Student of the Game: Mikey Taylor

In the third episode of the Student of the Game podcast, Nolan invites on his friend and mentor Mikey Taylor of Commune Capital to touch on team building, his thoughts On investments, real estate, and the importance of having a financial advisor

Mikey Taylor Bio:

Mikey Taylor is the current President and Managing principal of Commune Capital, a private equity real estate investment firm. A serial entrepreneur at heart, he first found success with nearly two decades of professional skateboarding. Throughout his career, Mr. Taylor held lucrative sponsorship contracts with DC Shoe Co., GoPro Cameras, and Alien Workshop. Over his tenure, he had over 100 signature skateboard decks, 7 pro model shoes, and was one of the most recognizable pro skateboarders on the planet. Mikey Taylor also co-founded Saint Archer Brewing Company. A San Diego based craft beer company and its first of its kind business model, led to quick success and multi-million dollar purchase by MillerCoors Company in 2015.

Mikey Taylor Socials:

https://communecapital.com/

https://www.instagram.com/mikeytaylor/

https://www.youtube.com/user/mikeytaylorvideos

https://twitter.com/Mikey_Tay1or

Nolan Smith Socials:

https://studentofthegame.me

https://www.instagram.com/nolan_smith/

https://twitter.com/Nolan_Smith

https://www.instagram.com/studentofth…

Show Notes:

3:00 - Having the right people around you on your team

• Able to manage more when you have a team that allows you to do so
• Everybody has the same amount of time in a day
• Whoever can put the best team around them has the potential to do the most 
• Being able to rely on others and delegating 

• If someone can do a job 80% as well as you then you should delegate the work
• Delegating in the client service business

12:50 - Mikey’s story

• Started off as a professional skater
• Founded a beer company
• Founder of an investment group in Commune

14:45 - Not viewing a single-family home or home that you live in as an investment 

• A common misconception people have is that when buying a home you’ll be able to sell it for more than you paid, without a thesis or plan this is not always the case
• Mikey had an experience buying a home at 23 years old and selling it 15 years later but didn’t make any money on that investment.
• Buying a home is more of a speculation and less of an investment 

17:45 - Mikey’s opinion on real estate investments

• People commonly say “the real estate market always goes up” which is a fair point but if you don’t have a timeline on when you’re holding an asset then you’re just guessing that you’ll be able to sell as the price went up
• Ex: Buying a home in 2003 but selling it in 2012 due to the recession… you lost money on the house
• Everybody has been told that buying a home is a great investment but not why it’s a great investment
• The return you get by buying and owning a home is much more achievable through other assets which is why owning a home isn’t that great from an investment perspective 

23:00 - Thoughts on going to college

• The idea of school makes sense, of getting an education to obtain the tools to help their careers. However, that’s not always the case as most students enter college without knowing what they want to do and instead use that time figuring that out and taking courses that may not help get them where they now want to be
• Thinks that after graduating high school everyone should take a year or two off to experience life and figure out what you want to do (travel or internships)
• In this era with the internet, so much knowledge is out there that school may not always be necessary
• School doesn’t teach you how to make more money, it teaches you to be good in a system

37:30 - Thinking that where we’re at is as far as we’re supposed to go, rather than seeing it as a step towards the next level and journey of who you’re supposed to become

38:50 - Finding a financial advisor early on as a young pro skater

• Teaming up with his parent’s financial advisor to help plan out how he could make this work
• Financial freedom was the goal set in place
• Mikey’s financial advisor taught him early on how to plan out his spending and discipline his spending so that when he was making money a lot more money he was used to being smart with it

45:00 - Advice to young people who don’t have direct access to a “financial advisor”

• There are enough people out there who can help, that aren’t necessarily financial advisors 
• In this age of information, you have access to so much information which can help your spending behavior
• The challenge is making sure the person you’re getting information from is actually giving valuable information
• To do so, start by making sure that person is someone you want to emulate
• Dave Ramsey does a great job when it comes to behavioral financing when it comes to getting out of debt
• Mikey’s company Commune is a place where people can turn to the social media pages and gain knowledge of behavioral finance and where to invest
• The more you know about yourself 

54:00 - What did your financial advisor advise you in as you started to make more money

• Rather than using the money to invest in stocks or companies, invest in yourself first
• Mikey began investing in his own private skatepark and videographer to continue to make him a better skater as well as making more content which would lead to a higher demand for him as a professional skater
• The greatest investment is in yourself
• Investing in himself led to obtaining the max amount of sponsorship money that he could obtain and put him in a situation where he could now start doing active and passive investments

1:01:00 - What he learned when starting up St. Archer

• It was a high risk/high reward investment
• Mikey only invested a small percentage of his overall finances, so if it were to fail he would still be okay financially

• There’s beauty in being able to go for things

1:07:15 - Creating Commune

• Mikey was impacted heavily by his financial advisor and wanted to find a way to do the same
• Commune is a community of people dedicated to bettering themselves financially, seeing that investing is a group sport and you’re better working together