← The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe
The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe
416: Nathan Walters—So You Want to be a Builder
01:07:07
Oklahoma builder Nathan Walters discusses his unlikely journey to owning his own building business, the virtues and pitfalls of college vs. on-the-job training, and what he’s doing in Oklahoma to encourage high schoolers to consider the trades. Big...
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- [00:04]
Mike Rowe
So you want to be a builder? That's the title of this episode of the Way I heard it. I'm Mike Rowe, joined by the one and only Chuck Klausmeyer. Good day, Chuck.
- [00:12]
Chuck Klausmeyer
Good day to you, sir.
- [00:13]
Mike Rowe
How are you? I'm pretty good. This guy, this Nathan Walters, who I'm about to introduce the world to, he's the reason really that I wanted to do this long form version of the podcast. I'd never heard of him. I met him at this event through actually one of our sponsors, Diggs, invited me to Las Vegas a while ago. Diggs are the guys who use AI to somehow streamline the process between builders and buyers. Anyway, this guy is at the National Home Builders Convention and I got to talking with him. He lives in Oklahoma. He builds luxurious custom homes in Oklahoma. He's got maybe a dozen going on at any given point. And he was so interesting just talking about the stuff I talk about all the time with microworks and the challenges he faces in finding skilled labor. But it's actually more than that. The guy's an entrepreneur who came to the building industry in a pretty unique way. Right. And it's such a problem, friends, what's going on in our country right now, it's just becoming increasingly alarming. The paucity of skilled labor and it's impacting the luxury market, it's impacting the commercial market, it's impacting basic residential homes, it's impacting anything that needs to be built. So I've always looked at these guys as magicians in a way, but it's more than that. And I just thought it might be interesting on the podcast to hear from a guy, he's got a going concern, but he's dealing with a growing problem.
- [01:57]
Chuck Klausmeyer
Yeah, he's doing his part to try and help it out. I mean, he does have something that he does every year with kids to try to introduce them to the trades, which I think is a very good thing.
- [02:07]
Mike Rowe
Yeah, Build your future, it's called. And honestly, that's kind of the other reason I wanted him on, you know, Micro Works. We can do what we can do. I don't run into a lot of people who, who are opposed to what we're trying to do. But more and more I'm looking for people who are trying to do their version of it wherever they happen to be. And this guy happens to be in Oklahoma. Yep, he's doing great work. The name of his company is Masarosa Luxury Homes. Right. We'll learn about what that means as well. It's kind of a fun story, and he's a super smart guy and he's doing really important work, and I thought it might be insightful to crawl inside his brain for a bit. His name is Nathan Walters, and you're going to meet him right after this.
- [02:55]
Sponsor Voice
This episode is sponsored in part by.
- [02:57]
Mike Rowe
Our friends at BetterHelp.
- [02:59]
Sponsor Voice
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- [03:53]
Mike Rowe
Too broad a brush, but if you.
- [03:55]
Sponsor Voice
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- [04:19]
Mike Rowe
It'S the first time I've worn headphones on this podcast ever, so it's a big day for me. It's very exciting.
- [04:24]
Nathan Walters
I heard through the grapevine that that was going to be a conversation that nobody wanted to have.
- [04:27]
Mike Rowe
Nobody wants to have that guy. I tell you what, man. That was not a pleasant conversation. You had Mary deliver the news?
- [04:33]
Chuck Klausmeyer
No, she told me. The last thing she said was, I'm going to let you tell him. Okay.
- [04:36]
Mike Rowe
Yeah. She was actually laughing when she told me. She literally knows how badly that chaps my ass.
- [04:41]
Nathan Walters
He wanted it.
- [04:41]
Mike Rowe
Yeah, she enjoyed it.
- [04:42]
Nathan Walters
Was everybody. That's what made it funny. Everybody was like a game of paper, scissors, rock for. Who had to tell Mike that he had to wear headphones?
- [04:50]
Mike Rowe
You said paper, scissors, rock instead of rock.
- [04:52]
Sponsor Voice
Paper, scissors.
- [04:53]
Mike Rowe
What's that all about?
- [04:54]
Nathan Walters
I don't know. Paper, scissors, rock is. That's. I guess that's how I learned it. It's how I learned it here in Oklahoma. So I say it that way. Paper, scissors, rock.
- [05:01]
Mike Rowe
Nobody in the history of the has said paper, scissors, rock. It's always rock, paper, scissors.
- [05:08]
Nathan Walters
Paper, scissors, rock. Yeah. No. I don't know. Maybe we're backwards out here.
- [05:11]
Mike Rowe
Well, I'll tell you what, Matt. Here's the thing about Oklahoma. I feel like there is some kind of weird tractor beam in the middle of that state that has been pulling me there for decades. And somebody has actually cranked it up. Like, it started for me with Dirty jobs back in 2002. We shot a pilot not far from. I want to say Eufaula maybe. Okay, that's a place.
- [05:39]
Nathan Walters
That's a place. Lake Eufaula. Yeah. It's a place about two hours outside of the city.
- [05:43]
Sponsor Voice
It was Lake Eufaula.
- [05:44]
Mike Rowe
It's not far from Shawnee.
- [05:46]
Nathan Walters
Not far at all.
- [05:47]
Mike Rowe
So I check into this pit of despair in Shawnee. This was really like my introduction to Dirty Jobs. The. There was a refrigerator, like a cooler. They had in there, like, half a fridge. And the door was hanging off. The TV was cracked. One of the windows had a hole in it, like a rock had been thrown through it. And there was an air conditioner in the window that sounded like a chainsaw. It was called the Cinderella Motor Lodge. And I'm like, this is the craziest.
- [06:20]
Sponsor Voice
What a mess.
- [06:21]
Mike Rowe
And all I knew was, the next morning, I was going to Lake Eufaula to shoot an episode on something called noodling. And I'm like, what is noodling? And my producer's like, it's just fishing. It's just.
- [06:34]
Nathan Walters
It's just a type of fishing.
- [06:36]
Mike Rowe
It's what people in Oklahoma call fishing. I'm like, all right, you know? But this guy's a known liar, so I'm not sure what to think. So I lie down on this thing that I'm only going to call a mattress because it was in the place where you would expect to find one. And I turn on the broken tv, and there's a local PBS station. And I don't know what the title of this show was called, but based on the content in it, it could have been. For the love of God, please don't noodle. All it was were conversations with people.
- [07:14]
Sponsor Voice
Who were missing fingers who had giant.
- [07:17]
Mike Rowe
Scars on their face. There were conversations with mothers and wives and girlfriends who had lost their loved ones.
- [07:25]
Sponsor Voice
Yep, because they fish with their hands, man. They fish with their hands.
