HEATHER EWING: The CRE RUNdown
Are you intrigued by Commercial Real Estate? Join Heather Ewing, CCIM each week as she dives into CRE trends, Deals, and Developments throughout Madison, WI. Learn the crucial role of Mindset in CRE and Marathons! Success leaves Clues.
HEATHER EWING: The CRE RUNdown
Ep. 51 Margo Masri - From Financial Adversity to Empowerment and Transformative Leadership
What if transforming your financial stress into empowerment was more achievable than you thought? Join us as we sit down with the inspiring Margo Masry, a formidable CFO from New Jersey who recounts her personal journey from financial adversity to leading others toward fiscal empowerment. Margo's story challenges the perception of finance as a burdensome necessity, demonstrating instead how it can be both approachable and transformative. Through her authentic approach to finance and taxes, Margo reveals how aligning your financial strategies with genuine intentions can lead to a more fulfilling personal and professional life.
Mindset plays a crucial role in how we approach our financial goals, and Margo shares insights into how aligning actions with intentions can revolutionize your relationship with money. We explore the intricacies of mindset and neuroscience, shedding light on how our conscious and unconscious behaviors shape our experiences. Together, we discuss practical strategies for setting intentions and managing influences, highlighting the evolving impact of AI on consumer awareness. Margo's insights into avoiding stagnation and fostering growth through intentional living offer a refreshing perspective on achieving financial success.
Navigating the complexities of modern finance doesn't have to be overwhelming. Margo guides us through the challenges of staying current in the commercial real estate sector, emphasizing the importance of creative strategies and resourcefulness over substantial upfront capital. From handling years of backlog to embracing the balance between intense work and rest, Margo's experience offers a blueprint for achieving professional growth. The episode concludes with powerful stories of personal transformation, underscoring the importance of aligning personal and professional aspirations for a truly fulfilling life. Connect with Margo on LinkedIn for continued insights and support.
Welcome to Heather Ewing, the CRE Rundown. I am your host, Heather Ewing, and today I am a delightful guest for you. It is none other than Margo Masry. She is the heartfelt CFO, Margo welcome.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me. How are you?
Speaker 1:I'm doing well. It's a little chilly here in Wisconsin, but that's all part of the charm, right?
Speaker 2:Oh, it's really cold here too. Where are you?
Speaker 1:remind me.
Speaker 2:We just moved to New Jersey actually, and here I think it's like 12 degrees. It might've even been like negative eight this morning.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, it's. It's definitely the time of the year I always joke. You know that it it just helps you to make your roots go deeper and stronger right.
Speaker 2:Literally.
Speaker 1:Yeah, definitely so. We've known each other on LinkedIn, I think, for about a year or so, but for those in my community that haven't met you online or in person, can you share a little bit more about yourself?
Speaker 2:in person. Can you share a little bit more about yourself? I'm a mom of two. I live in New Jersey. I do a lot of fun things on the side I love yoga, I love swimming, I love to learn more and have like an open mindset. Love nature, cooking, shopping who else doesn't Right? My lifelong purpose is to help business owners and individuals around the money, business and tax and all of the in between, which is where my company has evolved over the past 20 years, and I just have a passion for giving people the idea that so much more could happen with a dollar than what they really think is actually possible.
Speaker 1:Definitely there's a lot of room for leverage in that right.
Speaker 2:Literally.
Speaker 1:So, backing up, how did you get into this right Like what? Was it a just an inner calling? Did you meet someone? How did it all start?
Speaker 2:Growing up life was really, really difficult. I saw how money was such a hardship with my parents and it just seemed to always be like I call it now like low level emotions, anger, frustration, sadness, like things really to bring out a lot of hardship. And one day I was in the store with my dad and I wanted this jacket and all the cool kids had this jacket and I thought it was going to be my lucky day having this jacket. We got to the register and it seemed that it was still a little bit more because you add the tax. It was hard for my dad and I saw that face on him and I was like I never want to see that on him or another human Again. Everything around me was always showing how it was hard. I saw that tax was hard money and I was like you know what I'm going to make it that I did have this, that people think that money is fun, money is intimate, and that's really how it began.
