May 7, 2026 – Relationship Real Estate Athena Brownson and Opportunity Zones Ashley Tison

00:00 Intro 1: From the AM FM and Podcast 7 Radio Network. Broadcasting from AM and FM stations around the country. Welcome to the Small Business Administration award-winning School for Startups Radio, where we talk all things small business and entrepreneurship. Now, here is your host, the guy that believes anyone can be a successful entrepreneur, because entrepreneurship is not about creativity, risk, or passion, Jim Beach.

00:26 Jim Beach: Hello, everyone. Welcome to another exciting edition of School for Startups Radio. We got a cram-packed show today. I need to get going. First up today we have Athena Brownson from Colorado. She was a professional skier, and now she is a relationship real estate expert. She’s one of the top agents in Colorado, and I’m very excited to learn from her and get an update on the, the market there.

00:50 Jim Beach: After that, Ashley Tison will be with us. He is an opportunity zone specialist, a way to save taxes. Uh, amazing interview. Very, [00:01:00] very information I knew… Informational. I didn’t know anything about this. So h- he is a great source of information. Anyway, crowded show. Let’s go and get started right now. Very excited to introduce my first guest today.

01:11 Jim Beach: Please welcome Athena Brownson to the show. She has had an amazing life and career. She was a professional skier and had to have nine knee surgeries and two neck operations, and that is where a lot of the resilience that we are going to talk about came from. She was, uh, retired, obviously, and looking for a career, and thought that realtors were a dime a dozen sales people, and that changed with a mentorship that she had.

01:40 Jim Beach: And since then she has become a very active and successful real estate agent, and is one of Colorado’s absolute top realtors. She’s going to talk today about that, and also all of the mindset and psychology behind personal achievement. Athena, welcome to the show. How are you doing today?

01:58 Athena Brownson: Jim, thank you [00:02:00] so much for the lovely introduction.

02:01 Athena Brownson: I feel like I can drop the mic now. You just did such a great job. But I, uh, couldn’t be happier to be here, and hopefully share a little bit of the wisdom that I have picked up along this crazy journey that life has been.

02:16 Jim Beach: So I would’ve quit after eight knee surgeries. Why did you

02:21 Athena Brownson: have nine? Okay, eight’s the number for you.

02:23 Jim Beach: Yeah. I would’ve quit then and said, “The hell with it. I’ll just cop out.”

02:26 Athena Brownson: You

02:27 Jim Beach: know- Why’d you

02:27 Athena Brownson: have that ninth one? That’s an excellent question that many would ask. I think many would ask after the second one, “Why did you keep going?” But when you are raised and trained in a sport where injury is a part of, um, what happens, you know, if you’re throwing yourself off 100-foot jumps doing tricks, you’re bound to get in- injured.

02:51 Athena Brownson: So I was taught from a very young age that if you got hurt, you did X, Y, and Z, and you would rehab your [00:03:00] knee or rehab your neck, and you would get much better. So I, I, you know, call it stubbornness, maybe call it a little bit of, um, I don’t know if it’s stupidity, but I was just so driven to do what it was that I would love to do and what I was passionate about that I had never had anyone tell me, “Athena, I think you should hang up the boots at this point.”

03:25 Athena Brownson: But at, at number nine, my knee surgeon just looked at me and said, “Athena, you’re gonna need two knee, two knee replacements before the age of 30 if you keep this up. I would highly recommend going into a much less impact sport.” So I did. But that’s not real estate. Which is, which is real- Real estate is high impact, Athena.

03:49 Athena Brownson: I was gonna say. Real estate- I see the knees now … is not a low impact sport. It, but it’s a, uh, it’s a more mentally taxing sport than physically taxing. [00:04:00] So I just traded one form of, um, you know, brutality for the next.

04:07 Jim Beach: So I also kind of view realtors as dime a dozen salespeople. You know, they talk about the great ones, and I’ve met some of them.

04:16 Jim Beach: Um, Barbara Corcoran called me an undertaker. She said that I had the look of an undertaker that day ’cause I was trying to stay out of her way. Uh, I was on Shark Tank- Wow … one time and Barbara was teasing me. Uh, not as- Oh. … one of the normal things, but I was the… I put together the first deal where a Shark Tank company got bought out after the Shark Tank investment so that- Wow

04:42 Jim Beach: Barbara Corcoran could get out of the investment is w- what she wanted to do. So anyway, uh, dime a dozen. What- Yeah … changed where you made yourself realize that that wasn’t necessarily the case, and talk to me about choosing that industry that you had looked down on.

04:59 Athena Brownson: [00:05:00] Absolutely. And, and to give you a little backstory, you know, I grew up in a small mountain community, Breckenridge, Colorado, where we had more real estate offices than we did T-shirt shops.

05:10 Athena Brownson: So for a tourist community, that’s really saying something. So I had a view of realtors being corny car salesmen that truly were a dime a dozen, and I had that mentality for, you know, over 20 years, despite the fact that my dad was a residential real estate developer. It was in my family. Well, I, I, you know, coming out of my ski career, I, I try- I dabbled in a couple different careers and quickly realized that I needed to be an entrepreneur.

05:45 Athena Brownson: I needed a career where the amount of input I put in would reflect in the output that I, um, was being rewarded with. I, I wanted to work really hard and see the results for that, and for me, [00:06:00] entrepreneurship was the answer. I never in a million years would have thought of real estate until a dear friend of mine said, “Look, Athena, I think you should sit down with the owner of my company.

06:12 Athena Brownson: I… He has a very different take on what real estate is, and I think it will really reframe that real estate should be something that is a very relational business, where you’re guiding your clients through the largest investment that they’re ever going to be purchasing or selling. This is someone’s livelihood, it’s their shelter, it- and they’re entrusting you with the opportunity to help guide them through that.”

06:42 Athena Brownson: And, and those simple words and the idea of relationship-based business completely transformed my view on real estate, and I was fortunate enough to, after getting my license, I quit my job the next day after this conversation, believe [00:07:00] it or not. Um, I’m not one to, to sit and mull things over. If I, if I have a feeling that something’s right, I’m gonna jump into it, and I did that.