- [07:30]
Nathan Walters
They go underwater, put their arm in a hole, and hope it's not a beaver in the hole, hope it's a catfish.
- [07:35]
Mike Rowe
I Learned all of this the next day with two dudes, Don and Jerry. Incredibly were their names. Don Brewer and my God, man, that was my real introduction to Oklahoma. I've been back many times, but I've never been able to shake that feeling of reaching into a hole underwater. Literally praying out loud for a catfish. Please let there be a catfish that bites me so I can pull it out. As opposed to a water moccasin or an alligator gar or whatever other demon spawn you guys have down there.
- [08:08]
Nathan Walters
Or some kind of beaver. All of it.
- [08:11]
Chuck Klausmeyer
Could a beaver be hiding in a hole like that?
- [08:14]
Sponsor Voice
Oh, yeah.
- [08:15]
Nathan Walters
Yeah. Oh, yeah.
- [08:16]
Mike Rowe
Wow. So I guess my first question is, have you noodled?
- [08:20]
Nathan Walters
I have not noodled. I grew up in a town about 20 minutes west of Oklahoma City. It's a suburb. I was definitely way more city than noodling. As you know, Lake Euphau is about two hours outside of the city. So I didn't noodle. I didn't fish a lot. My dad wasn't a fisherman. Fishing became more of a thing as I've gotten older. I've understood it. I liked catching. The fishing portion of it was very miserable for an 8 year old for me. But now being older, I'm like, oh, I get why they fish. You go out there, you have a couple beers, it's quiet. I'm like, oh, fishing makes sense now. As at 8, I was like, I don't love this.
- [08:56]
Mike Rowe
Yeah, I don't like fishing, but I do like drinking on a boat with my friends.
- [09:00]
Nathan Walters
Yes, love that part. Sometimes I'm fishing, sometimes I'm not. But I'm definitely drinking on the boat with my friends.
- [09:06]
Mike Rowe
Well, you know, I mean, it's a funny way to transition into something more topical, but it's kind of like building in the sense that when I met you in Vegas, was that months ago or years ago? I have no sense.
- [09:19]
Nathan Walters
Months ago, February.
- [09:20]
Mike Rowe
So time doesn't mean anything. The lockdowns did something to me. They did something with the business of both compressing and extending time. I'm just not as good at pigeonholing dates as I used to be. But I do still remember vividly conversations. And I asked you if you were having fun as a builder, and you were like, oh, building is amazing. I love building, but just because I'm a builder doesn't mean I build anything anymore. I have a business now, and now I'm involved in all of these other things. It's not, in other words, the fun of getting a catfish on the end of your arm. Or a catch on the end of your rod. That great fun moment is not what you experience most of the time. And I guess the same is true in your vocation.
- [10:12]
Nathan Walters
Yeah, that's a, that's 100%. I remember saying that. Because building the home, being a site supervisor and building the home is, that's the funnest part. It's how you end up owning a business. You know, it's how I end up owning a home. Building businesses. I was site supervising for a builder here in Edmond and I absolutely loved building and I started a home building business thinking, man, this is going to be amazing. And for a couple of years I'm doing that, I'm building, I'm doing everything. And then you get 10 years in and you look up and you're running a home building company and you're lucky when you get to go out to the job sites and see them. But that satisfaction of getting to build is not the day to day basis as much as it is, you know, making sure the marketing's working, making sure you're talking to customers and doing those things. There's definitely been a change once you become a 10 year old business.
- [11:03]
Mike Rowe
Well, every entrepreneur I've ever talked to who has had success really in virtually any industry ultimately comes to the conclusion that the thing they thought, the business they thought they were in is actually the customer service business.
- [11:20]
Nathan Walters
That's right.
- [11:21]
Mike Rowe
That's all it is. And that sooner or later we're all salesmen for whatever it is we love or used to love. And that's really what I want to get into. Because the other thing you said that I remember with remarkable clarity is I was surprised to learn that your dad wasn't a builder and that you don't come from a long line of builders. Because most of the people like who I've met on dirty jobs, most fishermen come from fishermen. Most farmers come from a long line of farmers. You know, soldiers tend to have parents and grandparents who served. And the same is true of builders. But somehow you like Forrest Gumped your way into this first generation thing. How'd that happen?
- [12:08]
Nathan Walters
You're exactly right. I feel like I fell into it. I sometimes ask myself how I got here. You know, I wake up, I'm like, how exactly is this? Because you're right. My dad was a welder. My dad was a welder that owned an aluminum horse trailer manufacturing plant. So he was still blue collar, very blue collar. But he wanted what's funny, which is where a lot of this stuff is going, he wanted like A lot of blue collar parents wanted. He wanted a different life, right? Hey, you need to go to college. Hey, you need to make good grades. You need to do these things. You don't want to end up over here. Okay, So I go to college because he wanted me to go to college, and I get out of college. And it is actually 2010. And if we all remember 2010 now, it's very close to 2008. And you know what there's not a lot of in May of 2010 is jobs. So great. I went to college and there weren't a lot of jobs. A really good buddy of mine's dad owned a gutter installation company. And we had a massive hailstorm come through Oklahoma City in May of 2010. Damaged roofs, damaged gutter. And he needed help. And I couldn't get a job. A corporate job, if you will. And he said, hey, do you want to hang gutter? I was like, well, I don't know how to hang gutter. And you know, it's the old adage, water runs downhill. Oh, yeah, you know, he's like, trust me, it's easy. As long as the gutter slope in the right direction, you're gonna figure it out. So I hung gutter for four or five months and then ended up getting to know the people who owned the supply yard that was supplying the gutter material. They did siding and windows, started working for them, selling windows and siding after I installed gutter and tried to sell windows to a builder. One day the home builder calls me. I thought I was getting to sell a window job. He's like, hey, come up here. I go to his office. He's like, have you ever thought about building houses? He's like, I don't know anything about building houses.
- [14:04]
Mike Rowe
And he said, when can you start?
- [14:07]
Nathan Walters
Perfect. That's what we want. When can you start? And so that was October of 2011. I started working for a home builder. And I'll tell you this, I started on Monday. It was Friday. It was so exhilarating. I knew. I came home and my wife will still tell you this. And I said, I'll never do anything else. This is what I will do. Because I just remember being a site super and being out there, and I remember 10am getting gas to go to the next job and thinking about my buddies that are sitting in a cubicle in a corporate office moving paper around. I'm like, I'm out here getting gas at 10am going to talk to a framer at the next job site. And then after that Talking to an electrician and watching real things come to life. And the passion really set in one weekend of being like, this is unbelievable that this is what I get to do.
