Marc Kuhn

Rent the Pink BMW.

(Why you should spend more $$$ on your kids.)

There’s a sobering stat you might’ve seen:

-> By the time your kids are 12, you’ve spent 75% of your time with them.

After hearing that stat, I started a new tradition with my kids.

When they turn 10, we go on a 1:1 trip together.

The first time I did this was with my oldest daughter, Stella.

We drove from Scottsdale, AZ to Santa Monica, CA.

But we wanted to do it in style.

So we rented a Pink BMW.

Was it silly?
Yes.

Did Stella love it?
Yes.

Did I love driving it?
...Yes.

Was it the financially responsible decision?
Of course not.

But you and I both know that some decisions aren’t about the money.

After all, what are we chasing money for?

• Don’t we want better lives?
• Don't we want to make a bigger impact?
• Don't we want to enjoy life more, and to leave it better than we found it?

I can't think of a better way to build a better life than to make fun memories with my kids.

And I can’t think of a better way to make a bigger impact than to spread joy.

Life is short.

Your time with your kids is shorter.

Rent the Pink BMW.

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Where was the last trip you took with your kids?

A tile guy pays us $780/mo for a garage.

He could lease a warehouse for $4,000.

But he picks our Mega MAK Storage condo every time.

Most of our storage tenants aren't storing couches. They're running businesses.

Plumbers, electricians, landscapers, and contractors run their operations out of our units, often with $50,000 of tools inside.

A traditional industrial lease wants a 3 to 5 year commitment and four grand a month.

Our unit gives him:

→ Climate control and real security
→ A 12x14 door he can pull a trailer through
→ A 30-day lease instead of a 5-year handcuff

For a growing business, that flexibility is worth more than the extra square footage.

About 75% of our tenants are business owners. That's not an accident. We built the product for them.

When you build for a specific customer, you stop competing on price.

Who is your product actually built for?

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DM me "storage" to learn how we develop luxury storage at MAK Capital.

Let’s be real—girls are smarter than guys.

Starting a business wasn’t on my radar…

Until I met my wife.

I was broke. Fresh off a DUI. Wearing skater shoes and earrings.

Proud of two things: my truck and my beer league softball team.

We met at a bar.
She denied my date requests for weeks.
Can’t blame her.

But I stayed persistent—and eventually got the date.

My biggest task in life at that time:
Get my sh*t together.

6 months later:
• Engaged
• Bought a house
• Started a business

13 years later:
• 3 kids growing up fast
• $60M+ real estate portfolio
• Multiple companies doing $30M+ per year

I brought the hustle. The appetite to take risks. The ability to take the leap.

But she had the vision.

The creative marketing eye.
The details I missed.
The patience I lacked.

I grew up in concrete. Time was money.

No fluff, no storytelling, no branding—just work.

She helped me see the bigger picture.
Not just the next job…
But how to build a brand people remember.

Today, everything is marketing. And the MAK family of companies wouldn’t exist without her.

There’s power in persistence.
But even more power in partnership.

If you're an entrepreneur raising a family, building businesses, hustling all the time...

You need that partner in life to share all the good, bad, and craziness that comes with it.

What’s the most important lesson your partner has taught you in life or business?

We filled a 72-unit building in under a year.

In a town most investors can't find on a map.

Everyone wants to invest in Austin, Phoenix, and Nashville.

I built Northern Point in Grafton, North Dakota.

We leased it from empty to stabilized in under twelve months.

Here's what the "boring" market gave us that the hot ones don't:

→ Land at a fraction of sunbelt prices
→ Permitting measured in weeks, not years
→ Almost no competing new supply
→ Renters who actually stay

The coasts have more people. They also have more developers fighting over the same dirt and the same tenant.

I'd rather be the only new building in a town that needs one than the tenth in a city that doesn't.

The unsexy market is the edge. Most people are too proud to go get it.

What's a market everyone overlooks that you'd quietly bet on?

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It's the kind of overlooked, execution-first market the large capital partners we work with want a piece of.