Speaker 1:Which would be a huge mind shift. Right, because it'd be interesting if you took a basic poll right. You hear, you know, some of the top issues of life is one public speaking, two financials. Right, it's really at the root of a lot of challenges, or, conversely, a lot of great giving and other things. So how did you help to kind of break down this massive topic?
Speaker 2:You nailed it. So breaking down the challenges and also being public about it was actually two struggles in itself, and when I found myself in the struggle because there's this complex around when you're in the field that you should know everything, you have all the answers, and it's like this magic wand that you have that poof people come and you're going to give them all the answers, the prosperity that they're looking for and all the things. However, not until you take the steps and actions does things really evolve. So as my life evolved and things were happening and it was happening on autopilot and on auto repeat I was like wow, these are processes and I could continue to evolve and showing up how my life was. Clients were asking me for things. My first client was actually a famous designer and he really just gave me this like wild opportunity to dive in and I said to him I was like I don't really know much and I was like in college and he was like I want you, margo, and it was all about because I had the skills and the involvement. And really communicating it to people was a separate thing and I'll be honest with you. I have a lot of gratitude towards my first coach and writer for this, because my coach helped me find this writer to really get my voice out there around it. And when you see people receiving it and needing it because you think it's taboo, you want to spread it more and sharing that people could really align with where they are and not feel like money and tax is hard or that gorilla and in the room and really see it evolve over time.
Speaker 2:There's nothing better. I don't sell people. I solve problems. I literally look to when people have the. There's nothing better. I don't sell people, I solve problems. I literally look to when people have the pain. There's always an education or a value or something that we have to give and it aligns and usually people do. But the how was really just sharing and living in it, because I'm the example, my kids live it and what you want is probably what, something else, that, what people have. So, and as a leader, people saw that I was living that life and clients over time it just grew, which is like it's just magical in itself because, uh, I was probably the struggling bookkeeper to now really having beautiful clients, a team and just constantly people looking to evolve, which is really what it's about.
Speaker 1:Definitely. And there's a couple of things that really popped up for me as you were talking. One is authenticity. I think so frequently it is shining the light in the scariest spaces of life that we do uncover those deeper levels, those deeper meanings, and really flesh out the challenges that we're experiencing. And I think in taking those bold steps, you, one, help yourself transition to a different point. But then, two, you're also able to share that. And two, you're also able to share that.
Speaker 1:And I think you know I don't remember if it was Jim Rohn or who had came up with a statement you know something that luck favors the prepared. And with that first client that you were seeing, you know you're kind of like why me? He saw within you and I would think too, a lot of times, so much of it is when your ethics align. A lot of times, so much of it is when your ethics align, I think people give you more opportunities also because they know that you will be forthright, you'll be honest, and that they are in good hands and that you will figure it out. So I think you saw many aspects of your leadership in those early days that are really flourishing, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2:Authenticity is just really the name of the game, because if you don't share it in that way, people are not going to follow you and lead and your life's purpose is not going to evolve.
Speaker 2:And when I really did first share I mean I also was learning through debt at a time I learned to understand credit card and loans, how to use it properly, however, without being proactive, like you just said and you have intentions, the rest align. And being a mom and being a feminine leader, you know, and this really does have its components, because the feminine, along with the masculine, is really a big thing, like if you think about Michelle Obama and Hubby and how they align together, there's a lot of things that changed because of that. So, having a feminine CFO at your fingertips I mean, our tax manager is male there's just a whole different paradigm that could happen. And I will say if you meet yourself where you're at, authenticity won't be hard. And it hurts me so much when I hear that people think authenticity is hard because we're then in our own way and that's the first step to any evolvement around money, business and tax.
