Overcoming Alcohol On The Journey To Wealth & Sobriety w/ Thomas Bepko

I didn't have a coach, dude, I didn't have people to push. I had God and I had my fucking little boy that wanted out. You keep pushing, you're gonna break your way into somewhere. You just don't stop. You know what a billionaire told me once? Bro, I've chased a dream with everybody. I was able to sit with a billionaire. You know what he told me? You wanna make money. Don't have money. Keep your back against the wall. I can't forget that little room and me crying, as a little boy dude, of, like, what the fuck am I gonna do? Like, but I'm gonna get a job and I'm gonna figure it out. I'm gonna stay sober. When people say this dude, he's never gonna stay sober, okay, wow, maybe that's a bad part of my ego, but if somebody challenges me, I'm not giving up till I prove that fucking dude wrong.

The journey to wealth is a long walk and some may walk quicker than others, but what good is sprinting to the finish line if you pass out when you cross it? On Walk to Wealth, we enlighten and empower young adults to build wealthy, abundant lives. They say the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step and your first step starts right now. This is Walk to Wealth with your host, John Mendez.

Hey everyone, welcome back to the Walk to Wealth podcast. If you're tuning in on YouTube or any of the podcast directories, make sure to do yourself one teeny, tiny little favor. Make sure to give us a follow, because I don't want you to miss out on any of the amazing guests I got coming on this year. Without further ado, let's get right into this one. Tom is for anyone who hasn't had the pleasure of the opportunity to get to know you yet brother man, tell us your elevator pitch. You know who are you or what do you do? My name is.

Tomas Beppko and I feel like I'm an entrepreneur of many types. You know, I started my whole career. I learned everything in the mortgage business. I learned everything real estate. I actually learned a lot about life in the mortgage, mortgage business. So I pay homage all the time and I'm grateful for my mortgage career. Then I became a real estate broker and you know I tell the story a lot being in real estate, being a real estate broker, was my way out, right, because mortgages when you hear mortgage, you're like, oh, that job must suck. It's not actually the best career in the world but it's not for everybody. When I became real estate broker, I became a better loan officer, right, and I was able to help more people on both sides of the ball and then fast forward there. I started investing. I invested early in my career and I would learn what not to do in investing, but what I did was I continued with mortgage that I can't even the real estate, and now I'm investor, right. So everything real estate. But I am an entrepreneur, I like to look at everything. I like to help a lot of people, right, I like helping people. That's not a pitch, it's just what I do genuinely, you know and today, hopefully, we can help somebody with their career, with their life, and that's my goal of today's podcast. I want to be able to help somebody.

So I love starting off this way, man. Take us back in the time machine, man. What was little Thomas like? What was it like growing up in your house? So I think you're from CT, right? I'm not mistaken. What was that like? So?