07:09 Athena Brownson: I got my real estate license, and I was fortunate enough to mentor under this individual who, who kind of explained relationship-based business to me for about a year of my, my career, and that is truly what set me up for success for the rest of my career and framed the viewpoint in which I approach real estate and approach my clients.

07:34 Jim Beach: So what, what is your different approach to, to real estate? And you said that the, the meeting you had with this, uh, gentleman where he, uh, you know, told you his philosophy and it shocked you. What is that different approach?

07:50 Athena Brownson: So it, it means you’re not going into a, a- client meeting, a transaction [00:08:00] with the mentality that you’re just going, you’re going into it to get a paycheck and then you’re going to turn and burn and go on to the next.

08:08 Athena Brownson: It’s the concept of creating deep, long lasting relationships with your clients that go far beyond the closing table. Because as we know in entrepreneurship, when you’re building lifelong connections, that’s where referrals come from. That’s where they, you know, they become a part of your sphere of influence.

08:28 Athena Brownson: And that is the greatest marketing you can do is word of mouth. So understanding that you’re working with a human being that you want to build a relationship of trust with is something that I really believe differentiates the great agents from the agents that, you know, are maybe doing a couple of deals a year and probably getting violations for not being ethical because that is unfortunately a large percentage [00:09:00] of the real estate population.

09:02 Athena Brownson: But when you find a good agent that wants to stick with you far beyond the closing table, there’s no more rewarding feeling. I mean, I still sit down to dinner with clients years after helping them purchase a property to catch up and make sure that I’m staying in communication with these people because in a way they do become a part of my family and they’ve entrusted me with their largest asset.

09:28 Athena Brownson: And that’s something that I don’t take lightly. And it’s something that was instilled in me from the very beginning of my career. So I was very fortunate.

09:39 Jim Beach: So where do you focus now, Athena? I think you said that you are calling from Denver. Do you focus on Denver or the ski markets or all of it or only luxury above $5 million?

09:54 Jim Beach: What’s your particular niche?

09:56]Athena Brownson: Oh, I wish that I could tell you that I only focused on [00:10:00] luxury o- you know, 5 to 10 million, and I’ll get there one day for sure. Um, but to be completely honest, my, my market is the greater Denver metro area. I go all the way up to Boulder. Um, I do do some work in Breckenridge, my hometown, because I know it very well.

10:18 Athena Brownson: But Denver metro’s my bread and butter. And, you know, it doesn’t matter what price point my client is looking in, whether they’re looking for their first property that might be $400,000 or whether they’re looking for their dream home that might be $5 million. Um, I, I’m way more about if the relationship is a fit and if we’re gonna work well together than what the price point on the property actually is.

10:48 Athena Brownson: So I would say my niche is finding like-minded people that I know are going to, to trust me to do the best possible job for them.

10:59 Jim Beach: [00:11:00] And what is the market in Denver like right now? Atlanta is a weird market right now. It’s supposedly a, a seller’s market, but then weird things are happening. A lot of deals are falling through.

11:14 Jim Beach: Um-

11:15 Athena Brownson: Yes …

11:15 Jim Beach: what, what’s happening in Colorado?

11:18 Athena Brownson: You know, it sounds pretty similar. I keep describing it as the most bipolar market I’ve experienced in my 12 years of real estate. Um, we have, the last two years have definitely been a more buyer-centric market, meaning that there’s been, you know Because there are fewer buyers, there’s less competition, and thus buyers are able to take their time, and listings are sitting on the market for quite a bit longer.

11:50 Athena Brownson: Now, we are starting to see different pockets of Denver shift more towards a seller’s market, where if a property is positioned [00:12:00] properly, and by that I mean, um, you know, it’s priced well, it’s staged to the nines, and there’s no fatal flaws to the property, then we are seeing multiple offers, you know, within the first week or so of the property being on the market.

12:17 Athena Brownson: But I say that be- because… I say that it’s bipolar because it is changing week to week right now, and I think that has so much to do with the overall political and e- economical climate that we’re experiencing. Um, there’s a lot of uncertainty. There’s a lot of, uh, apprehension as to what, you know, what is to come, and interest rates are still a little bit higher than they have been in the past.

12:45 Athena Brownson: You know, I mean, they’re lower now than they were a year ago. But prior to that, we were down in the 2% range, which probably should have never happened because it created a very unhealthy market. Um, but [00:13:00] interest rates are still a little bit higher, so the barrier of entry and the affordability is, is a little bit greater, and it does mean that there are a smaller number of buyers.

13:11 Athena Brownson: And because there’s a smaller number of buyers, properties are just sitting on the market a little bit longer. But it seems like things are picking up. I say that this week. Next week could be a completely different story, but I like to think we’re, we’re trending in a positive direction.

13:29 Jim Beach: So the entire industry was slapped down by some court saying that your 6% standard fee was illegal.

13:41 Jim Beach: You’ve been doing that for 90 years, I think

13:45 Athena Brownson: Yeah

13:46 Jim Beach: I don’t think it’s changed anything, though. I’m still seeing 6% pretty much across the board. What about there?

13:51 Athena Brownson: You know, it, it, I, I’m with you. The only thing that it’s really changed is that we’re not allowed to advertise [00:14:00] publicly what the commission rates are gonna be.

14:04 Athena Brownson: So typically, we used to be able to say, you know, within the MLS system, if a buyer was, buyer’s agent would be paid 2.8%. If it was a discounted, um, commission, if they were getting, like, a 2.5% or a flat fee, we’re no longer able to do that. But I think the main point of this legislation was to put the hands and the pow- the power in the hands of home buyers, or, or excuse me, home sellers, and, and make it a conversation piece that they have with their agent.

14:39 Athena Brownson: And there definitely are, um, quite a few sellers that are now wanting to do a 2.5% buyer’s agent commission and maybe a 2.5 or a 2.8% listing commission. So we are seeing that some, um, some properties are offering under 6%, [00:15:00] but I would still say 6 percent’s the norm. Just the, the most important part of that legislation is making sure people understand that this is something that is negotiable and that is not set in stone.

