December 30, 2018December 30, 2018 FOGA

Why I Decided to Pursue FIRE

Financial Independence, Lifestyle

It’s late December 2016, and I am in my office. I am not having a good day, and it’s only 9:30 am. There are a few reasons why and I will get into them below. Unfortunately for me, my day was about to get worse. 

 My boss strolls in to check on me a few minutes later. After some polite small talk about some of the issues I had, she puts a few sheets of paper on my desk. These papers were my formal write-up. Three pages to say that I had not met my sales goals, that I was not doing my job effectively, and that I am a negative person with “negative facial expressions.” She noted my negative facial expression three times by the way. To say I was floored would be the understatement of the fucking millennium. She then tells me to go through my write-up, write my comments & opinions, and sign it before she leaves. I could ask questions while she was there, of course. 

I am in shock and unable to speak at this point. What I want is for this woman to leave so I can process what the hell was happening. Thankfully, the universe seems to understand my predicament because she gets an emergency call and has to rush to another community. She’ll come back afterward. So, that left me alone with my notice. 

Some Backstory

At the time, I was doing the same thing then as I am now: New Home Sales. The problem was my company at the time had undergone a “successful merger.” When I say “successful merger,” I say it sarcastically on both points.

“Successful”

Successful couldn’t have been further from the truth. We were in a horrible spot. Our management took the wost parts from both companies and pushed them together. It was chaotic. The mistakes coming out of our main office would have made my buyers run for the hills.

“Oh! You wanted your home to have a three-car garage?”
“They wanted that bonus room on the second floor?”
“You didn’t choose this flooring that we’ve already put through your entire home?”

Checking every other department’s work had become my main job, then correcting those mistakes, then fighting with other departments about said mistakes, and then finally selling homes. 

“Merger”

They called it a “merger of equals.” One company got 51% of the shares, and the other got 49%. We were integrating the best parts of both to create one stronger company. So, imagine our “surprise” when the business with 51% essentially took over and the entire culture shifted to theirs. Most people would call this an acquisition.

This “merger” was a luxury builder buying a semi-luxury builder. Everything that we considered normal for either builder was just shot all to hell. The only thing a $200,000 home has in common with a $550,000 is that they are both homes. Everything else is different from the type of buyer to the kind of upgrades they want in the homes. Combining the two made no sense, and caused all the problems. 

I made the most of it when this happened, but it was not a smooth process.
I’m borrowing Steveark’s terminology for this. Check out his post on this topic. It’s terrific.

My former builder was a strong proponent of the family business model. They cared about the team and did their best to make sure everyone could succeed. It wasn’t perfect, but everyone was content. Sadly, most of my managers did not make the cut in the merge. Our new management criticized our entire team since we came from the “subpar” builder. The smug, superior atmosphere was one of the worse parts. (Probably why I noticed it so much on that cruise, huh?) They altered just about everything we had to their model. We became part of the team business model and culture. AKA: What have you done for me lately?

Things Got Worse

Over time, I started noticing the agents from my company quietly leaving. I’m not talking about the ones who were there for 1-3 years. These are people who had 10-15 years invested. It happened slowly.  They did not fire anyone. People just decided to leave. Consistently. Most were people who sold over an hour away from me. I didn’t know them as well and didn’t hear much about it. 

Then it started happening to the people I knew pretty well. Thankfully, they were more than candid. It turned out we were being forced out and replaced. Our managers visited one of my coworkers to tell her she was staying in a community with only two overpriced homes left to sell. Once she sold out, they would consider other neighborhoods to relocate her to. Others received notices very similar to mine. They moved at least two to communities that were struggling and therefore not selling any homes. 

Over time, we got more and more notices that people had left. Now it was starting to be people from both sides. Everyone started to get fed up with all the issues that were not corrected. The mistakes of the “successful” “merger” I mentioned from before started cropping up all over the place. Everyone’s jobs turned into checking everyone else’s work. By the time December rolled around, we had lost over 50% of the agents we had at the start of the merger.

My Situation

While I did the best I could, I was not okay. I was struggling with depression. It was even worse considering how many good things were happening at the time. We were buying a new home with the same company (more on that in a second), and we got married that October. I should have been on top of the moon, but work was making me miserable. I felt like an ungrateful brat, but it didn’t change how unhappy I was. At Mr. FOGTA recommendation, I started seeing a therapist, and that helped, but it was still a long climb.

For those wondering why I didn’t just leave my job: I couldn’t. I couldn’t get a new job until the house closed. Due to my income being commission, if I left and went to work elsewhere, I would have to wait for at least one to two years before I would be able to qualify for a home again. Mortgage companies are not kind to commission employees or those who work for themselves.

Plus, all those issues that were happening with other homes were happening with our’s as well. Our initial contract went missing for a month, and we only noticed because they never cashed our deposit check. They switched our construction manager out on us in the middle of construction
The replacement was new to the company and had no clue how to use our systems. They forgot to schedule one of our mandatory walkthroughs, and we had to remind them about it. The only reason we got updates on my home is that I made it a point check in about once a week.