I'm from Fairport or Bridgefield, right, I came, my parents were divorced, debbie dad. I was born in DC and I moved to Bridgeport with my grandparents and my mom and my mother was a single mother. And you know it's funny that even though there was a letter T in the word mortgage, I had no idea what a mortgage was because we lived in my grandmother's house and then when my mom got her shit together when I was 15, she bought a house. I'm like my mom makes $25,000. How do you, how do you, buy a house that was $90,000 in Fairfield? And my mother really my mother grew up in Bridgeport and wanted to get me into Fairfield school systems. So she did whatever she could to get me out of Bridgeport into the Fairfield school system. So I got in the Fairfield school system young and I went through the Fairfield school system. I wasn't a college guy, I wasn't a school guy. I fucking hated school. To be completely honest, you know I want people to, to people that work with me, people who I help. Whatever your why is like, just stick with it, whether you're a handyman, whether you're a janitor, whether you're an agent, whether you're an influencer, as long as you give 100% and you do not stop, no matter what life takes at you or what life does to you. Just have the goal and don't stop until you reach it right and then come up with another goal. And school wasn't in my cards, you know. I was the alternative schools. I actually dropped out at 15 or 16 because I figured you could. I couldn't get in trouble with dropping on to 16 at the alternative school, wasn't? I made a lot of bad decisions younger, you know I hung out with the wrong kids. My mother told me you hang with trouble till you're going to get in trouble. My, you don't know what you're talking about. These are my boys. They'll go to war with me. They will die with me and you know they differ me. You know they differ me. They got me in more trouble. You've got to drive Right Then. And you know you, you couldn't tell me that as an adolescent. So I ended up, you know, taking the wrong path. My grandmother passed away when I was 18. And the one thing she wanted me to do is to graduate high school, dude. So you know what I did. I don't know what. I hated school. I went back to another program in school and I graduated. I did five years in high school. I did two summer schools and I was able to graduate. And to this day I still have nightmares that I didn't graduate high school. But I did and but I worked. I worked since I was 14 years old man. You know I liked money. Right, I had two jobs. I would, I would set up the pizza place, I would be a line cook and then when I was 16, I got my driver's license that I would deliver. So I would set up in the morning, get those hours in, then I'd deliver a night. And that's one of the keys to being a good broker in Fairfield County because I know the streets. I was driving pizza around in Fairfield and Bridgeport and Westport, so I understood the streets and I understood like the house and I was like, damn, these are nice houses. You know I wanted to live one day in these houses in Greenfield Hill, fairfield, and guess what? Now I live there. Ironically, and you know that's because I would drive around and dream and I'd set the goal like dude, I'm going to get one of these houses one day making $4.50 an hour Plus it right, subconsciously I was coming up with a goal and you know I there's a lot of drugs and alcohol in my story and like I'm just going to keep it real. You know my dad died of alcoholism, an abusive alcohol. My mother cleaned her shit up. Right Me. I got into trouble early with drugs and alcohol. Right, alcohol was my thing. You know I drink a lot, man. I partied. I partied a ton, dude. And you know my mother got sober when she bought that house. She got her life together 15. She got sober Me. That's when I started Mess with weed and then mess with alcohol. And one another one thing my mother told me is, dude, you need to put down the alcohol. Don't drink, don't drink. Guess what. One of those other things I should have listened to back in the day and I didn't. Now I got 13 years sober. I haven't drank in about 13 years, but we'll get to that in the story. You know I didn't know what I wanted to do. I knew I wanted to work and I wanted to get out of Bridgeport and Stairfield so bad, because this is when people were it was. It was in the 90s, bro, and the 90s were a lot different than now and the late nineties, early 2000s. I had to get out, dude. I joined the army and I got us far away from Bridgeport. So I moved back to Bridgeport after high school, moved back to Bridgeport and I wanted to get out, dude. So I joined the military to get out of here, you know. And I still had that entrepreneurial spirit. The army wasn't for me. I wasn't going to reenlist, I wasn't going to ever do it again. I don't regret it, but I'll never do it again. Never saw work time, but I did train. I went infantry. I saw the cool videos. I did all the top training exercises, got willing. I, you know, I did my time. I got out. I didn't have to serve any wartime and when I got out I immediately got it into the mortgage business. I was lucky, right. I ended up on my God Well, I can go to college. Now, Dude, I barely graduated high school, right, oh me, I was not going to college. I moved back to Bridgeport, went through one winter, started hanging out with those friends again that I got an army. I said peace. I went on an entrepreneurial journey with my best friend at the time who lived in San Francisco, and we started clothing on. And I was working three jobs, dude. I had the fashion business. I had a taste in the fashion business that's super competitive. I'm not really artsy, I kind of have the eye for it, right. But I was still that entrepreneurial spirit. I was working three jobs I was delivering flowers, I was bartending, waiting, serving, busing tables at night and I was selling hats out of our bag because I was an entrepreneur. We started a fashion company and I didn't want to do t-shirts, I had these little wallets and I had these accessories and these hats that I was making and the hats started to stick. So the hats I was selling out of my bag while I was delivering flowers and talking to people at the bar, trying to get my hat company off the ground. And I remember I made one connection. I was dating a girl and she was like dude, you got to try mortgage. I'm like what is mortgage? I didn't really understand how my mom could afford a mortgage. We didn't make any money. She got her shit together. She bought a house. I'm like, dude, what is a mortgage? I didn't even know it was M-O-R-T-G-A-G and I say when I bring in new load offices, I'm like it's about mortgage. Right, you don't even know there's a letter T in the word mortgage and there is. And she's like you got to meet these guys. They're young, they're successful. She's like they're driven like you, but you're working three jobs and these guys got Mazuradis, bmws and Benz's and I'm like, I mean, dude, I don't even got a car. And I came to Florida, san Francisco, Dude, I got three jobs and San Francisco was still one of the most expensive cities in the country. Right, so I got the interview and I'll do it. I'll never forget I don't tell this story much and hear this out. I got I was so nervous the night before for my interview I walked to like this deli that was open and I got some bad food. Dude, I got food poisoning the day before my interview to my mortgage career. And this is kind of how my life goes, right, like life always throws these super crazy challenges at me. Before that, that pivotal point in my life or changed my life in being in mortgage, I bought a three piece suit from a thrift shop for like $5. It was a three piece suit. I had a white shirt on. I had my mom send me a tie from TJ Maxx Because I didn't really have the money for a tie. I was still working, but rent was so expensive, life was so expensive. I didn't have much cash flow, had my tie from TJ Maxx and my mom's ship from Bridgeport Right, and then I had a three piece suit on. I got. I got from a thrift store in downtown San Francisco and, dude, I'm so sick I'm throwing up on the way they interviewed. I'm like, dude, I'm not not making this interview. I'm like I don't care, like I'm going, I'm going to show up sick, I'm going to give it my all. And for me, like as an entrepreneur, I give everything my all. You know I could be the addict and the alcoholic in me, but I give everything 150%. Dude, if I'm not in it, I'm not doing anything, but if I'm in it, I'm giving you my all. So I showed up. These dudes are like what's wrong with you. I'm like, dude, honestly, like this is an excuse, like I think I got food poisoning. I was in San Francisco. I hate something bad. He's like all right, I hope he opens the door and it's like a boiler room and I'm at, I'm in San Francisco Union Square, at the top of Union Square, and there's this boiler room and I'm super intimidated. I'm like sick and moosey. I think I just like got my head rushing because I was so nervous, like that guy rid of my food poisoning. I was nervous, sick right. And they one dude sales manager interviews me. Second guy interviews me and now the owner comes out. I'm like I'm fucking shaking at this point. He's like you look at my resume. He's like you do all this stuff. Like how long is it going to take you to learn mortgage? I said, dude, when can I get a paycheck? And he goes you're hired, 100% commission. I'm fucking hired. I even know there's a letter of tea in mortgage. I go but, dude, like I'm really sick right now, like I start tomorrow. He's like, yeah, come back tomorrow. So I had the food poisoning, I started and I haven't quit mortgage and I was in like October of 2005. And it's going to be I'm going to be coming up 18 years this October, 19 years. I mean, I'm coming up on 20 years, man.