15:15 Jim Beach: Well, but here’s the trick that I’ve been hearing, Athena. Mm-hmm. Most

15:18 Athena Brownson: people,

15:19 Jim Beach: I think, choose a real estate agent, a person that they want to hire. Yeah. And that’s the person they trust. And then that person says, “Well, I work for-” You know, Brownson Real Estate, and that’s where, you know, I, I list my properties and stuff, and so they are the broker, and I work for them, and they require 6%, and if I don’t do that, I will get fired

15:46 Athena Brownson: You know, and that is the case with some brokerages, and every brokerage has a different amount that they’re willing to take as their lowest possible percentage.

15:56 Athena Brownson: And oftentimes w- it’s, it’s actually unfortunate [00:16:00] because if the seller is offering, say, only a 2.5% buyer’s agent commission, well, then your, and your, your agency is requiring more, then that actually goes back onto the buyer and is an additional fee on top of everything that they’re already paying for.

16:21 Athena Brownson: You know, closing costs are getting astronomical when it comes to how much it c- costs to close a loan and just all of, you know, inspections and appraisals, and all of these things add up. So to have to pay another, you know, .3 to .5% of, of a commission that generally a seller should be paying could be a deal breaker for a, for a buyer being able to purchase a property, and it does mean that they will most likely lose that client, which is extremely unfortunate.

16:54 Athena Brownson: Now, I do believe that a lot of brokerages have some flexibility [00:17:00] because of the legislation that was passed, and they’re saying, “Look, we understand that not every, um, property is gonna be offering a 6% commission total, and, you know, the lowest that we’ll accept for a buyer’s agent commission might be 2.4%.

17:16 Athena Brownson: The lowest that we’ll accept for a listing commission is 2.5%.” So they’ve had to kind of create some flexibility within the industry, but that also hurts the, the companies that are, are running our businesses for the most part because their bottom line just changed significantly when they had to make adjustments to account for lower commission rates coming in.

17:45 Jim Beach: How do you sell your first house? How do you get into the market as a, you know, not… Yeah, how do you get into-

17:52 Athena Brownson: Oh, yeah … become a real estate agent? It is what- it’s funny because when you go to real estate school, you come out [00:18:00] lear- knowing almost absolutely nothing about how to run a business, and that’s why I felt so fortunate about having a really great mentor.

18:08 Athena Brownson: And what he taught me was that my CRM or my Rolodex, so to speak, my digital Rolodex, was going to be my gold. So the first thing that he had me do is go through everyone that I’ve ever connected with, um, you know, go through my Facebook friends, make sure that I have everyone’s phone number, email address, mailing address, and put them into my CRM so that they- they’re becoming a part of my sphere.

18:38 Athena Brownson: And then every single day being intentional about making phone calls to these people, asking, you know, po- very, very, you know, politely working into the conversation, “I’m in real estate now. If you, you or anyone you know is looking for an excellent real estate broker, my team and I [00:19:00] would love the opportunity to assist you.”

19:03 Athena Brownson: And it means consistency, dedication to making a lot of phone calls, and building a lot of relationships. And I think the number one thing for me was I knew that if I got in front of as many people as possible and had one-on-one conversations with them, that they- I would build rapport and I would build that trust.

19:24 Athena Brownson: And when I was, when they were then, you know, looking for an agent or if they heard of someone looking for an agent, I would be top of mind because not only had I taken the time to have coffee with them and catch up, but I’m, you know, I’m making sure that I’m making phone calls to them. They’re getting my monthly mailers.

19:45 Athena Brownson: So I think it really comes down to consistency and just putting fear out the window of, of saying, “Yes, I might be new, but I have a team of support behind me that is gonna make sure that your transaction goes [00:20:00] absolutely perfectly.”

20:03 Jim Beach: All right. We’ll have to swap craziest stories ever. Uh-

20:08 Athena Brownson: Deal.

20:08 Jim Beach: I bought a house, Athena, went to the closing, and there’d been a lot of crazy things, you know, working up to this.

20:18 Jim Beach: Mm-hmm. For example, the, it was an older couple selling the house, and the man wanted to sell and the woman didn’t. The woman started- Oh … leaving notes in our mailbox in our existing house, stuff like, “House is haunted. Don’t move in that house.” You know, like- Oh, no … stuff like that. Would leave us crazy messages in the middle of the night, you know, like, “The pool- Mm-hmm

20:40 Jim Beach: is gonna sink.” You know, “The pool’s gonna fall off the cliff, and the house is gonna be worthless,” and- Oh, damn. … you’re crazy to buy the house. And so then we showed up at closing, and you know, we were- Anxious. And so we kept, we’d- Yeah … drive by every day and, you know, we didn’t see any moving happening. You know, there was noth- nothing happening.

20:58 Jim Beach: No. It didn’t look like it, the house was [00:21:00] getting any, you know, less occupied. And so we went to closing, and they literally did not understand that they had to move out of the house. They didn’t understand- Oh, no … that they had to exit the premises. They thought they were, they had purchased a new house, but they were gonna live there for a, over a month they thought, and didn’t think that- No

21:20 Jim Beach: they needed to ask anyone. Meanwhile, we had moving trucks circling the neighborhood waiting to make, you know, empty out. You know?

21:28 Athena Brownson: Absolutely.

21:30 Jim Beach: Oh my,

21:30 Athena Brownson: they didn’t even know they had to move. That has to be one of the craziest things I’ve ever heard, to be completely honest with you. That, that has to be … Y- I think you just won a, a, an award for most ludicrous real estate story, because it, uh, I don’t know how their agent didn’t explain that to them, but they actually had to de-vac- had to vacate the house.

21:54 Jim Beach: It was crazy.

21:56 Athena Brownson: So how long did it end up taking them to get out? [00:22:00]

22:00 Jim Beach: Ugh, like two or three more days, and we were literally moving in as they were moving out, and so we had movement fighting over the stairs- Oh, man … and there were certain- Yeah … things that we had, were still arguing over who kept. And so they would roll it up and put it in their van, and then I would sneak over to their van and steal it and put it back in my van.

