's amazing to me, you and your brother at, what'd you say 11 and 15, basically on your own, living by yourself, you're primarily financially responsible for yourselves, right?

John Houston:

Correct.

Aaron Ackerman:

And yeah, I mean, you keep going to school. I'm thinking about my 15 year-old. I don't think I could leave him alone for a few days. It's amazing to me that if there was a 100 stories like yours and your brothers, some huge percentage of them would have a bad ending. What was it about you guys? You had something maybe just in your DNA, where you just said like, "Okay, we got a problem. We're going to figure out how to work our way through it," even at such a young age?

John Houston:

So my dad was an entrepreneur, and so we had grown up, I was 11 at the time. And so I'd been with my dad for 11 years, watching him do entrepreneurship. And so even at 11, I had no idea what we'd already learned. One of the great things that our parents, there's a lot of great things our parents still taught us, but one of the things that they taught us was great work ethic. So we knew we can put a plan together, we still have to work hard. And so our days basically consisted of, we got up 30, 45 minutes before daylight, loaded the truck and the trailer with all the mowing equipment. And we mowed yards until it was time for school, and he would drop me off at school. He would take all that and go to school. And then as soon as school got out, he'd come pick me up, and we'd mow until dark, and then most weekends we mowed as well.

So it was really, what's interesting to me about that, Aaron, is that what happens, is a lot of times when we grow up in chaos, we don't even know we're growing up in chaos. I honestly didn't, I never even really thought about it at 11 or 12, or 13 years-old, "What should this life look like?" I just knew this was the life I had, and I'd gotten used to growing up in this chaos, and it became my norm. And so it wasn't until I was actually dating, my wife now, Tracy of almost 30 years, praise God, I didn't realize until then that, "Wait, maybe things are supposed to look a little bit different? Maybe this wasn't the way I was supposed to grow up." And so your perspective, so many times affects how we live our life.

And, so praise God, I just had people around me that could actually teach me and show me there is a different way. And so I think that's the big takeaway for me, and that's why today, even at 51 years-old, man, I want to continue to learn. I want to continue to grow as a leader, and as an individual, as a man of God. So I want to continually ask questions both of the young and the old, because I believe I can learn from everybody. So I want to have this constant mindset of learning. I think our parents actually gave us that when we were little.

Aaron Ackerman:

So yeah, that's great. So Houston Homes. So when you started that at in '05, how did that come about? How were you ushered into the decision for you guys to start a company on your own at that point?

John Houston:

Yeah, so again, man, I want to make sure your listeners know, I'm never trying to preach to people. I'm just sharing my story. So for me, when I fully dedicated my life to the Lord, it was just a few months later, is when I felt like that the Lord just laid on my heart, that I needed to plan on starting a home-building company. So for two purposes, reach people of Christ, and give to the Kingdom. That's why we have every business we have. And so for me, what that meant, was, "Okay, if that's what the Lord wants me to do, then I need to put a plan together." So I started meeting with two or three different business people, some that had been very successful, and some that had lost everything they had specifically in home building. And I began to pick their brain on, what should this look like?

So I built a business plan, and built a budget of what is it that we need to, how much do we need to make in order to just make a living and get by? Because one of our plans, was to not actually get a paycheck for at least five years, and just to live off my wife's income. So that's really how we got started, put that business plan together, and then waited. We just continued to pray and wait until we felt like the Lord was telling us to go. And that was about just over five years that we waited.

The timing couldn't have been better, because we started, we had been in business about a year, when the housing market crashed. And basically, it was a couple years actually. We entered into the worst housing market in the history of the US. So as hard as I was trying to follow the Lord, and as smart as I thought I was, I was like, "How did I pick this time, one of the worst times to be in the home building business?" But for us, it ended up being probably one of the greatest blessings, because we didn't have any debt. We didn't have a bunch of overhead, because we were still too young of a company to have created that. And so that's how we got to where we kicked off the business.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's cool. You said something really interesting there about the purpose for you, was to impact people with your faith, to be able to generate money that you could deploy into other things that you're passionate about. I think that's such a great point to bring out. A lot of times, when I'm working with somebody that's selling their company, it's easy to start with the assumption that, "Well, the seller's purpose and the business owner's purpose is to make as much money as possible." Because a lot of times that's what businesses do, is they are generating money for shareholders, et cetera.