That's amazing. You have a really big story. I want to try it and you know, decompart a couple of it because there's a lot. So you have a. It's a lot, bro. I got a good story. Yeah, so I think it's something that resonates with a lot of people. It's like for me I grew up in the projects, right, With nine of us in the two bedroom. Right, we're still on section eight to this day. Right, it's food stamps, EBT, all that stuff, you name it whatever. We have a car. Growing up, walking everywhere. Like my dad was also an alcoholic, my mom suffered from depression and anxiety and no one around me really knew, like pretty much anything about exact mortgages, anything about money, finances, credit card, like none of that stuff was talked about. That's all. Thank God for YouTube University, because, man, that's that kind that saved my life. You know YouTube, books and podcasts, man, but I want to ask you because that's what you hear about on the bus, yeah, yeah, I want to ask you to because I'm really curious as to they figure out where your head was at, because, despite you know you going through the upbringing that you went through a lot of people could have pulled the victim card and be like man. You know why God has it out for me. The system is set up against me. I'm not meant to succeed Like you, but you was grinding throughout that whole process Like what kind of helped you to like have that mentality that y'all got to get this money I got to?

get to it because I knew that money was my only way out. Bro, and, as you know, as fucking narrow minded as that sounds, right, like, yeah, we, I grew up on section eight. They didn't. My friends didn't know what it's. My wife's a therapist. She tells me I suffer from poor kid, from Fairfield syndrome. Right, because I was around a lot of kids that were in even upper middle. I weren't what, we were lower, lower class. I was lower middle. Right, I live in apartments, dude, I, we didn't have a house. I told you, we eventually got the house and I got out and it was just the challenge, bro, and I just wanted what other people had, but I didn't, we didn't have a handout. And I look, I was in therapy and psychology and like all this shit, young Ray, like I had, count my counselors at counselors, I had shrink, you know, they always thought there's something wrong with me and I'm like I just knew how to work and I knew how to hustle. But I was always in the people business. I like to connect, I like to connect with people. I would talk, I was outgoing, you know, I, but I knew that if I could work, there was some way of. I just kept my head down and I stay consistent with something. Something's going to pop Right. And what's funny is you asked me that I helped the dude today. I was like, look in the mortgage business people. I'm like, dude, you know you do. When you get pissed, you fucking make money, right. You work and you talk and you fin, you hustle your way out. I don't know anywhere else to do it, like you could sit there and feel bad and play the victim. I didn't want to play the victim, I wanted to fuck out. So if I sat there and I felt sorry for myself, guess what I wasn't doing? I wasn't working my way out. I mean, I joined the military to get out and that didn't work Right. So I'm like well, army didn't do it, the government can't do it. You know, I went to. I went to, I got arrested. I got arrested, I got locked up a few times. I was young dude, I was stupid, right. But I realized later in life, like as a young kid, you don't realize the opportunities you have. And even before I joined the army, dude, one of my good friends, he's like, bro, you're joining the army. He's like why don't you just do real estate? Well, my boys are making money doing really like I'll show you all connect. You're like real estate. I'm like my, my great aunt's best friend in the agent. She's like 70. I'm like I don't want to do that shit. Right. Fast forward Mortgage and real estate is what I was doing when I, as soon as I got back and I don't know, man and you just, I just knew one thing that I could work my way out, dude and hustle my way out, and that's what I did, and I don't know if that's a good or bad thing, that's just my story. You know, to this day I'm still awesome away. I don't know where I'm getting out of, but I'm still pushing. Look, I had started to play the victim anybody can take. That's the easy way, right? Yeah, for me I like the challenge, like I like when people talk and say, oh, dude, he's never gonna be anything, he dropped out of school. You know what that does. That drives me, bro. They hate pushes me and we'll fast forward into my sobriety and we'll get into that. But I knew that I could work and they say, as near-minded as it was, I knew how to work and I knew how to connect with people and I know how to talk, right? You couldn't teach me that. And fucking fearful high school or the co-op or Bullard Havens tech right, fairfield prep, like you, you can't teach me that right? What I did was I wanted to hustle my ass out. I wanted to make an impact. I wanted to get be different. I was always different. If everybody's going left, I was going right. If everybody's saying, do this, I'm like you know what, I'm going the other way, because that's just who I was. I don't know the good thing, I was a bad thing. But I saw that, look, I wanted to buy Tommy Hilfiger clothes when I was 15 years old. What did I do? I had to work. If I want a brand new car to deliver pizza, I want the system in my shit in my 90, in the 90s, I want a new place. What I could do, I could work. So if I got to get three jobs, if I could hustle, I can make money and something's gonna pop Right and I can meet somebody. And it's not what you know to. You know, and when I told you when I got on the mortgage business, it was because of who I knew. God willing, god, god, throw me some. Life has thrown me bad shots. It's throwing me great shots, but I've taken advantage of every opportunity that I've had. And you need to take advantage Because, you don't know, this podcast could change my life right, this podcast could change your life. Something can happen. We can be able to help the right person and we can get the message and we can help somebody, and that trajectory can change at the Drop of a dime. So why not give your all to everything? And that's my story and that's me 100%.