Speaker 1:Oh, definitely Right. Well, it's interesting. Oh, definitely Right. Well, it's interesting. I don't know if you've seen that there's an assessment that's going around and it's really quick. I think it's like 50 questions. You just answer with a gut feel but then it tells you youronounced his name. Sorry about that, chris, but anyways, you know, speaking about taking that deep dive and uncovering some of those different things, that's where the magic is and it's. You know, I always say it's ugly before it's beautiful. It's flushing out the old for the new path that lays ahead. So, with all of this, you know balancing of the masculine, feminine energies, speaking from the heart also, you know understanding all of the numbers, all of those important factors as well. How do you see mindset having a role in all of this?
Speaker 2:Mindset is huge. It's huge. Over the past five years, I would say I took a deeper dive into it, because what I saw was is that I was acting robotic and not from an aligned standpoint. And when you act from a robotic of what you're told, it's a very different way of operating. You will max out at a point. It's a very different way of operating. You will max out at a point. So if people tell you how to make money, if people tell you what to do, versus you really feel connected to it. It's very different.
Speaker 2:So mindset and really knowing what you want to bring in and what your fears are is really the first step. I'll tell you a story. I just worked with this mom and she just recently lost her husband and when she first conversed with me, you can feel in her the grief. And then when she came back, she was like ready to sign on and she was like I just couldn't get the mindset going. But that's all we talked about when we had our VIP date together, because she had this beliefs around things that were really in her way. However, what was really in her way is that that those maybe just are not your people Right From there. So much more open to open up to her ideal client and things that she needed to bring in her ideal schedule.
Speaker 2:For me, mindset every day. And then it intertwines throughout the day. You know, throughout social and all the different blogs we see the perfect morning routine is going to really do beyond your wildest dreams. Right, If you do in the morning that hour or so or whatever it is. If you do in the morning that hour or so or whatever it is, if you don't intertwine and intermingle throughout the day, it's like as if it doesn't happen. So something simple like setting an alarm clock on your phone to see are you aligning with the frequency of what you're wanting to bring in? Because if we're not on that same frequency of what we want to bring in, that's exactly the reason why it's not. Or something like I want to make 60,000 a month, which is like a random number, but you really don't even know how your own budget is, of what you really need to bring in.
Speaker 2:So meeting yourself where you're at and creating, you know, frameworks around this, whether it's like I talked about before swimming, yoga, going into nature I mean, I kill the trees. Forgive me because I journal from here to tomorrow with all my deep dives and plans, dives and plan. But there's so much stuff, but the most important thing I want to share here around mindset is that it's who you're learning it from too. If you don't feel the person who you're learning from you're really aligning with, to like a core degree and like we talk about the values, then it's something to think about. It could be the coach is challenging you. Then it's something to think about. It could be the coach is challenging you, but you want to monitor what you're listening to all over the place, who you're following.
Speaker 2:If you open up your social and someone is triggering you, you want to remove that. It might be at times fun, but it how long are you taking to get out of that trigger that is washing away income, hours of your day that you could be generating new actions and new things. So mindset just throughout the day. I can't stress it enough. It even starts the night before, setting your intentions how you want to feel when you wake up. What do you want to bring in when you close the day, asking yourself this question did I squeeze the time out of the day? Did I squeeze the lemon of the juice out of the day. Yeah, or did I just like la-di-da you?
Speaker 1:know, and I think what you know, what you're saying beautifully, is to live intentionally, and the way you live intentionally is to connect with the feelings that you want to have to who you want to become. You know, in your example of 60k a month, what does that look like, right? Where are you spending it? Where are you donating it? How are you investing it? You know there's so many different ways to peel that back and make it more real. And then you, you know, you break the number down further, by weeks, by hours, things of that nature, so that it's, it's an easier nut to crack if you're not there.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I think, too, with that intentional living. I couldn't agree more. I joke that I went through an early, early midlife crisis in my 20s after a really bad car accident, but with that too, the beautiful gift was getting into meditation and really understanding the importance of how you start your day, end your day. And also with neuroscience, I find that extremely fascinating, right? Because we're all wired similarly but yet different. We have different perceptions, backgrounds, all of that similarly, but yet different. We have different perceptions, backgrounds, all of that.