But we've learned you really need to ask what is the purpose of your business? It might be somebody that has a real affinity for where they grew up in their hometown, and they want to never employ fewer than 200 people. They don't care as much about the bottom line. That's their goal. You had certainly some other goals. So I think that's a really important point. Even reflectively, sometimes we need to stop and remind ourselves, what is our why. Why are we doing this? Because it is easy to get pulled and lured in this direction or that, but to take a beat and remember this, "Why did we set out to do this in the first place?"

John Houston:

And I think that was one of the things that has helped us get to where we are, was knowing what our purpose was. Because I think purpose, every business decision we make has to go back to our purpose, of why do we [inaudible 00:14:04]? So even through the housing downturn of '08, one of the things that we constantly had to go back to, was what is our purpose? The plans, the strategies, the systems, all those things that we're putting in place, are they helping us accomplish that purpose? And if they're not accomplishing that purpose, or helping us accomplish those purposes, why are we doing it?

And it really helped us make different decisions than we would've made if we were just making decisions based on the market. So, yeah, it's huge. And you know what's interesting too, Aaron, is that a lot of the data that I read, and have been reading over the last year and a half, actually says the number one thing that prospective employees want, and employees you currently have, is they want to feel like they have a purpose, a greater purpose than just growing the business and just hitting the bottom line. Although I want to make sure I'm not sending the message that you don't have to, you have to create wealth.

Aaron Ackerman:

Absolutely.

John Houston:

You've got to build a business that is profitable and successful, or my opinion is, you don't have much of a testimony because what good is that? So I think they go hand in hand, that purpose for us, of reaching people of Christ and giving to the Kingdom. You can't do one without the other. So if I'm not profitable, I can't give.

Aaron Ackerman:

Right

John Houston:

If I'm not purposeful, and if I'm studying to show myself improved to become one of the best in the business, then I'm not fulfilling the purpose either. So it just keeps that balance for us.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's well said. So is that really a John and Tracy culture, or does everybody that works for a [inaudible 00:15:53] Homes company, one of the family companies, they know the culture, everybody has that as part of their why and part of their mission when they work there?

John Houston:

Yeah. Well, the approach that we take is we're never going to push our faith on people, but I still have to be who I am. So my DNA is still my DNA, and my faith is still my faith. So we believe that we actually have to earn the right to share the gospel. We don't just get to share the gospel. So part of our goal and objective is, and to answer your question, no, everybody that works for our organization, they don't have to be Christ-followers. They do have to be willing to, our motto is helping people find their way home, by being a joyful hope-filled loving guide. They have to want to help people.

They have to be able to want to love people, and serve people, and come to work and choose to be joyful, so that our customers experience that joy. And I'm not saying we're all perfect at that every day, but that is our goal. I believe every person, regardless of their faith, can actually engage in that and walk it out. So that's just the approach we take, because I mean, we're here to live life with everybody, and love and serve everybody. My number one goal, as a CEO of all these organizations, is how do I love and serve my employees, and how do I love and serve our customers better?

Aaron Ackerman:

So that's awesome. And that's a great business plan, whether it's John Houston, or Google, or Walmart, or whatever, I mean that, serving people, putting them first, that just creates a customer experience that people want to come back to over and over again. Okay, let me go over a few numbers. And I don't know if my math is right, but just based on output, over 17 years or whatever, Houston Homes has grown 10,700%. If you go from six to 650, and that is seven doubles. So that would be, on average, doubling the company every two and a half years.

Anybody who's been in business knows that that kind of growth is not easy. It's hard. I want to ask you about the growth that you guys have experienced. How did you manage such rapid growth without the train getting off the rails? Because a lot of people will talk about going through steep growth periods, and how it's just going so fast, and it's hard to manage, and you feel like you're changing the oil on the car while you're driving 80 down the highway. And how did you manage, that is amazing growth, and congratulations on that, but give us a little insight on how you guys did that?