I agree with that 100%, because one of the best things that I learned is that you don't have to be correct, man, you just have to be directionally correct. As long as you're moving the right opera and in the right direction, things will figure out and pan out and all in it. But I if there's another thing on that love Russell Brunson. He talked about this one time. He was like man, are you a good steward of the ideas the guy blesses you with? Because all these ideas that we get aren't ours is Ideas that we're being blessed and so like. When we don't act on something and five minutes later and you're five months later, someone else down the block, you know there has that same business opportunity you thought about months ago. It's because that idea was never yours to begin with. You fumble that opportunity when it was given to you and a lot of people don't act on the ideas and their gut feelings when they need to. And the people that do, such as yourself, man, it's like it's just compounds and compounds to get to where place you're at now. It's like you're proud but you can't even recognize that you used to be way back. When is there a whole new panel? So I want to ask you so you said around 2005, that's when you got, you know, you got the, the mortgage job and that's when you're like, really start to pivot man. So take us through that time period. So after you got over your food poisoning, now what was it like starting off in a hundred percent commission? A lot of people nowadays is like, if they're not getting paid minimum minimum wage, at least they don't want it. They don't want to be, you know, be at stake, for if you don't catch anything, you don't, you don't eat, right. So that's how it used to be man, you catch what you kill and that's what you eat, and you eat what you kill you eat what you kill, right, just like.

Just like back in the day, right, if the, the, the animals didn't eat, or the gorillas or apes where we came from, we didn't eat, we didn't kill it and we didn't eat, right, if we couldn't pull it from the ground For me. I work better at my own leisure again. That's why I'm an entrepreneur. It's very hard for me to work for somebody else in the mortgage business. Right, yourself, employed, but by the laws you have to be a wage owner. So it's still hundred percent commission. It's a hundred percent commission. Hanging my license somewhere. I still work for myself, right, because nobody's paying me to be there. You feel me? Yeah, I work better under those terms. I did not realize that until I was the first one in the office and I was the last one to leave. The top guy. He had fair gommel belly, a fair gommel cuff links, a fair gommel shoes. He had a fair gommel tie. He drove a Maserati. What did I do? I sat with that motherfucker and I learned mortgage. Why? Because he was the top person in that company and I wanted what he had. So why not just go to him and say what he says and do what he tells me to do and be his little apprentice and then take what I learned from him and then make it my own. I remember in October, september, october, whenever I started in mortgage, it's about what's your year to date, how much? What is your year to date on your W2? How much money you make. And I remember my first goal was like dude, I had no money and I was a hundred percent commissioned. And now if I couldn't work the other jobs, bro, so I had no income coming in right, I couldn't be. I had to. I had to be in my phone, on the phones from nine to nine. I was single and guess what people pick up the phone from after work? Right, and this is also in 2005. Tech we're on the internet, we're buying leads, technologies, a lot different. And I remember I had the phone Up to my ear, smiling and dialing, make out 150 to 200 phone calls. But when I get upset, I would make more phone calls, I would try to connect with more people, and I didn't leave till I got a deal it. I made this promise to myself I need to get a deal a day. If I can get a deal a day, I'm closing 30 deals a month and my first goal was I need to make a hundred thousand dollars. That was my mouth, was my goal, and it was a short year, my for four months, that first four months. I mean sixty seventy thousand dollars in four months and my year to date and my year to date at the end of the year it wasn't a hundred grand, but I said I a. That was my first couple months. I had a. Now I'm going into my new, now I'm going into my new year. I need to hit that hundred grand. And I made a hundred fifty thousand my first year and I never turned back. My first four year made that sixty seventy in those first four months. But that wasn't a full calendar year. My first calendar year I just sat there and I made as many connections and helped as many people. So I can make a hundred grand and I made a hundred fifty thousand and I never looked back.