Speaker 1:And I think it's you know, there's, there's the scientific stats to prove it of the waking hours, the sleeping hours and how that all affects the conscious, unconscious, and it's kind of like anything right? How do you maximize the performance? And we want to do that in our businesses and our lives and our joy, our love and in every arena. But if, if the focus is to get by, you're going to miss out on all of those different elements that you're sharing to up level and to continue going to our next level and beyond. So firm believer in everything that you're saying, margo.
Speaker 2:I love it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so shifting a little bit into you know what you're seeing in the market. Also, how do you see things evolving from a tax perspective and anything else that might jump out at you, like whether it's AI or otherwise?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I feel like people are becoming more conscious, they're wanting to be more involved. Ai is kind of like when a lot of accounting apps came out where people thought it was going to replace a lot of things it could complement. It never replaces. I remember when, you know, there were so many apps that were coming out back to back in the accounting industry around the receipts. The actual tax market evolved and people were like, oh, I don't need to hire you, and da-da-dee, da-da-da, but then they got into worse scenarios because it's apps that they really just never learned. And AI is the same thing. Nothing replaces the human component. Nothing replaces intention or being proactive. What I see is definitely evolving is that people wanting to be involved more. However, what's not happening is that that literal jump of that step of I'm going to do it, it's that it's a higher inquiry, but it's still like on the sideline versus being in there. And I would say that's mainly because of the fear of money, when really money just wants to be intimate with you in terms of like, what do you want to bring out in the world? What's your reason? Hey, let me go find it for you. Let's align In the real estate industry.
Speaker 2:I mean, the hard part here in the CRE world is that a lot of it is kind of like it's always catching up and it's not in the present time, and that's one of the core reasons of why people don't really ever really save money or get out of tax debt or back credit card debt and things, because they're always in behind, they're never in the current time.
Speaker 2:Our process and our firm is being in the current time, in the current realm of time, and I can't say it enough like the average client will come like two to six years of bookkeeping and tax returns, so they're all exactly one client. Now we're back. I think we're like in 15 with her and um to her. The reasons were hard at the time and right until things evolved and now it compiled. However, it's the right person to work through with her one year at a time and to prioritize it, and that's the key is that you may have a lot to do, but it's the person that's going to take you through it and get to what I call the garden, and the garden is the place of where you're not in the mud, holding that backpack of all of this stuff that you're looking to work through and like you're really holding on to, like with a tight grip.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 1:Well, I think so much of commercial real estate and life is really taking those big chunks whatever it might be right, like your example, I would say, is definitely a big chunk, and breaking it into smaller amounts, and I think that's that's one of the steps.
Speaker 1:But it's really the predecessor to that step is finding the right professional for whatever you need help in right, because then you have all the years 20 plus years of experience, of knowledge that you know what to do, what not to do, great resources for ancillary type of needs that they might have, and it just makes it so much easier. But I think what happens is people shut themselves down before they even begin. Same with you know the brokerage world of they think that they have to have 200k to do anything and it's like oh, no, no, there's so many other options to get where you want to go. Yes, that is one, but there's a lot of creative ways to merge the gap. And so, you know, I think it's one of those, almost like a plea for people of one, find the right resources to find how you can work with them and three, start just breaking it down into actionable chunks literally just.
Speaker 2:I always say take the goal and then work backwards from there. If you want to see it in three years, six months, 12 months, whatever it is, break it down into from, like, a three-year goal to a 12-month goal and into a weekly goal, and then break it down into actions. The most common question around that I always get is I don't know what to ask. I don't know what to do. Right, everyone has to start from somewhere. So see where it goes, you know. Take a whiteboard and see what happens. Open up a Google Doc and see what happens.