John Houston:

Yeah. I mean, man, here's what I can tell you is that, one, it was by the Grace of God. But two, also, one of the things that of my mentors taught me early on, was that I needed to surround myself with people, not that thought just like I did, and not that had the same gifts that I had, but people that actually had different giftings than I have. So you look at our executive team, I'm the visionary, so I'm the guy with the idea. And we have my wife, who's very systems and process-oriented, who's our CIO. We have Chad Miles, who is our chief financial officer. And we have a guy named Terry Trayvick, who is our chief strategy officer. And then we have a guy named Bobby Parks that is our chief ministry officer. So each one of those people have very different personalities, and each one of those people have very different skill sets. So none of us do the same thing.

And so I say all that to say that was an investment that I felt like we had to make pretty early on. So even when I was talking about the first five years, I didn't get paid. I mean, literally didn't get paid, and we chose to use those funds to invest in our future. So that meant Terry Trayvick, our chief strategy officer was one of the first people that came on with us. So his gift is actually setting up a strategy and a plan of how do we get there. That helped us so much. So we always keep a three year plan out in front of us, even to this day, that's very detailed, that actually gives us a roadmap of where we're headed. What goals do we have to accomplish? And what are those key components each year that we have to achieve?

We also needed a financial, a CFO to help us manage that. Well, Terry Trayvick actually had to play both of those roles in the beginning, because we couldn't afford to hire a CFO. So he was gifted in both of those areas, but his biggest strength was in strategy. So in other words, Aaron, what I'm saying is, I've got to know people that know things I don't. And so there were times where, for example, HoganTaylor, Lee is, you guys are so good at what you do, well, I don't have to be the expert in that. I need to know who the expert is, right? So I need you at the table with me. I need you in the room with me, when I'm having some of those conversations. So I don't have to have a full-time person that just works on that, but I have to know who I can call on when I need that.

And so that was actually how we really grew the business so fast, is really trying to identify what are those key positions that we need, which ones can we actually afford, and which ones can't we afford full-time, and how do we bridge that gap, and work with other people that have those gifts that I don't have. So in order to do that though, I had to really be able to work with my mentor and go, "Let's really figure out what are my gifts, what are my primary skills that I have. And let's identify the ones I don't have, and that I'm not good at, so that I can go find the people that are. So I can just tell you, without the Lord and without those people, we wouldn't be where we are today. That actually rolls all the way down through our organization today, because that's how we established it.

We just believe, we've got to know who the right people are. We who are the right people to have on the bus, and make sure they're in the right seats to the best of our ability, based on their passions and their skill sets. So a lot of planning, a lot of hard work, a lot of ... By having that strategy and that plan as the market continued to shift every quarter, all these years, you've got to be able to make the adjustments you need quickly, but if you don't have a plan and a strategy, then it's very easy to get off track. So I use the example, a lot of Google Maps or Waze, I personally use Waze Maps. And so even today, we live in the Southern part of Dallas. We live about 30 miles outside of Dallas. So I'm driving in Dallas-Fort Worth in downtown, I always turn on Waze.

The reason why is because I don't know what roadblocks I'm going to hit along the way. But Waze, one of the things I love about it, is it actually will tell me when there's an obstacle coming up, and it'll give me an alternative route. My destination doesn't change. And I think that's key when you think about strategy, and you think about where you're headed, what vision do you have? What vision for me has God given me? And I can't take my eye off that ball, but I also have to know, I'm going to hit hurdles, I'm going to hit roadblocks, I'm going to hit potholes. But the earlier that I know about those, or the earlier I can begin to perceive those or discern those, the faster I can make the adjustments and hopefully them be the least impactful as possible.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's a great analogy.

John Houston:

I will tell you-

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah?