- [14:56]
Mike Rowe
Well, that's why you're on this podcast, man. I meet a lot of people, and I do get to travel around a lot. And not every day is spent waiting for something in a hole to bite me. Right? I mean, I get. I get a chance to rub elbows with some pretty interesting people. You know, my agenda. I think your industry just has a huge challenge that's going to impact virtually everyone who shares my addiction to hot and cold running water and indoor plumbing and roofs that don't leak and gutters that work and windows that actually close and all those things. And it was your enthusiasm for the business, it was the fact that there was a light switch moment. You know, you weren't raised in this thing, but when you saw it, you just decided and you went for it. And it's rare for an entrepreneur to kind of stumble into it that way. And I'm looking at you here. I assume the house behind you is one that your company built.
- [15:57]
Nathan Walters
Was. Yeah.
- [15:58]
Mike Rowe
Yeah.
- [15:58]
Nathan Walters
This was our very first parade of homes. That's a home show. And when I started my business, this was the very first. First home I ever built on my own.
- [16:06]
Mike Rowe
What year was that?
- [16:08]
Nathan Walters
2015.
- [16:10]
Mike Rowe
So I gotta circle back to your dad as well. You just glossed over something about horse trailers, which I'm sure is gonna be interesting. But the satisfaction of knowing that that was an empty lot and now it's not. And there's a thing there with a thousand moving parts and the product of 10,000 little decisions that the homeowner had to make. And there you are, guiding them through this paralyzing miasma, you know, holding their hand. And I just. If you can just speak to the thrill of seeing a tangible thing in a place that was previously vacant in ways that people can understand because it's special.
- [16:49]
Nathan Walters
That is the thrill, right? You know, you're lining up with everything that made me do this. That's the thrill. You said it. I show up out here, this house is on a. Behind me is on a 2 acre lot. 2.07 acres, and it's nothing but trees and wild weeds and grass on it. This was my very first home that, oddly enough, my. My sister knew nothing about construction, but she's five years older than me, always extremely creative. And I was like, hey, will you help me pick colors? Because that's the last thing you want me doing, right? Is picking Colors and making stuff go together, like in a, in a pretty way. And she was like, well, I don't know what I'm doing. I said, no, you can pick pretty stuff. We sat down at a kitchen table, worked on these plans, worked on this design. It's nothing but concepts and built this. It's funny because looking back, it's even crazier. The original owner of this sold this to another owner. And it's funny, that owner reached out and was like, hey, do you have any information on what was in this house? And what's funny since that was our first year. No, no, we were out there. No, we didn't do that. We were out there for the love of building and making decisions as we went and my sister had, was picking as we went and no, we didn't store anything. You know, it was about 2017, 2018, by going to the International Builders Show. I won't use the acronym. I'll call it what it is, the International Builder Show.
- [18:23]
Mike Rowe
They can't settle on one.
- [18:25]
Nathan Walters
They can't. Going there is when I started learning how to be a business and finding tools such as digs that stored information. But this, the passion you get from me on this is, it's. It wasn't business, it was a passion of home building. That's what built this house is. It was a passion of building this and in essence winging it. And not winging the build I knew how to build, but winging the decisions every day, which was amazing.
- [18:52]
Mike Rowe
Well, you're building a plane in mid flight, right? I mean, you're just everything. It's just endless decisions. I don't know if there's a specific word for it, but I know a lot of builders and I know a lot of people who had a house built. And at some point, I mean, there's just no justice in building a beautiful house and having an unhappy customer in the end. And I know that happens. It's got nothing to do with the work. But so often it's a kind of fatigue. It's like a decision making fatigue that sets in. And that's when I was talking to the guy that built my house about this the other day. And he was like, look, man, there are days when you are a counselor. There are days when you're a psychologist, a psychiatrist even. And then there are other days when you're a muddy boots architect. What's the most rewarding day? What do you still love most about your gig?
- [19:56]
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- [20:32]
Mike Rowe
You get a great cardio workout with.
- [20:34]
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- [20:49]
Mike Rowe
That's a great way to jack up your back.
- [20:51]
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- [21:39]
Nathan Walters
You are right, I'll get to that. But we call it selection fatigue. There it is what we call it in our office. We call it selection fatigue. You nailed it. It just grinds on people and we're trying to build a process that is countering that. You know, used to, I would say the end product and the design is what really thrilled me. Circling back to something that you said earlier, which is so true is somewhere along the way, Mike, I think probably about a year and a half ago I woke up and had the realization that you just said, which was I'm not in the construction business, I'm in the customer service business. And that's a fight coming from being a son of a blue collar welder in a manufacturing plant. Which is the end goal is what is the Most important, right, because it's manufactured in house.
- [22:26]
Mike Rowe
Sure.
- [22:27]
Nathan Walters
This is manufactured. It's just done outside with a customer watching every step of the way. So I'll tell you, the satisfaction that I've been getting is, as we have learned that customer service is what is most important. And we have started trying to implement things and having customers during the process thank us, tell us that something was easier than they had expected. We had a customer that told me, not just a month ago, man, we were really worried going to the tile store. Like, we were really feeling like we were going to be overwhelmed. And the way you guys ran that process actually really made it very enjoyable for us. Hearing that today is what gives me the thrill of knowing that we're trying to make something that can be very difficult to allow people to enjoy it because they should enjoy it. It's hard to enjoy it.
- [23:17]
Mike Rowe
I mean, I literally just got a queasy feeling when you said going to the tile store. It. I mean, I left Bed, Bath and Beyond one day years ago and made a solemn vow, which I've kept, to never go back into that place. It's not for a rational reason. It's the same reason I don't go to the Cheesecake Factory anymore. I got nothing against cheesecake, but when I pick up that menu, it. It feels like War and Peace. It just goes on and on and on. And that's what the tile store is. And that's anybody who's gone through a renovation, not anybody. Some people are good at this. Some people like that giant menu. Some people like walking around the Ikea looking for the meatballs and suddenly buying a bureau. And who knows? I can't stand it. How much handholding do you do?
- [24:09]
Nathan Walters
So we do a lot. We do an absolute lot of handholding. But we've really changed over the years. Used to, we were Cheesecake Factory. We were like, listen, we are a luxury home builder, which means nothing is off the table. And I was just witnessing, again, that selection fatigue setting in with the customers and just the. I don't want to make any more decisions. Can you please just get our house done? This is. This process is just taking so long. And we have much more. We are still hand holding everything, but we are also curating a lot more. We're getting ahead of it on the design on the front end, using digs and getting these people's inspiration pictures. And then we're actually sending our designers to the tile store to pre select this tile based off of the pictures that the customer has given us. And now, when the customer walks into the tile store, instead of walking into a 30,000 square foot warehouse where the world is your oyster, it's like, hey, your master bath pictures you've shown us, this is the tile. So there's really only three options you need to look at. And we pull the three options for them. So we are still hand holding all the way through, but it is way more curated and we're just finding the customers enjoying that much more. Even though they think in their head, no, we want endless options, they think that they don't, they don't want it.