22:21 Jim Beach: And I mean,

22:22 Athena Brownson: it was a- Like I just got this …

22:23 Jim Beach: crazy day.

22:25 Athena Brownson: That, you know, I don’t think I have anything that could p- possibly top that. Um, you know, I’ve run into situations, for example, where I go to my final walkthrough of a property to show, show the clients what the house looks like, you know, after it’s emptied and the sellers are out.

22:45 Athena Brownson: And one time I found that it had been inhabited by a family of raccoons. So finding someone that was able to trap the raccoons in a short period of time and relocate them somewhere [00:23:00] safely was almost impossible. Um, I, I, I’ve never walked into a house before and had about five raccoons looking at us angrily, and my clients just looking absolutely horrified that that had happened.

23:16 Athena Brownson: But that is nothing compared to what you just told me, so I’m gonna give you, give you the award on that

23:23 Jim Beach: one. So when you get tats up one arm and one arm only, how do you decide which arm it is? D- like, does left arm mean straight and right arm mean gay, or what-

23:35 Athena Brownson: For tattoos? … how do you choose what

23:37 Jim Beach: arm?

23:38 Athena Brownson: You know, so funny enough, I have a port built into my right arm.

23:45 Athena Brownson: Um, I get plasma transfusions every, you know, four days a month for Lyme disease, and unfortunately I’m not allowed to tattoo over it. So it made my decision very easy that the [00:24:00] left arm was the one that was gonna get covered.

24:03 Jim Beach: Okay. I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry. You- we were talking about that earlier.

24:06 Jim Beach: Mm-hmm. You think you got a tick bite in Vermont hiking in the woods.

24:11 Athena Brownson: Potentially. And you know what? It’s been, um, the most difficult but most, um, probably rewarding thing I’ve ever been through. I think the hardest things that we go through in life are, are what teach us really what we’re made of and show us who we are and teach us the lessons that we wouldn’t have learned otherwise.

24:33 Athena Brownson: So although I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, I truly believe that when we’re faced with adversity in life, it’s actually a really beautiful opportunity for us to learn something that we don’t know about ourselves or about the world. Oh. And that’s exactly what Lyme disease has done for me.

24:52 Jim Beach: Oh, BS. I have chronic conditions too-

24:55 Jim Beach: and I would rather-

24:57 Athena Brownson: And it does suck … not

24:57 Jim Beach: have that knowledge and not have the [00:25:00] chronic conditions, so. Yeah.

25:02 Athena Brownson: I try to find the light side of it, for sure. But I agree. I would rather, I would rather have my, you know, my professional skiing health back and not feel like a crippled old woman at age 35.

25:16 Jim Beach: Well, I can relate to that.

25:18 Jim Beach: I can relate to that.

25:19 Athena Brownson: Oh, you and me both.

25:20 Jim Beach: Yes. But you know what’s amazing is you fight through it and are still one of the top agents out there, and so that’s what’s important-

25:27 Athena Brownson: Thank you …

25:28 Jim Beach: is the resilience- Yeah … and the, the I am not gonna let this hold me back-ness.

25:34 Athena Brownson: You know, it’s a psychosis, I like to say.

25:37 Athena Brownson: Um, and I really believe that everything that I learned as a professional athlete from my coaches, you know, what resilience looks like, the art of showing up, um, what grit looks like in motion, these are all things that of course have served me in my real estate career, but even more so have served me in, in being able to fight through [00:26:00] a very debilitating disease and, and come out victorious, and, and with a business that is, you know, extremely successful, and with a team that I, um, you know, I’m grateful for every single day ’cause they keep my head from spinning off.

26:16 Athena Brownson: So it’s, uh, y- I, I like to thank skiing for giving, giving me these traits.

26:23 Jim Beach: Very, very well said, Athena. How do we find out more about you, follow you online, hire you in Colorado?

26:30 Athena Brownson: Well, you can hire me any time you want, Jim. But, um, I would say the easiest way to get ahold of me is gonna be my Instagram page, because it has my phone number, my email, my website.

26:42 Athena Brownson: Um, it’s a great hub just for, for content. I’ve got videos every day that kind of give a little bit of insight into real estate, and you can find me just first and last name, so Athena Brownson Realtor. And please don’t hesitate to reach out. [00:27:00] Um, I’m always here to chat, whether it’s providing information about real estate or whether you’re going through a challenging, you know, maybe health issue, and I can give wisdom there.

27:10 Athena Brownson: I, I don’t bite, and I, I love to meet new people.

27:15 Jim Beach: Fantastic. I love the attitude. Athena, thank you so much for being with us, and we’d love to have you back. Thanks a lot. You were great.

27:20 Athena Brownson: I would love that. Thank you so much, Jim. I hope you have a wonderful day, and I appreciate your time.

27:25 Jim Beach: Likewise, and we will be right back.

27:27 Jim Beach: Bye-bye-bye.

27:38 Jim Beach: We are back. And again, thank you so very much for being with us. Very excited to introduce another great guest. And this is good, because I know absolutely nothing about this topic, so I’m excited to learn as well. Please welcome Ashley Tison to the show. He is the founder and the force behind OZpros, which stands for [00:28:00] opportunity zones.

28:01 Jim Beach: They help you, be businesses, go into opportunity zones where you can get huge tax breaks. He has been doing this for about a decade, and prior to that, he had a very successful career as, uh, one of those horrible lawyers that we love to make fun of. Uh, got his degree at UNC Chapel Hill. That’s incredibly prestigious.

28:23 Jim Beach: Also s- did, uh, I think undergrad at the, uh, one of the military academies, right, Ashley?

28:31 Ashley Tison: Yeah, that’s right.

28:31 Jim Beach: Was it the Air Force Academy?

28:32 Ashley Tison: It was the Air Force Academy. That’s right.

28:34 Jim Beach: Well, thank you very much for your, your service. And you played ball there, too, right? Basketball. D1 basketball?

28:41 Ashley Tison: I did, and, uh- How

28:42 Jim Beach: tall are

28:42 Ashley Tison: you?