John Houston:

I will tell you this. I didn't always get it right. I'm confident I won't always get it right. But the goal is if I just have a blowout, that's better than all four wheels coming off the bus. So if we can eliminate those, and lessen the blow just by really staying focused on the plan, and where we're going, it really gives us more clarity, and I think it helps us get there quicker, and faster, and more effectively

Aaron Ackerman:

My podcast partner and I have this saying that virtually all businesses have at least one near-death experience. And it doesn't seem like quitting is in your nature, or getting discouraged to the point that you want to give up. But did you have times, maybe even after the first couple years, once you got it started, after the housing bubble burst, were there any times where maybe you and a leader looked at each other, or you and Tracy, and you just think, "Oh my goodness, this might not work. And we might have to do something else?" Any times where you just had those moments, where you thought, "I don't know if this is going to happen or not."

John Houston:

Yeah. Well, I don't know if I've ever actually had the thought where, "We might have to do something else," because I try not to ever take an alternative route unless I have to. I mean, if that day came, then I would've figured it out when that day came. But what I can tell you, is I can think of at least three times where we had major, I mean there were major challenges in front of us, and if God didn't show up, honestly, we weren't going to make it. I'll share a real quick one. Early on, one of the very first ones that we went through, sometimes in business, you have these gut feelings that just say, "Man, I shouldn't do this." Well, I came up with this, there was another home building business that I came up with, that we could start, that would just be almost like an apartment on a slab, really streamlined, way more cost-effective.

Our business, we were already doing 300 houses a year with John Houston Homes. And so I was like, I mean, "We can make this work, we're doing it and we're doing it well already. We just need a more affordable product." Started that company, and invested a bunch of money in it. And we got it going, got the house plans done, started building them. Then I would go walk these houses, and I'd be like, "Hey guys, you need to add some of this, and you need to add some of that." And then all of a sudden, about a year and a half into it, it really hit me that one, we're losing hundreds of thousands of dollars, and it's my fault. The reason why it was my fault, was because I started a company to try to build more affordable houses, but my DNA was walking those houses, and then adding a bunch of stuff to it, that actually made us almost the same home builder we were, but selling the houses way cheaper.

I learned, I mean, it really cost us, and it took us a long time to get out of it. And it cost us well over half a million dollars in a time we didn't really have a half a million dollars. So there were times like that, where we just had to shut that business down, and it didn't work. I think that's how we learned though. Also I also learned from it, and I said, "Man, I got to stay in my lane. I got to know who I am. We have to know who we are as a company. And just because it's working for somebody else doesn't mean it's going to work for me."

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, no that's a great example. Want to ask about Trinity Oaks Mortgage. So that's one of your other companies, very successful. I read that it was named the number one mortgage company in the nation to work at. So when did you start Trinity and why? What about it makes it a place that people love to work so much that it finds its way on at the top of those lists?

John Houston:

Yeah. I'll just be honest with you. I can't remember when we started it exactly, because we've started quite a few businesses. It's been quite a few years back, but our ... Aaron, I think one of the things we did probably better with that company than John Houston Homes, is we started out the gate with a little bit more knowledge and experience and wisdom than we had originally had. And it really was our goal to be more flexible with our employees, listen more, and really remember we're here as leaders to serve, not be served. So we really do try. We're not perfect at it, but we really do try to take an approach that says, "Hey, how can we help you in life?" So Aaron, let's say you worked for Trinity Oaks, my goal for you, Aaron is, how do I help you succeed?

And so we really went into Trinity Oak's Mortgage with a mindset of how do we help our employees succeed? How do we help them reach and achieve the visions and the goals they have as individuals and as a family? And if we can do that, we think it brings a healthier balance to their life. Then they know that we actually care about them, and that they're seeing their net worth increase, they're seeing their family become healthier. So some of the things that we do as an organization, we offer, we do three marriage retreats a year. We let our staff take off to do mission trips. We do every other Friday off in the summer, so that our employees can have time with their families in the summer while their kids are off. There's just ... We have counseling, we'll pay for counseling if an employee or their family is going through something, we want to be there to support.

So those are some of the ways that we actually do that. As well as we started out to be best in class in our systems and our processes, and the way we do business, or we don't even have the opportunity. They don't care what we have to say, if that makes sense. But we also really want to listen. We want to listen to what are they saying? How do they say we're doing, and what adjustments do they want us to make?