Speaker 2:If you're out there and you don't have the cash and you want to do something, then how could you find the cash? Maybe it's not 200,000, maybe it's a hundred thousand, maybe it's 50,000, but we all have to start somewhere. If you were to tell me like now my firm is a full service firm, 20 years ago I would have been like that's a wild idea, because I'm a bookkeeper and now we do talks and it's very common that clients come for the whole shebang, right, right, and let alone speaking and talking like I am now. I just would have said like you're just wild on lemonade. So Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, it's. It's interesting, isn't it, how things shape and evolve. And with that, I'm sure you know, there was a lot of stress at different times and stress is inevitable, right, Kind of like. When I hear balance, I'm like balance is not seven or eight hours a day In my opinion. Balance to me is like you're going to have times in business where there's a lot of hours and it might seem a little wild, but it's for a certain amount of time, and then then you take a, you know, four day vacation or something like that, where it's more. So I see it as sprints. What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2:It's for sure. Sprints, yeah, it's almost like how you see your calendar and like pockets of time, like I have certain days I do things and it's literally for that amount of time because you know what you're gauging yourself for that activity and then making it happen. And what happens is is from there you're like, oh wow, did it, but you could do it again, exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I have a feeling like we could talk for hours at a time, margo, but as we wrap this up, what would you say living fully means to you? This is always the way I end each podcast and it's one of my favorite questions. So what does living fully mean to you?
Speaker 2:You know, when I saw it on your questions, I thought about it a little bit. Yeah, I was like you know, because our podcast with you and I got to late a little bit and it actually helps me because it's actually the perfect time to answer this. You know, I just recovered from surgery and I had ankle surgery and it was. However, I look at the time and because of what I do, I was able to be fully in the recovery. I was able to really have everything I needed. So, for me, living fully is that I'm not. I'm living with what I want. Also because if I need to do something, it's there. My family was taken care of and my team was taken care of so that I can do what I need.
Speaker 2:So it becomes a choice. There's no guilt and it's an option. It's not by default, it's not by somebody saying like you have to do this Right. It's living fully in your heart and what you want to do. It's not. It's it's trying to step into that fear and really making things happen that you want to do. You know, we just moved into New Jersey. My daughter got into a five-year program for architecture and in terms of wealth development for me, for my personal life. It actually evolved me into another level because I started to rent my home and now doing other things. So when you tap into one thing, you realize how so much more can happen for you between having a healthy body, healthy mind and really putting it all together. So if you're living not living fully out there and there's something you want to do, just get it on the calendar.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly. It sounds simple, doesn't it?
Speaker 2:But that's how things happen, and put a picture too, like put a picture with it so that you see it to look forward to Right.
Speaker 1:Well, and then you feel it right, so it becomes more real.
Speaker 2:You can't forget about that. You got to feel it, and then it becomes like day after day where you get to cravings. It's like it's coming closer Right.
Speaker 2:The excitement builds. Yeah, I mean this move. It probably took almost two years to really make it happen. However, like just, things shifted and so much more evolved here because of what we wanted to happen. It was really being intentional around what my daughter wanted, what I was looking for. I cared less about myself, because what she was looking for I was totally in and wanted to help make that happen, and life just took off. You, you know business in a different way. Opportunities, they say, which means like you, you would change your place, you change your luck, and I was already happy and this just brought in different things.
Speaker 2:So, um, I love it, save for medical, and I just I want to close with a story. We have a client who she came to me last year and she has MS. She has very profitable business and she was worried about her MS, how things were going to evolve and people default to insurance and all of these things, which is a good basic step. What happened with her is that she didn't really have the proper basic bookkeeping and accounting to see her cash flow. The surprise was she needed to take a bigger W-2, so extra cash for her, which really was her medical savings. So we stacked, taking care of her medical. She had a health savings account. She took care of her family and then she had a health savings account. She took care of her family and then she had a more peaceful time off. Oh, definitely, this is an example of living fully and how an accounting and tax system could stack and work for you I love it.
Speaker 1:Well, that is perfect, margo. Thank you so much for joining me. It was a delight and I look forward to connecting you with others and, speaking of which, what's the best way for people to connect with you?
Speaker 2:Please see us each day on LinkedIn. We have a daily post. Each morning we post blogs, infographs, videos and all of the fun things. Feel free to DM me. I love voice texts from all our followers or whatever suits you, and I look forward to hearing from you around our social and anything else you might need.
Speaker 1:Excellent. Thanks so much, Margo.
Speaker 2:Talk soon. Thanks again All right, bye-bye. Bye.