- [25:35]
Mike Rowe
So back to Diggs. I mean, full disclosure, I know Ryan, I know the CEO, I've worked with those guys. And it's kind of embarrassing to admit because I always like, I really like to understand everything I'm involved in, but there's something like magical going on with AI that I think I understand, but I don't really. And it felt like they put a new tool in the toolbox for guys like you. And that does interest me a lot, even if I don't really understand it. Because I think part of what has to happen to get the next generation of kids interested in your world is they have to see some tech that intrigues them and that feels like it's cutting edge. So, I mean, I don't want to turn this into a commercial, but I do want to understand what that tool has done for you in Oklahoma.
- [26:32]
Nathan Walters
So it's been absolutely unbelievable for us. And what's been unbelievable for us too is we are bending it to do something different than what they originally intended. And then now they're seeing, oh, we can still do our original intention and we can add what Nathan is wanting to do to this. And so we use it on what we call pre construction, which is also design, which is where we're drawing your plans and we're doing your initial design. One of the easiest things it's done out of the gate is it has shortened that process. I get shortened that process tremendously because how it used to work is we'd get the big set of plans, we'd have the customer come to the office, we would do the notes on the plans. We would then drive these plans over to the architect, tell him what the changes are, he would make the changes. It would take about two weeks, get us back the plans, redo another thing with the customer, another meeting with the customer. And this went back and forth for months and months and months. With that, now we're uploading the plans directly to Diggs. The Customers are able to use their iPad, sitting on their couch and make notes on them, attach pictures to them that instantly myself and the architect get. And then we're able to now do things and turn things around in a week and a half to where usually the turnaround was three weeks. And so that has been unbelievable. But then with the AI portion of it, what's crazy is how AI learns you, which is scary and crazy. It learns the things that you're doing. And so now when we put certain selections into Diggs, we can then use Ask Diggs inside of Diggs and be like, what was the kitchen refrigerator. It pulls it up in one second with the link with all the specs to it instantly. So we don't have to go hunt for things and do things anymore. We can literally input our information into Digs and then instead of us having to remember where we put this information, all we have to do is use Ask Digs and then a nanosecond AI is giving us the information we want.
- [28:44]
Sponsor Voice
It's just so crazy.
- [28:45]
Mike Rowe
I'm like, in the end, who benefits the most, the builder or the buyer?
- [28:52]
Nathan Walters
So the buyer is benefiting on time frame? Both. The buyer is going to benefit on time frame. We're going to be able to move through that process quicker. Also, information's at their fingertips, which makes them feel more comfortable that they know that the builder has the information that they want the builder to have. So I think that puts a buyer at ease. But the builder, this information we're putting in, we can upload our trades into it. The ones that know how to use it, they're getting information. So now instead of having two or three employees inside of our office that are doing nothing but gathering information and then trying to put it into the correct place and trying to make sure the trades have the right information. Now, if our plumber wants to see the faucets, he goes into digs, Ask Diggs for the faucet specs. Boom, he has them just like that.
- [29:45]
Mike Rowe
So, I mean, how do you, as a builder, because I'm sure you're inundated by companies with a better mousetrap, a new idea, an improvement on some existing tool, or maybe in this case, a brand new tool. When I was at that event, when I met those guys, I guess it was a couple of years ago. You know, people who don't go to these industry type events really have no idea how massive they are, how boozy they get. Like the deals are going on all of the time. Everybody is huddled up and they're all talking about the next big thing. How do you separate the wheat from the chaff?
- [30:29]
Nathan Walters
Well, usually we go with a purpose, so our team goes with a purpose. Okay, this is what we're looking for. Okay. So try to block out the rest. Right? Hey, this is what we feel we have a need for. Let's go to the show. Let's try to, to do our need. I wasn't looking for Diggs, which is funny. I had was not looking for it. And what was hilarious is we're at an event at a builder event only, but Diggs was a sponsor. And I'm having a full blown conversation with one of my really good builder friends out of Atlanta, who also is now a digs user. And we're having a conversation. And Ty from Diggs interrupts our conversation. Hey, let me pitch you this thing real quick. And I remember as you're saying, all this is happening all the time. So I'm annoyed. Yeah, I'm like, I'm annoyed. Hold on, man. I'm middle of a conversation. I'm not. I don't want to hear anything about what you're about to tell me. He's 30 seconds in. Something clicked that he had said that I wasn't listening to, but over like just went through my brain and I said, hold on, what? He's like, yeah. And so we ended up talking for 20, 30 minutes. Ended up over at their suite a couple of days later. The day they launched. The day they launched, we were in their suite. That's how it all started. So oddly enough, I usually go with a purpose. I didn't go for this purpose. Got interrupted, was annoyed. Now I love those guys.
- [31:54]
Mike Rowe
Well, yeah, I guess it is ironic. On the other hand, you didn't set out to become a builder, right?
- [32:00]
Nathan Walters
No.
- [32:00]
Mike Rowe
Like you're hanging gutters. It's all super interesting. And I want to circle back to that for a minute. Your dad, he was a welder, but he was also building horse trailers.
- [32:10]
Nathan Walters
Yes. So aluminum horse trailers are welded. That's how they're put together. And he went to VO Tech in high school. Him and three buddies were such good welders. The VO Tech teacher actually got them a job at nights, in the evenings at a local horse trailer manufacturing plant. So he ended up welding aluminum horse trailers his entire life. And somewhere during that process he was like, you know, we could do this as a business. Him and his right hand man. He was the plant manager and then he had his right hand man. And they're like, we could, you know, we could do this. And they. They went out and started their own called Elite Trailers. And they made the best of the best aluminum horse trailers. Still do, except for my dad retired his portion of it. He said. He said, I don't need this anymore. And so he was a welder, that same thing. I mean, he, in essence, stumbled into being a business owner, too. He really was. Was a welder, and that's what he loved doing. He actually got bored of owning the business and loved going into the shop and welding. He's like, man, this part of it's terrible. I want to go into the shop and do the fun part.
- [33:20]
Mike Rowe
See, this is the story that really, I think the country needs to hear, because it's an entrepreneurial story. It's a success story. But it starts with mastering a skill.
- [33:31]
Sponsor Voice
He starts welding.
- [33:32]
Mike Rowe
And like, this doesn't happen in accounting class, right? You're not halfway through your deal, and the instructor says, hey, you know what you should do? You should come over here across the street and add up a column of numbers and dive into the tax code for this company, right? I hear these stories all the time from people who go through our foundation. They. There's just nothing like the trades to put you on a path. Now, I don't know where the path will take you, but you are on a path to something. And by the way, Elite, no pressure, dude, but when you call your company Elite, it better be a damn good horse trailer.