And I'm not saying we always do what they tell us to do, or that we do everything they say, but we at least address the issues that they see, and that they have. So we actually have a company that every year with all of our companies, that we actually have come in and survey our employees, to find out from a third-third party perspective, how do they actually say we're doing on these certain core things, that we're measuring? And if there's areas we're not doing good, that's what we do as an executive team and as a leadership team, we say, how do we address that? And that becomes one of our big goals for the next year.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's awesome. So I want to ask you a little bit about transitions. A minute ago, you mentioned several names of people that you've brought in, leaders at your company that are leaning into their strengths, and allowing you to really lean into your strengths. I know you're a young guy, you're still busy working in the business. You've written the book, you're doing some writing and speaking and some other things. I think I heard you on an interview recently talk about the ability to be away for two or three weeks, and everything's going great, because you've developed leaders. You don't have to be there every hour of every day for things to run smooth.

So this is something I've been really aware of, and thinking about lately, as I see people transition in their careers, thinking about retirement, but it could be different transitions. But handing over something that you've built to other people, not everyone does it gracefully. It's hard to do, even when it is done well. But how do you think about that? You mentioned a lot of people that have joined the company, and I'm sure you've developed people in the company to continue to take on more responsibility. But what kind of intention have you put into really being able to let other people run this thing that you and your family built?

John Houston:

Yeah. So for me, my wife and I, we follow a little bit different process, in that when we lost everything, I realized I can't control everything anyway. And so I started following a passage in the Bible, which you Psalm 24:1 that says, "The earth and everything in it, including its people, are God's." So when I dedicated my life to the Lord, I had to realize that I'm not even my own. These businesses aren't ours. And we're, really simply, just stewards of what is God's. So what that did, was it took a lot of pressure off of me to not feel like I had to make anything happen.

That literally, if I'm just stewarding, if I'm a steward, then really what that means, the definition of stewardship is managing somebody else's estate. So if we look at each business and each of these people as we're stewarding them, and for us, that's for the Lord, how do I do that? So part of stewardship is with these businesses, if I realize they're not mine, then the way that I use them, so for example, with John Houston Homes, we had multiple offers to sell a few years ago. Man, honestly, Aaron, I 100% wanted to. I mean, if I could walk away with a couple hundred million dollars, why not?

But my wife and I just didn't have peace about that, because we really felt like these employees were the ones that helped us get here. So if we're partially responsible for stewarding them, then don't we need to do a better job of teaching them what stewardship is? So part of stewardship is, if I give you a little bit and you steward it well, then I'm going to give you a little bit more. You steward it well, I'm going to give you a little bit more. So we believe our employees have an opportunity to be 10 talent-people, in other words, they can steward a lot. And sometimes I think as leaders, we don't actually believe our people can actually do more than they can. So I'm just a fan of, if you're willing and your heart is in it, and you've already proven to me that you will work hard, and you will steward what I'm giving you well, I'm going to give you more.

And so with that, I also understand there's a cost associated with that. So for us, I look at, for example, this guy named Jason Dodson that runs our multifamily company. Jason started with us about a year after we started the very first business, which was the home building business. Jason had been working for me for a couple years, but I knew the only way I can advance in what I'm doing, the only way my lid can be raised, is if I continue to take the lid off. And I allow Jason or whoever else it is, for them to take their lid off and continue to rise up.

So with that, what I did was, I sat Jason down and I said, "Hey, man, I want to move you into this position, but I don't want you to call me every time you have a problem. You're smarter than you think you are. And I want you to make the decision that you need to make. Now, what we're going to do though, is I'm going to put a parameter in place, that says, 'At that time, if it's going to cost me more than five grand, don't make the decision without asking me.'"