So let me ask you so, from someone who grew up not having much, from someone who grew up I said in apartment on that section a, now what was that? Minds that? What wise. When, like, you checked your bank account and you seen the six figures, I, what was that time period? Like man, because a lot of times we get in our own way from believing that People like us can make that much money. So it's like, well, do you kind of overcome that? Because sometimes we self sabotage along the way, especially once we start seeing that we could Actually accomplish. It was like, oh, man is getting there, and then we shoot ourselves in a foot and so, like, what was it like? So that may help you to get over that. It at threshold.

Let me tell you, I felt, it felt very good, right, but it was only fulfilling my ego, yeah, my ego. So then I start overspending, bro. I'm young, I'm 24, 25 now, making 250, 300 thousand dollars, like what? Let me say, francisco, single, I got the bends, I got the ring You're gonna put watch, right, I was partying, right, and my thing was, I told you before I started drinking too much, right, so I would make up ton of money and I'm spending it recklessly. For the listeners, let me tell you you need to invest yourself. You need to spend your money wisely. I made a lot of reckless investments. I always made investments. I always knew, like, dude, I could turn 10 into 20 and 20 to 40 and 40 and 80 and I can buy houses and I can flip and I can do this. I always had that mentality. The problem was I was too young and I wasn't experienced and I didn't have the right mentor or the right coach at that time. I had a bunch of idiots, right, and I was left to my own world. I had no spirituality, had no God, I had no gratitude, but I had none of that stuff. I was a lot of ego. So the money was good, but it started filling this ego. I'm like, bro, dude, I'm making money, I'm living my life, I'm cool as shit, right, making reckless investment. 2008 hit, 2009, the financial crash. Okay, I got hit over the head like a ton of bricks. I didn't know what hit me, but what I knew how to do is I knew what a drink and I knew how to be reckless and my Drinking and my money spending and my bad habits got out of control. From where there I had to make a decision. And I remember I came to a turning point my life and I was in California and I was broke, dude, I was still working, but I was mentally broke, spiritually broke, financially broke and I was boozing too hard, bro. I was boozing too hard for where I had to make a decision of I Got to find God and get help or I got to go down this path and die, like I was like drinking in the morning, like very, very, very bad in not a rehab, in and out of jail, like it was bad, bro, and I just all because of drinking. And I'm like, dude, I need to make a decision. You know I can do anything I want and you know I be kind. I had tried alcohol to anonymous and alcohol AA saved my life. And there's this. There's a story in the big book where it's only in the last analysis is where he may be found. And I'm not a big preacher, I'm not. I don't go to really church. I have my own relationship with my higher power. But I know I remember NBA basketball game. I embarrassed myself and I was so wasted and broke. I was front and deed. I so fully. You got no money. I was acting like I was cool and the market crashed but all I knew how to do was party and drink and I wasn't doing anything about fixing my career and I had a lot of bad debt. I had a lot of investment properties and I was a mess bro, they called me, I called myself a dressed up mess and I remember I was crying on the bathroom floor one time begging God for help, and at that moment my life changed and I got sober and I put down the alcohol. I did a lot of work through alcohol. It's not I missed you therapy through helping a lot of people. I don't give the war stories, but that decision changed my life forever and that was. It took me a little while to get some time together. So I would do like 30 days sober and I'll go drink. I do like two months sober, I do like two days, I do two hours. And that took me about a year to really get my sobriety together. And I was steel 13 years ago. This March will be no. This March will be 13 years of no alcohol and I turning my well, my life, over to a care greater than myself. And now it's about who can I help? Gratitude, right, what do I have? I got to be grateful for what I have. I was very scared of Losing my drive like dude, like I'm gonna change my life, like change my personality, that hustle mentality that that never went away. I was all bullshit, right, and I got better. My life got way better. Take the alcohol out I still got the grind, so got the hustle. But I can help other people, right, I can help other people with their career. I can help other people save their lives. Like that meant more than the commas in the Czechs. Yeah, no my thing was I would take the dudes that needed the help. They had some issues. I brought him in the career. I brought a lot of the loan officers in yellow brick when we worked, a lot of those guys that wanted to change their lives and that's how I built my teams. A lot of them are still with me today. You know they didn't. They didn't know those were teeth little letter team workers. They didn't know how to do real estate right and that that that was my pivot in my career and being able to help people on their journey or with their career or save their life. That meant more to me than anything.