- [34:11]
Nathan Walters
They were. And what's crazy is that I started hearing that he would have, you know, jackets and stuff. And when I got older, I wanted to support my dad. I'd wear an Elite jacket. I remember multiple times being in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and going to football games and wearing an Elite jacket. And if I heard it once, I heard it a hundred different times of people saying, oh, do you have an Elite trailer? No, no, no. I just know someone who works there. They're like, man, that's the best trailer. We hope to own one one day, or people who own it. That's the best trailer. And he obviously thought they built the best trailer, but, man, they did. They stuck to what they did, and they did not mess around. I mean, to the finest detail. And this is what I bring into home building is from him is to the finest detail of. A lot of horse trailers have different colored tape on the side of them. Okay? Red, green, black, blue. It's what gives it. So it's not just a big aluminum box running down the road. Well, the majority of horse trailer manufacturers will just silicone clear the Seams where it meets. Right now, my dad's company, they use the color that the tape was of caulking. So if it was green, it was green. If it was red, it was red. And they used the color, which is minimal. But it's not. It's the little things that build up throughout doing the entire trailer that stands out and makes it elite, as opposed.
- [35:37]
Mike Rowe
To subpar trailers or C plus horse transport or.
- [35:43]
Nathan Walters
That's exactly right.
- [35:45]
Mike Rowe
You know, it's like the business of managing expectations really touches just about every aspect of every business. And I love it when a show lives up to its name. Dirty jobs. Well, the jobs will be dirty. And when they're not, the viewer has every right to go, hey, wait a second. Right. If the trailer is not elite, and I bought an elite trailer, it does put the pressure on it. Tell me about your company, how you came up with the name and so forth.
- [36:15]
Nathan Walters
So I loved when I came out, there's something about Italian style homes that I absolutely love. And so I wanted some kind of Italian something in it. We searched provinces and cities and everything that we could kind of search to kind of have an Italian flair to it. And I'm not Italian. I just enjoy Italian architecture. And so I wanted to go that way. And so what we started doing is putting in words that mean something to Oklahoma into Google Translate. And so we put. We put thunderstorms and tornadoes and we let Google Translate spit it back out.
- [36:53]
Mike Rowe
Italian noodling.
- [36:54]
Nathan Walters
And so red dirt is synonymous in Oklahoma. We have red dirt. Septic. We have red dirt. Red dirt is a thing because we have red dirt. So we typed in red dirt and it spit out macerosa. And I just enjoyed hearing it. It sounded so well. And so that's how we went. We went with Master Rosa that direction. But what's funny is my Hispanic traits, because Spanish is so close to Italian. They say it the way it's supposed to be said. They roll. They roll the Russ. Yes. To where? If you're from Oklahoma, it's called Massarosa is what it is. What is what a lot of people call it. And that's not the name. And then then same thing as my dad used Elite. We put in luxury in the name on purpose. And the start was a luxury home was, hey, we want the home to be luxurious again. In the last year and a half of learning from this business, we now what we like to tell people is, hey, yes, the home. We want to be luxurious. We also are talking about the process. We want the process to be Luxurious. And it's not just the things that we're supposed to do. We want to go above and beyond on some items and be thoughtful to our customer base. And so we haven't perfected it yet, but, man, in about a year and a half, two years of really, really focusing on, hey, we want the process. It's not just the home. The home is supposed to be luxurious. With the amount of money you're spending, let's focus on something else being luxurious. And we've been working really hard at that.
- [38:28]
Mike Rowe
How busy are you right now? How many homes are under construction?
- [38:32]
Nathan Walters
So we got during the prime of COVID when interest rates dropped, we got up to 20 to 22 of these homes that had that were actively under construction. During that time is when we realized we needed to make a shift to customer service. Because we were building the homes and we were doing the homes well, we were not servicing the customer. Just like you said, Mike, of people being like, man, you know, the house is good. But I didn't enjoy the process. And about two years ago, I set a goal. We'll never do more than 10 to 12 active construction jobs. So we have 12 right now, and I cap it, and we will create a waiting list if people really want it. But I have made a point as the owner that the customers will be served a certain type of way. And the only way to serve the customer is as at a max of 12, 12 homes to be going under construction at one time.
- [39:29]
Mike Rowe
So last Christmas, I gave away half.
- [39:32]
Sponsor Voice
A dozen of those aura digital picture frames. And since then, every single person who got one is called to tell me how much they love them. This really is the most universally loved.
- [39:42]
Mike Rowe
Gift I've ever given.
- [39:43]
Sponsor Voice
So this year, I'm going to double down.
- [39:46]
Mike Rowe
That's right.
- [39:47]
Sponsor Voice
I'm going to give people the same.
- [39:49]
Mike Rowe
Gift I gave them last year.
- [39:51]
Sponsor Voice
Why? Because most of my friends have multiple rooms in their homes, and I'm sure.
- [39:56]
Mike Rowe
They'Ll find a place for a duplicate.
- [39:57]
Sponsor Voice
Version of the number one digital frame out there. Aura frames not only display an unlimited number of photos, it allows you to share those photos with an unlimited number of friends and family members. Sharing photos is a great way to stay connected.
- [40:11]
Mike Rowe
It only takes a couple minutes to set up.
- [40:13]
Sponsor Voice
It comes with free unlimited storage, and there are absolutely no hidden fees or subscriptions. You also have complete control over who has access to your framework. And the Aura app lets you share photos more securely than you can with email, which many other digital frames require. It's not just the gift that keeps on giving. It's the gift that I keep on giving.
- [40:37]
Mike Rowe
That's not bad.
- [40:38]
Sponsor Voice
And now, for a limited time, you can get $45 off Aura's best selling Carver matte frames by using promo code Mike at checkout. That's a U R A Frames promo code Mike. This is an exclusive Black Friday Cyber Monday deal, and it'll be their best deal of the year, so don't miss out. Terms and conditions apply at a U R A frames.com promo code Mike.
- [41:04]
Podcast Voice
A U R a U R a U R A frames.com/Mike.
- [41:19]
Mike Rowe
See, that's a lesson, man. That is a lesson. It's got to do with, you know, getting over your skis and biting off more than you can chew. It's why there's so many metaphors for the same thing. My favorite. You know John Rich, country music guy?
- [41:34]
Nathan Walters
Oh, yeah.
- [41:35]
Mike Rowe
So John told me something a couple years ago. I was over at his place in Nashville. It was the middle of the night, and I just come out with some whiskey named after my granddad. And he's got this whiskey named for his grandmother. Well, it's not named for her, but it was inspired by her. She had her pictures on it and everything else.
- [41:55]
Chuck Klausmeyer
Redneck Riviera.