So we started Jason off at 5,000, probably a few months later, I moved him to 10,000, because I saw he was managing that well, he was stewarding it. To where now, I mean, he's running a multimillion dollar company, and honestly I hear from him once a month, which is in our executive update meeting that I'm in every month. Now I'm not saying he hasn't called me and asked me for wisdom here and there. But overall he's making all the decisions, and he's running the company. So for me, it's, you as a leader have to identify what is your comfort level, and what are you willing to give up?

So for me, I'm all about delegating. I'm going to delegate it to people. And as long as they're showing me they can continue to do it, then I want to give them more. So even you even alluded to me being in the business day to day. To be honest with you, I'm not. That was one of my wife and I's goals, is that I don't want to be in the day to day. Now it's taken us 16 years to get there, but I still have other dreams and visions that I believe that we need to accomplish for Christ. So I need to take people with me, which means I need leaders that are going to continue to grow and develop, and fulfill the dreams that they have as well. So in other words, we come alongside them, help them, "What are your goals? What are your objectives? How do you want to accomplish them?" And as they're willing and able, then we give them more.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah. That's such an empowering message. I love the story of with Jason, that's just so cool that you say, "You're smarter than you think you are. Here's your, we're going to put a sandbox in, but you just go do it."

John Houston:

That's right.

Aaron Ackerman:

That's awesome. I love the 10 talent-people too. I wrote that down. I'm going to borrow that. I really that's a great parable, but to coin that phrase, "10 talent people," and you do well with the little, then you get more, and you do well with that, you get more. I mean, that is amazing. Well, let me ask you about your book, John, Finding My Way Home. Just maybe, I don't know, whatever you want to say about the book. What prompted you to write it, and share your heart with people and just put it out there in the public?

John Houston:

I think for me, the biggest reason why I wanted to share it was First Peter 3:15 and 16 that says, "Always be prepared to give a word for the hope that is within you, with gentleness and respect." And so if I'm just being real with you, Aaron, I grew up in a really churchy church, and a really churchy world, that people were really quick to tell me what I was doing wrong, and not a whole lot of people were there to just love me where I was. So really the book is really about my story of, I actually had some people come alongside of me. Honestly, even as a crazy kid, man, I just had some people in my life that just loved me where I was. And actually that's all the story is, how my perspective of life changed over time.

And I didn't realize that the chaos that I was living in that I thought was normal, wasn't normal. If it wasn't for those people coming alongside and sharing their story with me, then I think my perspective would still be warped. Really that's really why I wrote it, is just to say, "Hey, this is my story. I hope it encourages you. It's a crazy story, but here's what I can tell you. A lot of people that'll read that book. They probably have a crazier story than I do, but I want to bring hope to them, that even if you're in the midst of chaos or crazy, there is hope.

And on the other side of that, when we learn, how do we process that hope? How do we learn to think different? I think it changes every area of our life, and it changes the way it changes our ourselves as men and women. It changes how we live and operate as husbands and wives, and as individuals and as leaders. So for me, that's the primary goal and objective for the book was to say, "Hey, no matter where you're at, no matter how far you are, no matter how lost you are, there's hope." So I just try to take some of those dumb things I've done over the years, and just the crazy life that I had, and show you that, man, it can be turned into good.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's powerful. So I know meetjohnhouston.com is your website, where I think people can go and learn more about you, read your blog, see what you're up to, schedule you for speaking events. Is there other ways, or is that the best place for people to go find you and learn more about what you're up to?

John Houston:

Yeah, no, that's definitely the best place.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, and I'm assuming the book can be found anywhere people buy books, pretty much? Amazon, all that?

John Houston:

You can get it off of that website. You can get it at Amazon. You can get it at Barnes and Noble. I don't even know where else, but I'm sure you can find it in one of those three places.

Aaron Ackerman:

So before we wrap up, we've got five questions we ask all of our guests. I don't know if you had a heads up for this or not?

John Houston:

I didn't, but let's go for it.

Aaron Ackerman:

All right. You may have already answered this one, but what's the first way that you ever made money?

John Houston:

First way I ever made money? Well, I believe it was, my dad, he had bought a rehab house, that we were going to actually live in. And he actually had me take the brick off of the fireplace that wasn't functional, brick by brick, and chip all the mortar off, because he wanted to keep the brick. And I was probably seven or eight years old, first time I remember doing that.