That's extremely like touching man, because it's a. It's a that that rock bottom right when I guess all major you know, you know Rocky stories have bro. It's true.

I hit it, bro, crying like a baby, begging God for help, like a foot 30, five, 35, 30. What am I filming? I'm 44 now. I got sober 31, 32, right, because I had about two years and my son was born and my kids will never see me drink homie, like that's just not an option, right? They don't know that guy. You know Nobody, only me. I'm not. I don't run from that guy. I've done a lot of work. I've made my men's, I fixed my life, I turned it all around, I've turned that ego into helping people, right, and then the money will come Right. The money's gonna come right cuz I the TJB, the Thomas Joseph, that young cat that always wanted to hustle, wanted to prove everybody wrong. I'm still here, dude. Then that's one of the way, like I'm telling you got so hard to get sober, dude, I didn't get it and I had that, that rock bottom, and I, like I got back to that place. You know, shit's real good. I can't forget where I came from, dude. I can't forget that little room and me crying as a little boy, dude, of like what the fuck am I gonna do? Like I'm not normal, I'm not like these kids I'm hanging out with and I don't have what they have it, but I'm gonna get a job and I'm gonna figure it out. I'm gonna stay sober when people say this dude, he's never gonna stay sober, okay, watch, you know, and that's the message, like that challenge of like dude, that maybe that's a bad part of my ego, but if somebody challenges me, I'm not fucking, I'm not giving up till I prove that fucking dude wrong. And those are facts.

There's a Alex from Mosley quote I love. He says use what you got, right, use what you got. And for me I resonate with that a lot too. So I'm back in middle school. I used to do like backflips and stuff like that. I mean the guys who used to go to the park. You just start flipping off of slides and yes, and whatever it is, always I Was always the follow-up guy, like once one of my boys did a flip and landed it. Like I'm like All right, say I won't, say I say I won't, say I won't right now hit this back, flip off this fence and land that journey. Right, it's gonna be better than his watch, yeah. And so it's like, after you say you that I won't, like, four or five times my ego flare up a little bit and then she's like boom, I just jump and throw myself back in. I said for better, for worse, right, that helped you me to help push me and keep me going. I think a lot of people try to try to downplay where we get the the energy from, and as long as it's a positive spin that you can have on it, like I'm not gonna say it doesn't matter where the energy comes from, because it definitely does, because there's something that you Know are like dangerous to mess around with and it's like but like if something like this, where it's like if someone just challenging you, I feel like for me a lot of people try to, you know, straightaway competition and downplay competition. It's like man, that's like that's how do? it the best I've ever been like Without competition. And it's not competition away where it's like, I think there's like a you know that, that underlying Competition, where there's like underlying hatred and envy and jealousy, like that's, I think, what people stay away from. But like healthy competition, man, that's what helped me, help me fuel through and push through so many especially I just think of so many times of football I just like I like running alone. I Would like die running alone, but you have me do bear cross suicides, but as long as I'm with the team man, I'm going.

With your. Hold yourself accountable with the team, or the team hold you accountable for it.

Now let me ask you so so now the pit they kind of like transition a little bit. So you had this you know, a pit for me moment where you just started to bring your life around it. It was a journey, you said it was. It took you a couple year process to really get your sobriety and check in, really start, you know, get that handle. But it's like after you've got that under control, after you got your ego Not for you entirely checked up, but for the most part you started to work on yourself. What was like the point where you decided to enter into to real estate. So you already had the mortgage thing going but like what helped you to get that?