- [41:56]
Mike Rowe
Redneck Riviera was not his grandmother's name, to be clear. But we're just sitting around sipping some of the whiskey and playing and singing songs for each other. And I asked him if he had any advice, what had he learned from the whiskey business? And he was like, oh, Mike Rowe. He calls me Mike Rowe. He just one of those guys, Mike Rowe.
- [42:17]
Sponsor Voice
You know, I'll tell you, I learned.
- [42:18]
Mike Rowe
Something from the whiskey business. Same thing I learned in the music business. You got to service your distribution. I'm like, what do you mean? And he's like, look, it's not hard making whiskey. It's not difficult selling whiskey. What's tough is servicing the people who buy it from you and who sell it for you and supporting their efforts and being there. And he just said, just be careful, you know, don't get more of it out there than you can manage after the fact. And I'd really never thought of it that way. It's just a bottle of whiskey, you know, it's just a bunch of brick and mortar. It's just a horse trailer. It's just a gutter on the side of the house.
- [43:02]
Sponsor Voice
But you can screw up any business.
- [43:05]
Mike Rowe
By leaning into one part of it at the expense of something else. And then you're out of whack and Then you're in trouble.
- [43:13]
Nathan Walters
That's right. That's exactly right. And coming from a manufacturing background of my dad, I was so. It was product driven. And the writing on the wall of, yes, the product matters, but how the customer feels matters, too, was so foreign to me. It was so foreign. And then getting to see how important it is to take care of these customers. He's exactly right. If I service these customers, they will take care of us. Building the house is building the house. And after doing this since 2011, I can build the house. That part of it is easy. It is servicing the customer that has become so important. But also that's. I love that you're hanging out with John Rich, because oddly enough, my wife and I. His song with Big and Rich Lost in this moment was our wedding song. That's what we danced to.
- [44:03]
Mike Rowe
No kidding.
- [44:04]
Nathan Walters
Yep, that's what we danced to.
- [44:06]
Mike Rowe
He and I wrote a song for Christmas a couple years ago called Santa Claus, Got a dirty job and recorded it, and we've been friends ever since. But yeah, man, it's funny. This is one more Oklahoma thing. You know, it's like, go figure. So obviously the thing that I'm most passionate about is what I'm guessing is the biggest problem you face. Skilled labor.
- [44:31]
Nathan Walters
Yep.
- [44:32]
Mike Rowe
How bad is it in Oklahoma? And talk about, what was it?
- [44:35]
Sponsor Voice
Build My future.
- [44:36]
Mike Rowe
Is that the thing you're involved with out there?
- [44:38]
Nathan Walters
Build my future is what I'm involved in. Yeah. So I. This year, I am the president of our local home builders association. So Central Oklahoma Home Builders Association. And this will be our fourth or fifth year as an association that we have put on Build My Future. And our goal is to get as many kids open to the idea of going into the trades as possible. We're starting with high schoolers. Our goal is to start getting down into middle school and elementary school because, you know, they may be too far gone by high school.
- [45:12]
Mike Rowe
Sure.
- [45:12]
Nathan Walters
But of really introducing this. And you just really nailed it on something a while back ago. We the paths that can be taken in the trades. So many kids don't know. They just don't know. And so we put on basically a big show where our vendors and our trades are out at a big facility at our state fairgrounds. So our electrician is there, and he's got a board to where kids can make up plugs. Bricklayers are there showing them how to lay brick. Concrete companies are there showing them how to unload concrete out of a truck, how to do flat work, H vac work in our Local trades. We asked them to do this. And I was standing next to the electrician's booth, and it was just unbelievable because they put up how much you make an hour starting, and then once you become a journeyman and all of this. Right? Yeah. And it was so informative to these kids because these kids are like, hold on, I can make 22 bucks an hour if I go to Votec and then come here. And the owner of the electrician company said, no, I'm Vo Tech. You come work for me for $22 an hour, and I teach you how to become an electrician. Why you're making $22 an hour. And it goes all the way up to their project managers of this electrician company makes six figures a year with health insurance and all of these things. And these kids watching these kids walk by, their minds were blown, mind blown, blown. That that's what it takes of, oh, I can just come to work. And so we are really, really pushing this as a home builders association, and it is really big for us. And the reason why is, you're right, it's bad. The skilled trade base and the lack thereof is bad. What you're really having is you're having an extremely skilled trade base that's getting older. My tile setters in his 60s. He goes through younger people so quickly because they don't want to show up five days a week. They don't want to be as skilled at laying the tile as he does, and he has to let them go. And that's really what we're seeing, is we're seeing this age gap that you're starting to get real weary of. Wait. My good trades are in their 50s and 60s, and this is really hard work. And you're looking at what's coming down the pipe, Mike. And nothing is what it feels like. Feels like nothing's coming down the pipe.
- [47:48]
Mike Rowe
Look, if it were just you, one luxury home builder in the middle of Oklahoma worried about this thing, you know, you could chalk it up to geography or bad luck or any number of things. It's everywhere, man. I. I've been to every single state. I've talked to hundreds of people who do what you do. And I can't overstate it. I try not to get on my soapbox about it because I'm just a broken record. But I feel like at this point, somebody needs to ring an alarm. Precisely for the reason you said the math is just not sustainable. Every year, five retire and two replace them. Although I'm told it's less than that now it's like 1.5 against 5. Okay, so. So a. When does it go splat? Like, when does it impact your business to the point where you just have to cut back further and further and further? And how do we fix it?
- [48:40]
Nathan Walters
Where it feels like we're going splat. Right. It feels like the demand is out there to do more than 10 or 12 of these units, but the capacity wasn't there. That was the problem. The capacity was not there. It feels like the demand is out there, and the capacity just is not out there for skilled labor. And I feel like we're hitting that roadblock. And you're right. It's. It's funny because I'm a part of a builder 20 group, which is a part of the national association of Home Builders, and you're with, like, kind builders, but in different parts of the country. When these larger metros, Atlanta, Columbus, you were seeing this trade shortage. Well before COVID like 2016, 2017, these guys were crying about it pretty much. I call it crying because we didn't have that problem. We're so close to Texas, which is so close to Mexico, that we had a very good Hispanic trade base that we weren't. I was like, no, we're not having that problem. And then kind of like you talked about with COVID on time, Covid came through, things heated up, and then all of a sudden you're looking around, and now our part of the country is like everybody else, you're just like, wait, where'd everybody go? Where'd they go? And I think that Covid had so many of them, that time frame had so many of them. Maybe not go back to work. Well, you know, we're 60, as I'm telling you, they're already older. We're 60. No reason to go back to work. And so it's like, it put it on a time warp. Like, one day, you're just short. And it almost feels like even though we've been doing this for five years as an organization, that really, the seeds that we're going to sow are years and years away. If we're getting in front of high schoolers now, we're still five, 10 years away from these guys making it through apprenticeship and becoming skilled labor. And that's what's scary. As an owner of a home building.