Aaron Ackerman:

So yeah, you've been involved in the construction business since early on?

John Houston:

Yep.

Aaron Ackerman:

What would you be doing if there was no Houston Homes, you had a completely different career, different path. What job might you be doing?

John Houston:

Man, dude, that's a crazy hard question. Honestly, I don't know that I can answer that question, because I love what I do. I literally don't feel like I get up and go to work. So honestly, I'm sure it would be somewhere around real estate, and some other kind of business. But I mean I got entrepreneurship down into my blood, so I'd have to ... Oh, I know what I'd do. I'd start a business buying fancy cars that are hard to get, because my daughter and I love cars. And so-

Aaron Ackerman:

That's awesome.

John Houston:

... I'd probably have her do that with me. And it would be just very rare cars, that you can only get from us.

Aaron Ackerman:

Very cool. So what's your favorite car?

John Houston:

I'm a speed guy, I love fast. So I love 911 Turbo S Porsche. And then I also love fast trucks, because I'm a country boy from Texas. And so Hennessey, man, has a TRX. For example, they always do these packages for me on my trucks, and make them a little bit faster.

Aaron Ackerman:

Very cool. Yeah. I'll have to make sure my son listens. He's a car guy, and loves, he's always talking to me about Huracans and Bugattis, and all this cool stuff.

John Houston:

Oh yeah.

Aaron Ackerman:

What would you like to go back and tell your 20 year-old self?

John Houston:

What I would like to go back and tell my 20 year-old self, is man, just have peace and be still and enjoy the journey. I think there was a lot of years of my life that I didn't enjoy the journey that I was on enough, because I was so focused and so driven. So I'll just say, learn how to enjoy the journey, and learn how to enjoy where you're at.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's great. I guess we've answered this one. I was going to say, what would you title your autobiography? But I think we have the answer to that.

John Houston:

We do. Finding My Way Home.

Aaron Ackerman:

That's awesome. Everybody needs to go check that out. Last question. What is the best piece of advice that you've ever received?

John Houston:

The best piece of advice for me personally, again, and I'm not trying to preach to people, but is out of Joshua, chapter one and it says, "Study the word of God, meditate on it day and night, do what it says. And then you'll be prosperous and successful in all your ways." So that's really structured how I live my life, and praise God, somebody taught me that early on, and gave me some direction.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah. Excellent. Well, is there anything we didn't talk about, any projects you've got going on, or anything you want to let people know about before we wrap up here?

John Houston:

Well, probably not other than, man, I hope you guys will read the book, and it encourages you. And if it does encourage you, we've got another one coming out in April. That is actually on, from the time we started the businesses until where we are today, and what that journey has looked like for us. So I think that'll be an exciting book for business people.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, that's awesome. Well thank you for your time. I appreciate just what a humble person you are, and genuine, and transparent obviously. Thanks for sharing so openly all of your experiences, and congrats on all the success. And I know that will continue. And just look forward to seeing what you do next, John. Thanks so much for being with us today.

John Houston:

Hey, thanks Aaron, man. I really appreciate you guys letting me be here, but I also want to give a plug out to HoganTaylor, you guys have really helped us, been a huge asset to what God's called us to do, and we truly believe we wouldn't be here without a team like you, and the team you guys have.

Aaron Ackerman:

Good, that's great.

John Houston:

Thank you guys.

Aaron Ackerman:

Yeah, thanks for that. That's awesome. All right, John, have a great one. Thanks so much.

John Houston:

Thanks man. Have a great day.

Aaron Ackerman:

That's all for this episode of How That Happened. Thank you for listening. Be sure to visit howthathappened.com for show notes and additional episodes. You can also subscribe to our show on iTunes, Spotify, Google, Podcast, or Stitcher. Thanks for listening. This content is for information purposes only, and does not constitute professional advice. Copyright 2022 HoganTaylor LLP. All rights reserved. To view the HoganTaylor general terms and conditions visit www.hogantaylor.com.