28:42 Ashley Tison: Ultimately… I’m 6’8″.

28:45 Jim Beach: Okay. How do you fit into anything that the Air Force makes?

28:48 Ashley Tison: Well, that’s part, that was part of the problem. That’s why I ultimately ended up transferring to UNC Charlotte and, uh, finished my basketball career there, and then played a little bit over in Germany.

28:58 Jim Beach: Oh, really? Okay, so [00:29:00] you were really good, then.

29:01 Jim Beach: Not NBA good, but really good.

29:03 Ashley Tison: I don’t know. I think that I was, uh, I was really good at playing roles. I, uh, learned that if you hustled and you grabbed rebounds that, uh, that you could get playing time even at, uh, inside of Conference USA. And ultimately, uh, you know, I decided not to make a living at it, but, you know, had a shot at potentially even making a living doing that.

29:24 Jim Beach: Okay. Well, very impressive. Very impressive. And seriously though, with your height, what did you do in the Air Force? I mean, that pretty much regulates, forces you to be a, a desk pilot, doesn’t

29:41 Ashley Tison: it? Yeah. A desk jockey, exactly right. I mean- That’s one of the, that’s one of the reasons why I transferred is ’cause I didn’t wanna be flying a desk in Minot, South Dakota.

29:50 Ashley Tison: And so- Aren’t

29:51 Jim Beach: pilots-

29:51 Ashley Tison: I, uh- … supposed

29:52 Jim Beach: to be really short, like 5’6″, 5’8″, something like that?

29:56 Ashley Tison: Yeah. I, you know, I think that you could be upwards of 6’4″. Oh, really? [00:30:00] The key is, is that you gotta be able to get in the trainer, and the trainer out of the academy is a T-38, and it’s got an ejection seat. And so the maximum height is 6’4″ for that trainer.

30:09 Ashley Tison: So I was, uh, I’m, you know, I was not pilot-qualified in any way, shape, or form coming out of the academy. Now, I could’ve reported to my duty station and then been a- been able to fly, but I, uh, I ultimately decided that I wanted to, uh, give it a shot. I had an opportunity to play for Jeff Mullins at UNC Charlotte back when we were ranked, uh, in the top 25, and I was like, “You know, I, I really wanna see if, uh, if I can give this basketball thing a chance.”

30:38 Jim Beach: All right.

30:39 Ashley Tison: Plus, I really love Charlotte.

30:40 Jim Beach: It’s a great town.

30:42 Ashley Tison: Yeah, it really is.

30:43 Jim Beach: Not city, town. Uh- And why did you leave the legal profession?

30:53 Ashley Tison: You know, so I’m still licensed, I’m still a licensed attorney, but, um, I like to say that I am an entrepreneur trapped in a [00:31:00] lawyer’s body. And so I have always been attracted to entrepreneurial ventures.

31:09 Ashley Tison: I, uh, I started my first business, uh, after five years of practicing law. Actually, I started my first business when I was 10 and I was mowing grass. But my first actual entrepreneurial venture started in law school, where I was doing legal research, and then, um, after the big firm had sufficiently sucked my soul, I, uh, decided that I wanted to get more entrepreneurial in my endeavors, and, uh, started an impact investment company back in 2005 that’s actually still around.

31:38 Ashley Tison: And we’ve done some really cool stuff with it, where we’ve been able to make some money, but we’ve also been able to really, uh, help some people along the way.

31:46 Jim Beach: What is an impact investment company, or is it a B corp? W- how do you impact?

31:53 Ashley Tison: No, so we, I mean, we were set up just as a traditional S corp. Um, I would, uh, buy- [00:32:00] Real estate, I’d buy residential real estate, and then I would basically kind of create naturally occurring workforce/affordable housing.

32:09 Ashley Tison: So I bought a house and, uh, the way that I would buy houses is that I would buy them when somebody was having to go into, like, a nursing home. They usually had some kind of situation at hand, right? So I bought a house where the woman’s adult son who, uh, was a little bit mentally handicapped, he, uh, he was still living in the house.

32:30 Ashley Tison: And so I bought the house and rented it back to him for my cost and was able to help him to get some services and ultimately work with his church to where they were able to help underwrite the rent that he was paying. And so we were able to positively impact that gentleman’s life. He was a great guy.

32:49 Ashley Tison: Unfortunately, he passed, um, you know, probably about five, six years after we, uh, purchased the home. But it, uh, it was really cool to be able to help [00:33:00] him and to do… The reason, the whole reason why I went to law school was so I could help people, and that was actually putting that law degree- Excuse me. What was that?

33:06 Ashley Tison: Say

33:06 Jim Beach: that again

33:07 Ashley Tison: I said the whole reason I went to law school was so that I could help people.

33:10 Jim Beach: Well, okay. I’m just… Okay. Okay. That’s what I thought I heard.

33:14 Ashley Tison: Um- And make money, right? You know, obviously you gotta do that too. But, um, I, you know, I’ve always been interested in kind of the purpose side of things.

33:24 Ashley Tison: And so we set up Soterian, which was my S corp, in order to do that. And it’s been a great, uh, you know, uh, a kinda catchall that I’ve used for different types of consulting over the years. And, you know, that purpose, uh, kinda a theme has driven, you know, my, uh, you know, my career move since then. I, uh, I built a M&A firm because I had to, I actually had to make some money, so I started doing M&A work where I was helping Main Street business owners use the Wall Street-level sophistication, uh, of documents and processes that we had at the [00:34:00] big firm, and we created a software program to allow that to do that, to allow them to do that on a more affordable basis.

34:07 Ashley Tison: I saw how much money they were leaving on the table in taxes, so I sold that firm to another law firm and, uh, and then set about doing what I do now, which is helping people to create generational wealth through tax mitigation strategies and succession planning. And, um, as I was doing that, that’s when I found out about opportunity zones and I was like, “Holy cow, this is like 1031 and private equity got married,” which, uh, lined up perfectly with my background, both in 1031 and private equity.