going. So, remember, I said I would never move back to Connecticut, remember? So I joined the military to get out of Bridgeport. Yeah, as soon as I. I couldn't get sober in California. So guess where? I moved? Right back to before, right back to Bridgeport. And In hindsight, like you look, dude, I was like over, with the worst fear of mine, because then I started to feel real sorry for myself, like dude, I'm a loser. I'm back with the. I'm back and Bridgeport. Like what am I doing? I mean, dude, I lived on my boys couch, right. So I got sober and I'm like dude, I'm got my life together. I need to. I'm gonna be home because I can. I knew I can rebuild on. I didn't want to, but I needed to stay sober. My sobriety counted. That was first. Mortgage was here. I knew. I knew I was a good officer, dude. I knew, I knew I had to do, but I had to get my mindset right. So I moved home, I went in and I'll never get. So. This is when Well Fargo had just came to the East Coast, because before that, through 2008, 2009, they used to be Wachovia, and then well as far going that I purchasing them, and then they moved a mortgage company to the East Coast and I'll never forget, dude, I was about a couple months sober and I had my mom Driving me around for job interviews up in my suit. I went to different mortgage companies and I pulled over a Wells Fargo. I was like my just dropped me off over here. I think why is it? Like? A wallster was a Wells Fargo mortgage on Summer Street in Bridge and Stanford Wells Fargo home mortgage. I went in. I went in my suit. I said hey, is the manager? It's like no, he doesn't work here, he's got other branches. I'm like do me favor, give him my resume, tell my name. Is Thomas back going? What's his name? Jim Moran. And I didn't know. I tried to access him and that Woman those are the front desk gave it to Jim Moran and this guy, jim Moran, called me. About two days later I got the call. Like hey, he's like Thomas, welcome. Like yeah, he's like you've been in mortgage but you're on the West Coast, you grew up around here, what's your story? I said, look, give me, let me sit down, pull me in front of somebody and I'll tell you everything. You know what I'm gonna do. I got a guy in Fairfield that you might be a good fit with the guy at Fairfield. Hired me on the spot. Hiring a spot, I mean I knew I might do it. I knew connections, I knew where I'm here. I'm like I have a little bit of business in New York and Connecticut but it's not gonna take me long. I grew up here. I'm like I go to the bagel store, go to bagel King, down that bridge for an. I'll pick up a deal, right. And he's like, okay, he hired me on the spot. Fast forward, about nine months later I'm not a Wells Fargo guy. Okay, they fucking fired me. They've. Wells Fargo fired me for bullshit, my mother think cuz I came in I blew the doors off all the top producer in like four months and I was causing waves and I just went to the corporate guy. I ended up going to total mortgage because Scott Penner, who's now the CEO of total mortgage, owned a title company that I was sending my title orders through a Wells Fargo. We became friends. It's not what I knew, it's who I knew. And I'm like dude, they fired me for no reason. I ended up going back and suing Wells Fargo again, getting my money that I they owed me but they like got rid of me for no reason and we got another episode. I'll tell you that. But I learned a ton of Wells Fargo. They taught me the real way to do mortgage. They put me through training, they put me through schools and I said, well, I don't need to do it. It was a lot, though I did go do it for myself, right. So I ended up hooking up with Scott. I came to total mortgage and total mortgage was an internet call center and I remember I said I was on the phones all day long and I knew that game very well. So now I could take leads and take. What I learned. It was Fargo and Go, attract the real estate partner, an agent, and give them a lead, and then in return they need to feed me more business. Because I'm taking leads, I can get a pre-approval and I can give it to the top agent. Who's doing that? Well, I was thinking a pre-approval going to a top agent, say, here's the deal, just make sure we use me the more it and they'd send me. So I sort of build in fast and I'm like, hold on, this could work. Well, why am I giving it? Because I was given the major I was giving it. They weren't giving me any business back. They were just taking my deal to not feed my family, not doing. I'm like whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, this ain't working, so hold on. I could. I could generate a client to come to me for pre approval. I had my real estate license so I could give it to a realtor and come back and I could build something. So that's how I started Yellowbrick. Well, loan officer, a lead in a dream, right. Then my partner, now who's president he has a different story, but his name is Alan Stewart, really good friend of mine, and he came to do more. I said, no, let's get your real estate license because I have a way to generate lead. We have the same mentor. My mentor is actually coming on my podcast, my next episode, which I'm really excited about. His name is Michael Barbro. He's. When I came home I said who do I need to connect with? I need to connect with the agents who are doing the most business that I know. Just the same way I learned mortgage. Just connect with the top people you know. And I connected with Mike, who was a broker, and he taught me real estate while I'm taking leads. I'm like, all right, well, I'm going to give him the mic now I'm going to give him my own people. So then we ended up building Yellowbrick real estate. I started Yellowbrick with my partners now and we generated leads and we were given to our new agents and we had rookie agents doing 30 deals in their first year. And in real estate, you could see it, it's all public data. We're like yo, how are these young guys, one year and less of one year of business, doing 30 deals? I was able to generate a lead. So that's how we started Yellowbrick. And then social media came into play. About two, three years. Then I started posting content, posting video, then put it on the broker page and then we got our agents to do video and do social and teach them how to post. Then I started a podcast. So that's been my goal. Now I'm executive vice president of sales of total mortgage, so I'm the corporate guy at total mortgage. I'm the broker and one of the owners is CEO of Yellowbrick real estate, who I'm the founder and one of the one of the original that started and came up with this idea for being able to give a lead to an agent. That's how I started and that's how that's my career. In a nutshell.