- [50:33]
Mike Rowe
Company, I bet it is. And as a guy who lives in a home, it's scary for me because. Right. It's like food, clothing, shelter. The essentials. The essentials are being directly impacted by what feels Like a paucity of work ethic, but also a real lack of enthusiasm for the opportunities. And I'll tell you the one that worries me more. You guys are neck and neck, but it's the energy industry. Oh, yeah, right. And so back to Oklahoma. I've been working with Continental Energy in Oklahoma and OERB now for the last, I don't know, three years or so. And this year their whole campaign is really just designed to tap Oklahomans on the shoulder and say, hey, we got a lot to be proud of here, where I think we're the fourth largest provider of energy in the country. And so much of our healthcare, so much of our educational system is paid for by this industry.
- [51:31]
Nathan Walters
That's right.
- [51:32]
Mike Rowe
Well, this year we're doing that in conjunction with microworks and the trades because, man, everybody's hiring in the energy industry in Oklahoma and it feels almost as desperate as your industry. So yeah, I just filmed at Central Tech. I don't know if you're familiar with that. I'm drawing a blank on the name of the town. It's right in the middle of the state. But they're doing so many things right and it's all focused on jobs in energy. Not entirely, but so much of it. And I just wonder if there's a solution like that that's more focused on the building trade specifically.
- [52:13]
Nathan Walters
Yeah, I mean, and that's basically what we're doing with Build My Future, which is how you and I really connected. Yeah, we connected talking about digs and through digs. But when we were talking after you were talking about microworks and we were talking about Build My Future, and you're right, it's the enthusiasm that's lacking because I could be wrong, but I feel like it really started in the 80s. Maybe it was a little bit of the 70s, but definitely the 80s. The push up. You have to go to college, you have to go to college. You have to go to college. And it really started pushing, no, you can't. Don't go be a welder, don't go be an electrician. You need to go to college. And there is nothing wrong with college. I went to college, but I don't believe that everybody needs to go to college. And we're pushing so many kids to go to college and we're more or less also telling them, no, you have to go to college. And the trades are beneath college is what it feels like. We have been pushing out into schools and things of that nature and it's just not true. It's not true. The trades can give you an extremely good lifestyle. It allows you to do stuff with your hands. It allows you to look at work that you've completed and there's just a lack of enthusiasm. It feels like of like, no, this is. You're really accomplishing something. And you can for 20 years if you're a framer, drive by houses and say, I helped build that, I framed that house. I was a framer. And look at that. And I mean, heck, I'll tell you what, I would much rather do that than when you get into some of these businesses, you realize on the white collar side of jobs, you're a glorified emailer. You email, you email and do zoom calls all day. I don't know if there's any enthusiasm at least from me for that to where if I can go out a job site and be a part of creating something. And I just feel like there needs to be a push nationally of no, the trades are not beneath. It is not for a lesser than. It is something that you can do something with your hands and you can always go by and be like, I helped build that. You was a lot and I was a part of making it that I.
- [54:18]
Mike Rowe
Was just about to say it. You're sitting right in front of the most compelling evidence there is. And really, you know, it's the answer I typically give when people say, what did you really learn from 350 dirty jobs? What does that group of workers know that the rest of us have either forgotten or just don't get exposed to? And that's my answer, what you just said. It's the satisfaction of finishing something and it's the visual cue that you get every single day in the form of feedback that always lets you know how you're doing. This desk looks pretty much the same at five in the afternoon. At five in the morning, I look around. You know, it's always 2am in the studio. You never really know how things are going until the producer starts waving at you is like, wrap it up man. You've been talking two hours. But, but with so many dirty jobs and with every skilled trade I know you don't really need somebody over your shoulder telling you how you're doing. You know, you know exactly how you're doing all of the time, for better or worse. And that's the other thing that the kids don't know. They don't know you can make 150 grand a year welding and they don't know what it feels like to truly finish a thing. And then Take some level of pride in that final point, too. It's. It's not just that they don't know it, and I don't want to make this political, but you'll remember a few years ago when that whole no, you didn't build that was in the headlines. I guess it was Obama who was kind of responding to the idea that no, no, you didn't do it. It's always a team effort. It's never just you. And, you know, a lot of people bristled at that. I wonder why. Were you offended by it, that idea that no, you didn't build that house behind you that happened as a result of some sort of amalgam, some sort of something else, not you.
- [56:25]
Nathan Walters
It's a real narrow road to walk, figure. Yeah, I mean, here's the deal. It is a team of trades that helped me. I didn't shingle the house, but yeah, I mean, the way I feel is I built that. I was at this house seven days a week calling these guys, making sure they were doing it correctly, making sure that, that when things were wrong, we were getting it fixed. It didn't just happen. I didn't call the footing contractor on a cell phone from my house, and then the footing got installed miraculously the way I wanted it to.
- [57:00]
Mike Rowe
Yeah.
- [57:01]
Nathan Walters
And so, yeah, I do remember that. Of, you didn't build that business and you didn't build that. And yeah, that's a bristling thing when you're on the side of entrepreneurship. And there are so many things that I love about entrepreneurship, but it is like everything else in the world, it's a given, a take. It's a full blown give and take.
- [57:19]
Mike Rowe
Somewhere in this cluttered mess of an office, I have a pipe that I held onto. It was sent to me by a woman whose welding certification we paid for. And it's really just like a T. It's beautifully welded. It's like textbook welded. And it came with a couple of pictures of her doing the work and a little note that said, look what I did, you know, And I just loved it. Look what I did. Of course, somebody galvanized the pipe. Of course, somebody shipped it, of course, of course, of course, of course. We all know that. But to be able to revel in the satisfaction, whether it's a simple weld or a better way to make a horse trailer or a better way to build a house or any of that, it's so important to elevate it and celebrate it and not just sand all the edges off. Same, same. Everybody's the same. It just. It makes me tired to think of life that way.
- [58:26]
Nathan Walters
It does. It does. We're different. We're all different. I keep something still. It's out in a pot of ours. And I keep it. Because when I started this, when I was building that house, I was officing out of the home office and we didn't even have an office chair. I sat on this wick kind of cross. Wicked. Almost like an end table. It was hollow inside. I sat on that for two years at my desk when I would go and I'd have to do bills and do stuff that I was learning from. And you're exactly right. Of like her sending you that pipe. Like, I remember where this started and I remember the effort that it took to get to where we are now, which is. I don't have to sit on a wick hollow thing. But it didn't just happen miraculously. Now, there were definitely breaks along the way, but there's a lot of sacrifices of kids, you know, basketball practice that starts at 5pm that you can't get to when you're out here and you're building something.