34:37 Ashley Tison: And I was like, “Man, they had a beautiful baby named Opportunity Zones.” So we popped up a website, uh, got my team to buy $1,000 worth of Google ads, and we had 150 inbound leads and $75 million worth of capital looking for deals and I was like, “Wow, I think we’re onto something.”

34:56 Jim Beach: All right, back up. I have a lot to learn here.

34:58 Jim Beach: A 310 [00:35:00] and then private equity. I understand what private equity is. Please, 310, educate

35:05 Ashley Tison: me 1031. 1031 is a tax mitigation program where you can trade real estate, like kind exchange real estate. And so if you sell a house or commercial real estate, you can buy something of equal or greater value, and you don’t have to pay taxes, so you defer the taxes.

35:23 Ashley Tison: That’s similar to the OZ program, where it allows you to take a capital gain, put it into a qualified opportunity fund, invest either into real estate or an operating business, and be able to defer your original taxes. And then after a 10-year hold, your new investment comes out completely tax-free.

35:43 Jim Beach: Okay, say that again, and give…

35:45 Jim Beach: Or maybe walk us through an example, Ashley, so we understand your-

35:48 Ashley Tison: Sure. With- So let’s say that you, uh, bought Nvidia stock when it was a dollar. Okay. Uh, and now it’s worth a w- a million and one dollars. So you’ve got a million dollars worth of capital gain on [00:36:00] that Nvidia stock, and, um, you are like, “You know what?

36:04 Ashley Tison: I think that I wanna sell right now. I’m ready to sell.” So you sell that Nvidia stock. You can take that capital gain, and as long as you do it inside of 180 days, you put it into a qualified opportunity fund. And that sounds complicated, but it’s really just an LLC taxed as a partnership. That’s as simple as it can be.

36:23 Ashley Tison: You put that into- Say that again.

36:24 Jim Beach: Qualified equity fund?

36:26 Ashley Tison: Op- Qualified Opportunity Zone fund. Opportunity- That’s a- … Zone

36:31 Jim Beach: fund. Okay, keep going. I’m trying to take

36:33 Ashley Tison: notes. That’s right. Then you get to defer the gain on the million dollars of Nvidia stock, and, uh, you get to defer that gain for five years. And then when you go to pay the tax on it five years later, you pay either, uh, the value of your, uh, what your original gain amount was, less 10%, so you get a reduction of 10% if you held for five years, or if [00:37:00] your investment has gone down, the value of your investment at the time, whichever is less.

37:04 Ashley Tison: And so it’s a, it, it’s a way to defer, so you effectively get an interest-free loan from the government for five years, and then you’re gonna pay 10% less when you pay it back to the government. And if you’re in a rural opportunity zone, you get a 30% reduction when you go to pay the taxes. And then- Let’s say you take that million dollars in your fund and you go and you, uh, buy a flex industrial or build a flex industrial warehouse where you start up a business that, um, you know, that you’ve got an HVAC business that you’re gonna start now.

37:39 Ashley Tison: And you grow that HVAC business over the next 10 years from your million-dollar investment into $10 million, and you sell it to private equity 10 years from now for $10 million. You pay zero capital gains taxes on the growth from a million to 10.

37:58 Jim Beach: Okay. I, I guess I [00:38:00] need to go back even further. Is an opportunity zone a geographical boundaried place where the government- It is

38:09 Jim Beach: wants investment and so they’ll, they’ll pay me to put a business in that area? Is that what we’re talking about?

38:17 Ashley Tison: Yeah, so they don’t pay you, but they effectively do in the context of giving you this incentive. Right. And so- You

38:22 Jim Beach: get all of the fu- uh, the, the 10% dis- yeah. Okay, you just explained that. Right.

38:26 Jim Beach: But it’s a- Right … a geographical area, usually in a bad part of town?

38:30 Ashley Tison: In some, some of them are. Um, they are, uh… So it was created by the Tax Cut and Jobs Act, and Congress gave the governors the ability to designate up to 25% of their low-income census tracts as opportunity zones. And so they are in, uh, urban areas, they’re in rural areas.

38:51 Ashley Tison: Uh, they’re in every state and every territory. So there’s one… There are some in the US Virgin Islands. 98% of the island of Puerto [00:39:00] Rico is an opportunity zone. And so you’ve got some great… And this was based upon the 2020 census as it related to the low income. Um, sorry, 2010 census. And so the 2010 census has drastically changed since then, where there might’ve been some areas that were kinda downtrodden and were low income back in 2010 that have significantly rebounded and that are really doing well now.

39:24 Ashley Tison: And so, um, they are now re-designating the tracts, and so there’ll be new opportunity zone tracts that will take effect, uh, January 1st of 2027. And so people are now in the process of, uh, you know, talking to their governors about the different tracts that would make sense for, to be designated opportunity zones.

39:48 Ashley Tison: But to your point, they are geographical areas that the governor’s got to designate. Some of them are, you know, I mean, they’re the, the kind of thing where you drive through and you’re like, “Oh, this looks like it should be an opportunity zone.” Some of the other [00:40:00] ones that got designated just were bas- m- mainly because of different circumstances that happened.

40:06 Ashley Tison: So like the strip down on Myrtle Beach, that was an opportunity zone because the people that actually live there were very low income. And so- An opportunity

40:15 Jim Beach: for a nuclear bomb to be dropped Well, I’ve been to Myrtle Beach, Ashley. There is, there’s no, uh, no evolution going on there anymore.

40:30 Ashley Tison: I tell you what, man.

40:31 Ashley Tison: You look at what happened to the strip from 2010 to where it is now, there’s massive redevelopments that have happened. There’s hotels that have been refurbished. There’s, uh, restaurants that have gone in, breweries, that kind of thing. And the, the short answer in whether it’s, you know, Myrtle Beach or whether it’s other places like Erie, Pennsylvania, or Huntsville, Alabama, is that this program has really moved the needle on, uh, substantially reducing poverty [00:41:00] in the tracks that got designated as opportunity zones.

41:03 Jim Beach: And so for me to qualify, I have to have an office in that zone? That’s right. Or can I have a PO box in that zone? What do I have to do?