You have to bring it on for like another episode, man, because it's been a while. I know I got a lot, I know.

I got a lot, but it's good value. I can help a lot of the listeners, especially the dudes with their backs against the wall that don't know what the fuck they want to do. They need to stay consistent of being disciplined. They need to figure out their goals, they need to write them down, they need to go get it and they need a coach and they need somebody to push them through the hard times. I didn't have a coach, dude. I didn't have people to push. I had God and I had my fucking little boy that wanted out and thank God I had him Right. Without him I wouldn't be anywhere. And that's facts. Dude, no matter what you keep pushing, you're going to fucking break something, probably something you're going to. You're going to break your way into somewhere. You just don't stop and it's what you do with the life's issues. You don't feel sorry for yourself. We're here to accept. I was here to accept that I was an alcoholic. I was here to accept my dad was an abusive alcoholic and a fucking idiot. Right, I was here to accept what at the hand, I got dealt, but it's what I did with that. It's what I did with those opportunities. If I'm going to be you know what a billionaire told me once, bro I've chased a dream with everybody I met the richest guy in the world from Singapore, one of them, mr Chan. I was able to sit with a billionaire. You know what he told me you want to make money, don't have money. To my face, I said what? Yeah, keep your fucking back against the wall. Keep your back against the wall. Go on by shit, put yourself in debt. I'm like, wow, now you see all the influencers and these investors. This dude told me this five years ago when I was starting Yelbridge. Yelbridge is like six, seven years old, but I was about a year in and I wanted to get big and I had a billionaire tell me don't have money. You want to make money, don't have money. I said that makes fucking sense.

Yeah, it makes a whole lot of sense.

You got to hustle your way out and you can build it your way.

It's like being a shark, like you can't stop swimming, just keep swimming. Got to eat too. Exactly 100%. Man, tom is man. Where can we connect with you at, man? Where can we find you at If we want to stay in touch with all of you, because you have a lot of things that got going on? You're starting to do your networking events in person. You got the yellow brick stuff. You got total mortgage stuff. You got to invest in stuff going on. Where can we find you? Where can we keep up with you so we can stay in touch with what you got going on?

Instagram at TomasBepko. That's my handle, tomasbepkocom, right? If you just Google my name, go to Instagram. Tiktok at TomasBepko. Linkedin. Facebook LinkedIn at TomasBepko, my website, tomasbepkocom. Instagram is the fastest way to connect with me. Send me a message Deals are done in the DMs and listen to the podcast. I got TomasBepko podcast, itunes, spotify. I'm social man, just Google me.

So now it's time for our famous five questions. Man, the questions we ask every day. Let's go, let's go, come in. It's making me heavy man One. What is the most impactful lesson you've learned in life?

Putting down alcohol. That is the most. I was nothing. I was nothing before I started my life over and that was the most thing that had me impacted. Finding my spiritual connection, that last moment, that hitting rock bottom that a lot of motherfuckers need to get to to turn around that one, that was the most impactful.

What is the most admirable trait a person can have?

Honesty and the ability to help others, being like you know, having humility, not being humiliated, not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself. Less Selflessness, honesty.

If you had to change someone's life for one book, which book would you recommend?

It's the book of alcohol. It's anonymous. It's the only book I ever read. You believe that? No, that was the only book. Now I read. I do a lot of the audios, but for someone struggling with alcohol or drug addiction, that's the most impactful book. It's the first book I ever read. What is the legacy that you're trying to leave behind? I love my boys, man, my, you know, one of the gifts of sobriety was being a husband, a faithful, committed husband and an amazing, genuine father bro like family's. First, I want my kids. I want my boys to do real estate mortgage. I'm not pushing them my wife's saying, dude, don't get around. I'm going to push them, god willing, that that legacy, though, live, honest and meaningful. I want them to enjoy their lives. I want them to do what they want, what makes them feel good, right, whatever. My boys are happy, my family's happy, I'm happy, but all the money in the world can't buy that.

And for anyone that wants to embark on their walk to wealth today. What is the first step you recommend they take?

Stay consistent in being disciplined, write down the goal and go fucking chase it. Dude, that's it, and don't take no for an answer. It's what you do with the shots, bro. Life's going to life on life's terms. You're going to. Life's going to throw everything at you Curveball, sidewall, screwball, hit over the head, kicked in the middle, like you just got to accept it. Take it forward and do what it is, learn from it and keep it moving, dude, and stay on the path.

You've now finished taking the first step. Now let us help you take the next one. Subscribe to our newsletter at walktowealthcom that's walk, the number two wealthcom so we can keep you moving on your journey. We'll see you on the next episode of Walk to Wealth with John Mendes.