- [59:26]
Mike Rowe
Speaking of basketball, did you play? As I recall, you must be like 65 or something.
- [59:31]
Nathan Walters
6 5. I did. Basketball was my sport of choice. It was? Yep. Played through high school. Signed a letter of intent to play at an NAIA college in Oklahoma. It was a smaller basketball school, but NAIA basketball is very competitive. Showed up for the summer, played against these guys and said I was not meant to be here. These guys. These guys are. You know, in high school, you can be good by pure effort, right? You can be good by pure effort. And I gave a lot of effort. And you show up to college and there has to be effort and athleticism and skill. And I was looking at this, I was like, oh, no, no, no. These guys are different. I learned real quick that I better just get an education rather than fool around and try to ride the bench.
- [60:22]
Mike Rowe
It's funny too, you know, you go through your life, you're 6 5, you're typically the tallest guy in the room, and then you're not.
- [60:29]
Nathan Walters
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Not by a long shot. And what's crazy now is that my height, you know, if I wanted to be an NBA player, I'd be a point guard at 6:5. It's wild. But yeah, basketball was my. Basketball is my sport of choice to play, but football is my sport of choice to watch. I enjoy watching football. I enjoyed the most playing basketball.
- [60:50]
Mike Rowe
But I think we can agree that fishing is still quite a thrill when the fish are biting, but very different when they're.
- [60:59]
Nathan Walters
That's right.
- [61:00]
Mike Rowe
By the way, your wife is in this business with you too, right?
- [61:04]
Nathan Walters
Or she is and she is that.
- [61:06]
Mike Rowe
She's a mandatory. If you're a, I mean, if you're an entrepreneur, it certainly helps, I would think, to have it a family affair. But she's on the real estate side.
- [61:15]
Nathan Walters
She's on the real estate side, which is perfect for us because we are both extremely type A, type A personalities. I think if she actually worked here in the office every day, we might have a little bit of a problem that her being on the real estate side, we don't have to co mingle every day, but when we do work together, we're great. And she is obviously much more put together than I am in all facets. Looks verbally brain wise. And she has helped me a ton because when I get offers or somebody says something, I will then fire back something that comes out of a construction worker's mouth. She will then put that into an email that is much more polite. Still saying what I said, but in a much more polite version. And that has helped me tremendously.
- [62:05]
Mike Rowe
Emily, right?
- [62:06]
Nathan Walters
Emily, that's right.
- [62:08]
Mike Rowe
Former, was it Miss Oklahoma?
- [62:10]
Nathan Walters
She was Miss Oklahoma 2010.
- [62:12]
Mike Rowe
Look at you, dude. You're six five, former Miss Oklahoma. Building 12 houses at any given time. Didn't know what you wanted to do. Your old man built elite trailers. And now here you are. You know, I mean, final point, this whole American dream thing, I don't know if we talked about it in Vegas, but so much of what an American dream is is owning your own home. And 64, 65% of people today say it's dead. The American dream's dead. Or it doesn't apply to them. I worry a lot about that. And I only bring it up because you're not only building it, you're. You're living it, man. You're a. You're just such a great example, I think, of getting into this space in such a unique way. It just gives me hope that, you know, other people can hear your story.
- [63:02]
Sponsor Voice
And say, why not, man?
- [63:04]
Mike Rowe
Why not get into this world?
- [63:06]
Nathan Walters
It's out there. It's out there to be had. And I don't know because, you know, I feel like every generation bust on the generation below them of not having the same work ethic. And so I know that that goes around, but it is, the dream is out there. The dream, even for the generations before us, it wasn't given to you guys. You Guys still had to go work for the American dream. And it's. I hate that people feel like the American dream is dead, because it's not dead. If you want to go take it, go take it. And that's what I would tell people. And you don't have to know what you want to do. That's the. I'm a. I'm a prime example of that. I never grew up saying, I want to be a home builder. That was never my, that was never once a dream of mine. Not once. And I did know that I enjoyed business ownership because my dad was a business owner, but I didn't know what that was going to be. It could have been anything. And you're right. I just want. I, I. That I don't like that. I did not know that 64, 65% of people felt that the American dream was dead. That's a. That's kind of heartbreaking to hear, honestly.
- [64:09]
Mike Rowe
Well, somehow or another it must be connected to the lack of enthusiasm in the trades, and somehow that's connected just to stigmas and stereotypes and myths and misperceptions and people just. Just not knowing. So, look, I love what you're doing out there with the Build My Future thing. I think we share a lot of space on the old Venn diagram with Microworks. And if history is any indicator, I'm going to be in Oklahoma again sometime in the next couple of months, reaching in the same godforsaken hole, praying that nothing in there is going to bite me. But love to do this in person next time.
- [64:46]
Nathan Walters
I would, too. I would love to do it. And hopefully we can meet up in Oklahoma when you're here. I know we've tried once. Well, with your team, we tried once and you were in and out. And. And I would love to meet up because it is. It's such a. You're right. It is a state with a pool to it. It has a magnetic pull and there's a lot of people that don't know it, but, I mean, I was very good friends with a buddy that's from Canada and we have a minor league hockey team, and he ended up here. And guess what? He lives here. And that's the way it is. You end up in Oklahoma once and you have. You think about it a certain type of way, then you end up here a couple of times and you're like, man, I'm kind of intrigued by this place.
- [65:23]
Mike Rowe
I assume there's a beautiful website filled with your handiwork somewhere people could go if by chance they decide. You know what? Mike made Oklahoma sound pretty good and those homes are beautiful. Maybe we'll just move there and see if Nathan can't build us a place.
- [65:35]
Nathan Walters
There is it's Matt Better spell so very M A S S A R O S S a dot com and my marketing degree came out on the second S of the S Masarosa. The Rosa is only supposed to have 1s but it looked in balance so I added a second S so that it was balanced and nobody knows the difference.
- [65:58]
Mike Rowe
That's the perfect place to land the plane. Keep doing what you're doing. Nathan Walters it's beautiful work and your story is terrific. I appreciate you sharing it.
- [66:06]
Nathan Walters
Awesome. Thank you. Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.
- [66:09]
Mike Rowe
Anytime. See you. All right guys, if you dig the.
- [66:12]
Podcast Voice
Podcast that we do, won't you leave a quick 5 star review? I really hate to ask much more of you but please subscribe oh please subscribe, please subscribe all we need are five little lousy stars Tell us what.
- [66:29]
Mike Rowe
You like and who you are Then.
- [66:31]
Podcast Voice
Share us with your friends down at the bar and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then subscribe and then save and then subscribe and then subscribe and then sub and then subscribe and then subscribe.
- [67:10]
Mike Rowe
The Way.
- [67:10]
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