41:12 Ashley Tison: No, you actually have to be physically located in the zone, and 50% of your income needs to come from a trade or business that’s happening in the zone. For a business, that means that it’s 50% of the total compensation paid, or 50% of the hours worked need to be worked by people inside of an opportunity zone.

41:31 Ashley Tison: So they don’t have to live there, but they need to come to work there. They’re trying to drive traffic to these areas by bringing in commerce.

41:39 Jim Beach: Okay. Are there any places that I would want to go? And let me tell you, Ashley, with my first business that I built back in my 20s, we, uh, started off in half of a duplex, and we got so crowded that my office was the top of the stairs.

41:58 Jim Beach: Um, and my office was [00:42:00] literally on the stairs. And we got a new office space, and it was literally and figuratively on the bad side of the tracks, um, in the worst part of town. You know, and we… That’s where our office was. So I’m willing to go put my office anywhere if it’s cool, you know.

42:19 Ashley Tison: Sure. So, um- You know, and the key thing is, is that you can…

42:26 Ashley Tison: There are, there are 8,700, uh, opportunity zones census tracks. So they’re all over the country. If you go to ozpros.com/map, you can look it up, and you can look it up by address. But, you know, I… And I know that you’re in Atlanta, and, uh, on the outskirts of Atlanta over on the west side, there are numerous opportunity zones that you would not believe are an opportunity zone.

42:53 Ashley Tison: Uh, a big one that goes around, you know, the perimeter, uh, uh, the perimeter- Yeah … [00:43:00] big perimeter project that they’re doing. Uh-huh. That’s a huge opportunity zone over there. Um, and I, you know, I’ve actually worked with a couple of developers in Atlanta who have been working on fantastic projects there, uh, in town that you’re like, “Wow, this is an opportunity zone?”

43:17 Ashley Tison: And so, you know, and then there’s some that you’re like, you drive through and you’re like, “Whoa, roll and lock them,” right? Because, you know, it’s like, “Wow, this is, uh, this definitely needs some investment.” But it, once again, the program’s working, and a lot of those zones have actually received investment because of the program.

43:38 Ashley Tison: And you said ozpros.com/map, right? That’s right. That’s right. And you can pull up, uh, and it’s literally got a map that shows every opportunity zone in the United States, and then you can search by address, or you can just search on the map, and you can just scroll into different places.

43:59 Jim Beach: Wow. Um- It’s [00:44:00] quite

44:00 Ashley Tison: the

44:00 Jim Beach: hodgepodge of Atlanta all over the place.

44:04 Ashley Tison: Yep. Um, very interesting. This is fascinating. Yep. And then you’ve got, um- They did actually. The governors did- Might be towards tech as well. Towards the tech Yes, exactly. Yeah, and the governors did an excellent job of trying to locate opportunity zones around college campuses. Um, namely so that they could encourage student housing projects, but also to encourage, uh, you know, accelerators and incubators to pop up.

44:35 Ashley Tison: I worked with Chapel Hill on a consulting project for them to create an opportunity zone fund that they would be able to roll out to their alum and to their donor base as an investment opportunity as opposed to just a pure donation play. Uh, we’ve taken that concept, and we actually offer a white label solution that if a, a town or a municipality wants to have their [00:45:00] own fund, we’ll actually run the fund for them.

45:03 Ashley Tison: They can make all the decisions about where they wanna make the investments, but we’ll handle all of the opportunities and compliance. We’ll even handle the securities work for them to get their, uh, PPM done so that they can offer it to the town fathers and/or to the people that are gonna be involved in trying to reinvigorate entrepreneurism in their, uh, in their town or in their college too.

45:26 Ashley Tison: So we’re, we offer that white label solution for colleges. We also oper- offer it for towns.

45:32 Jim Beach: Very cool.

45:34 Ashley Tison: Yeah. Towns

45:34 Jim Beach: like Charlotte.

45:36 Ashley Tison: Yeah, so i- ironically enough, we actually don’t have one in Charlotte yet. I’m, I’m trying to change that, but, um, uh, we’ve assisted a town in Ohio with that, uh, who had a really vibrant economic development corporation.

45:52 Ashley Tison: And, um, we actually assisted, uh, Bluefield, West Virginia with their efforts. They did an awesome job of really attracting [00:46:00] investment into their town. And we’re, uh, we’re working with a number of different towns, you know, that are trying to kinda get together best practices of how they can really take advantage of this program.

46:12 Ashley Tison: And, uh, I, I think that that’s one of the cool things that I’ve experienced in opportunity zones is that it’s become kind of a, an inflection point, a fulcrum, if you will, that people can then apply the different levers of different incentives that are available and center them around, uh, opportunity zones, and that opportunity zones have become a, a, a pinch point for being able to identify professionals and then consolidate resources.

46:42 Ashley Tison: So f- We’re actively working with the SBA to that effect to help folks with, that are startups or kind of transitioning through, whether that’s the SBIR program, the small, uh, innovation business research grants that they have that are available for the military and for different government [00:47:00] technologies, to transition into kind of the different phases that they have of SBA funding that’s available out there.

47:07 Ashley Tison: So opportunity zones become a really cool pinch point of being able to get lots of different stakeholders’ attention.

47:16 Jim Beach: Excellent. Excellent, Ashley. You’re doing a great job. Let me just tell you a very quick story. I love to tell this story, and it might apply to you. I used to do a lot of work for the SBA, and got to know some of the people there very well.

47:31 Jim Beach: I did a lot of seminars for them and helped them with quite a few different things, and brought in quite a, a good deal of business entrepreneurs who were hoping to get SBA loans, and I would bring them, you know, quite a few of those. And one of the guys there got to know me well enough that he sort of asked, you know, “What could we do for you?”

47:53 Jim Beach: And I didn’t really know how to respond, and he, you know, “Would you like to win an award or something?” We had these [00:48:00] SBA awards. And I was like, “Yeah, sure, I want the, the media award from the SBA.” And so I was the first podcast, and the year before me, the winner was the small business editor at The New York Times.