The day before my boss showed up I found out they put the wrong floors in my home and that was going to delay things even longer. Hence why I was not in a good mood that day.

Leading Up to That Morning

I sold out the community I was in at the start of the merger, and then I was moved to a new one. Everything in the neighborhood was untested from the floorplans to the systems. It was essentially starting from scratch in every way.

I doubled our sales plan in my first quarter, and we opened towards the end of August. The following quarter things slowed down. That was pretty normal for a new neighborhood. By the time my boss had shown up, I had a contract scheduled for the next day and therefore made the goal for the year. Pretty good for a community that opened two months late.

So, that morning I wasn’t expecting anything from my boss except an assurance that they were fixing the tile in my home.

Back to the Present

All I can say is thank the universe for my mom. After I ran out of the model and drove out in the community to get some space, I called Mr. FOGTA- he did NOT answer- and then called my mom. The cool thing about my mom: She’s the most logical person on the planet. I tell her everything while freaking out and I can hear she is pissed. However, she is the cool-headed one. She got me to focus and get ready to go on the offensive for when my boss got back. We got the battle plan together and then I went back to work.

My boss came back about an hour later, and the momentum changed. I controlled the whole conversation and learned a few important things.
1. I needed to sell a ridiculous number of homes in 34 days, and if I didn’t, I would face consequences up to losing my job. During the slowest time of year.
2. While it was her job to help me with issues, clearly, if I did that, it would come back to bite me in the ass. Therefore, I should ask her nothing. She seemed embarrassed when I asked her if it was not her job to help, train, and mentor the agents. I didn’t get a real answer on that.
3. If I decided to leave or if they let me go, they would totally give me my money back on the house. Assholes.

Did I mention that we wouldn’t be closing on the home for another two months? Well outside the 34-day deadline.

By the end of our “talk,” she essentially ran out of my office and told me I could get the notice back to her tomorrow. Just email it — a far cry from our original conversation.

How It Ended

After that, I call my mom. Now that the hard part is out of the way she is openly pissed off. I clearly need a new job which is fine. I hate working here at this point (even before this incident), and there were other options for me. The problem is now the house. At that point, Mr. FOGTA calls and I tell him all about my day. He is livid. It comes down to one fact: We need to be prepared to lose the house.

Later I call a friend who went through a similar experience. She emphasized. The good news is that she left our company and is with another builder. She calls her boss and sent in a fantastic word for me. She put in such a good word that her boss called me about 10 minutes later. After a five minute conversation, I had an in-person interview in four days. Within two weeks I had a job offer, and they agreed to wait until my home closed.

At my current job, I decided that since I had nothing to lose so, in January, I decided to speak to my division president. Why? Because, honestly, what the hell else could go wrong. He agreed to not do anything until my home closed although, he also said I wasn’t in danger of losing my job. Didn’t believe that for a second, but I was happy about the house. I also worked on my terrible facial expressions (just awful really) and faked smiled through all the meetings.

In the end, it didn’t matter. The division president fired one of the VPs a month later and then did a complete 180 on me. My boss actually had the nerve to say that they loved me in my evaluation. I called her out on that, but they stood by saying that they wanted me to stay. By then I was impatiently waiting for the closing day of our home to leave, so it didn’t matter.

Two days after we closed on our home I put in my notice. They felt it was pointless to have me stay the whole two weeks. My last day was three days later. I was free.

What I Learned From This

So, this was a trying and emotional two months of my life. That is not counting the year of dealing with the merged company. I did learn some things from it all.

1. I hate mergers, and I will never go through another one.
2. While some bosses are trustworthy, I will never fully trust one again.
3. I will never again allow myself to be in a situation where I feel trapped.
   • I will make sure I have at least one year of expenses so if I lost my job; we would be good for quite some time.
4. My managers will always care about what you’ve done for them lately and not what you have done to previously.
5. Networking is the best thing you can do for your career.

It was about a year or so later that I learned about FI/RE.

That’s why working to be FI is incredibly appealing to me. By achieving FI, I would never be trapped in a job that I hate ever again. While I am not sure if I would ever retire, I want to ability to do what I what I like where money is not an issue.

Conclusion

This was a definitive event for me and changed a lot of how I saw the world and employment in general. Since leaving that company, I make more money and have significantly less stress than before. Hell, I even have time to have a blog!

I still have depression, but it’s nowhere near as bad as it was. I am still seeing my therapist as well. She has been incredibly helpful, and I am a lot better at managing it now.

It took a lot for me to share this story- like weeks of writing and lots of re-writes on top of that. Not sure if I picked the right title and not even sure why I decided to share it. It was a very dark time for me. Crying on your birthday is never fun (it was three days after this).

Sadly, I know it’s not an uncommon story. I felt the need to share. If you are going through something similar, just know that there is light on the other side of the tunnel. It may just take a minute to get there.

Til Next Time!
-G