48:15 Jim Beach: And- Okay … I was the first podcast to win the National Media Award for the SBA, from the SBA. And I love that story because, uh, I get to brag. And then number two, you should now t- find some way that you can win an SBA award, and the way to do it- Okay … is to talk to your SBA contact and say, “Hook me up with an SBA award,” so that you can say that your firm is now an SBA award-winning opportunity zone specialist.

48:47 Jim Beach: Do you see what I’m saying? And so many- Ah, dude, that’s

48:49 Ashley Tison: awesome.

48:50 Jim Beach: I’m sorry, go ahead.

48:51 Ashley Tison: I said that’s awesome, because I’m still trying to figure out how we get paid for all the work that we do relative

48:56 Jim Beach: to the SBA. Well, Ashley, you’re never gonna get paid from the SBA, I’ll just tell you that now. [00:49:00] I’ll just tell you that now.

49:01 Jim Beach: Um, but I, you know, it, it’s just the overall strategy that I want people to think about when they win awards and, uh, get these opportunities to be on lists and stuff. 99% of that is user-generated. You getting yourself an award, you acting out- Right … and causing an award to happen for you. These awards don’t miraculously find these top 20 people.

49:28 Jim Beach: Those top 20 people- Sure … had publicists. So anyway, I’m off my soapbox, Ashley.

49:34 Ashley Tison: No, that’s, uh, great advice, right? So not only are we doing a podcast, but man, that’s, that’s actually stuff that I can use. That’s fantastic.

49:41 Jim Beach: Uh, seriously, hit, hit your SBA guy up for some sort of award. They have, like, 15 or 20 awards they give every year.

49:49 Jim Beach: So there’s something that will apply to you. Okay. Ashley, let’s go back in time now. Talk about building this business as an entrepreneur. Give me the entrepreneurial history. How’d [00:50:00] you get the idea to do this? Um, you said that, you know, part of your legal education exposed you to these zones. Uh, walk us through the, the birthing of the entrepreneurial baby

50:11 Ashley Tison: Yeah, it’s funny is that so when I sold my law practice, and when I say sold, it was basically I retained 25%, um, because I was, uh, I was working on going to work for, uh, a mergers and acquisition shop, uh, business broker.

50:26 Ashley Tison: And I was gonna become a principal there, and if I was a principal there, I could not Uh, you know, I would have conflicts relative to actually doing the deals associated, right, doing the law associated with the deals. And so in order to clear that conflict, I sold the law firm. I kept a residual off of it, which didn’t, uh, that, that didn’t violate the conflict stuff.

50:48 Ashley Tison: And as I was going through that, I was working on building a succession planning practice where we helped business owners really identify what they wanted to move towards instead of [00:51:00] away from, and to figure out, okay, hey, what does the next chapter look like? And how can I best position my company to be a, a viable acquisition candidate for private equity or a strategic buyer, whatever that looks like.

51:15 Ashley Tison: And as I was doing that, I could not get entrepreneurs like business owners to call me back. I was like, “Hey, let- listen, let me give you fifteen minutes of my time so I can walk you through some things that’ll help you save money on taxes and that will make your business more valuable.” I literally couldn’t get them to call me back.

51:33 Ashley Tison: And so I spent a solid eighteen months trying to get a listing and, uh, to no avail. And, you know, I, I’m, I’m a, a, a firm believer that, uh, coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous and that that door got closed for me. And as I was really struggling, I mean, in twenty eighteen, I think I made like sixty-five thousand dollars based on like valuations that I was doing for people.

51:59 Ashley Tison: [00:52:00] And I was having to continue to do a little bit of law work, uh, just to keep the lights on as I was trying to get this business brokerage thing going. Uh, that’s when I was at a CLE. I heard this guy talking about the Tax Cut and Jobs Act. He mentioned opportunity zones. Like I said, I ran him down in the hall afterwards and I was like, “Hey man, that sounded like Ten thirty-one and private equity got married.”

52:23 Ashley Tison: And I was… My expertise was I was– I had done Ten thirty-one deals. Those are the like-kind real estate exchange, and then private equity being businesses. And I was like, “It sounds like you morph the two of those. And man, this could be like right in my sweet spot.” And he’s like, “Yep, they had a beautiful baby named Opportunity Zone.”

52:41 Ashley Tison: So that’s what prompted the idea. I ran back into the CLE. I started taking down domains, uh, and so many that my, uh, my assistant thought somebody had hacked our GoDaddy account and so changed my password. So, uh, [00:53:00] we, we popped up a website on opportunityzoneconsultants.com, and, uh, that’s what led to, you know, people really responding to it.

53:09 Ashley Tison: And I w- I don’t think that it was anything that I did, you know, that was hugely intelligent. I just recognized what my strengths were, and I recognized what I believed to be a wave coming, that this was going to pave the way for a massive, uh, interest spike. And sure enough, right, there was just massive search traffic on opportunity zones, and there weren’t a whole lot of people who were filling that search traffic.

53:36 Ashley Tison: And so we got to be one of the front runners, and we, you know, we were able to reap the benefits of that.

53:44 Jim Beach: Cool, cool story, Ashley. Love what you have done. Congratulations. A pluses all around. We’d love to have you back. We are out of time, I am afraid. How do we find out more, follow you online, all that?

53:56 Ashley Tison: Yeah.

53:56 Ashley Tison: If you go to ozpros.com, uh, we’ve [00:54:00] got a special offer for you and your guests at ozpros.com/podcast. And, um, we’ve got a special deal on blueprint calls, which is how we review somebody’s situation to walk them through whether an opportunity zone deal works for them, or if they’ve just got high taxes that they’re paying.

54:17 Ashley Tison: If anybody’s paying over, you know, $250,000 in taxes, they need to set a blueprint call with us, ’cause we can help them solve that problem. And I know I need to ask you, uh, if we’re gonna play our quick 10. We’re gonna do

54:30 Jim Beach: that separately, Ashley.

54:32 Ashley Tison: Okay, great.

54:34 Jim Beach: We’re out of time. Thank you so much for being with us.

54:36 Jim Beach: Have a great day, everyone, and go make a million dollars. Bye now.