DM me "storage" to see how.

Follow me Marc Kuhn for daily posts about building wealth with boring assets and blue-collar businesses.

I made $250K in a year.

It was the worst I ever felt.

On paper, I'd made it.

A quarter million in income and a construction company growing fast.

But I was working 100-hour weeks for every dollar of it.

I was the estimator, the project manager, the closer, and the guy unclogging problems at midnight.

The money came in. My life got smaller, not bigger.

That was the year I learned the lesson that changed everything.

A high income is not wealth.

Income is what you trade your hours for. Wealth is what keeps paying you after you stop.

So I started moving the money instead of just earning it:

→ Into real estate that pays rent every month
→ Into businesses someone else could run
→ Into assets that don't need me in the room

It took years to feel the difference.

Now the work I do is a choice, not a sentence.

If you're grinding for a number that isn't changing your life, the number was never the problem.

What would actually change if your income doubled tomorrow?

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♻️ Repost to spread the wealth with your network

Follow me Marc Kuhn for daily posts about building wealth with boring assets and blue-collar businesses.

I didn’t have investors. I didn’t have experience.

I had $2,500 and a borrowed pickup.

That’s how MAK Construction started.

• No business plan.
• No accountant.
• No website.

I didn’t even know how to run payroll.

But I knew how to work. And that’s the part no one talks about when you’re figuring it out alone.

When you’re underbidding jobs just to stay busy.
When Friday payroll feels too close for comfort.
When you realize the hardest part of running a business isn’t the work, it’s the weight of responsibility.

At 22, I wasn’t trying to get rich.

I just wanted control of my time. To build something I could point to and say, “We made that.”

Years later, that small, stubborn bet on myself turned into:

→ A skill stack to lead a team of 50+
→ A $25M a year construction company
→ A $60M real estate portfolio built from the profits

But the truth is, none of that came fast.

There were years we barely made payroll. Years I slept 4 hours a night and questioned if I was built for it. Years I learned the hard way that growth eats cash faster than anything.

Here’s what those years taught me:

→ You don’t need luck, funding, or fancy branding.
→ You need grit, patience, and the ability to persist.
→ You win by staying in the game longer than the people who quit.

Every day you show up, move projects forward, make calls, solve problems — and it compounds.

That’s how you build real wealth from the ground up.

What did your first real bet on yourself look like?

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If you’re building wealth through a business, construction, or real estate…

Follow me Marc Kuhn for lessons from 15 years as an operator turning sweat into equity.

My nicest building rents for double.

It cost about the same to build.

That gap is the whole luxury storage thesis.

Concrete, steel, and dirt cost the same whether you put up a plain box or something a tenant is proud to pull into.

The upgrades that create the premium are small line items against the shell:

→ Taller doors and a wider approach
→ Climate control
→ Lighting, security, a floor you'd work on

Cheap to cut. Expensive to skip.

Most developers cut them to make a number work on paper, then spend years fighting for occupancy against everyone else who did the same thing.

We spend a little more up front and lease up while the plain boxes sit half empty.

Cheap to build and hard to fill is the worst deal in storage.

Where have you seen a small upgrade change the entire return?

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DM me "storage" to learn how we develop luxury storage at MAK Capital.

You’re probably in the busiest season of your life.

Will 100-hour workweeks make you free?

People tell me all the time:
“Marc, you’ve got a lot going on.”

• 3 kids in sports
• Building multiple companies
• 20+ real estate properties

You’d think I love being busy.

Truth is—I hate it.

When I was younger, working construction with my Dad, he said something profoundly simple:

“Get your shit done so we can get outta here.”

Translation: Be productive, not performative.

You always hear about the entrepreneur working 100-hour weeks, burning the candle at both ends.

Sometimes that’s what it takes to start.

But if that’s still your strategy 10 years later?

You’re not winning.
You’re stuck in a trap.
You're the bottleneck.

Busy is where entrepreneurs go to die (sometimes quite literally).

Productivity shouldn't be measured by how many hours you work or how many calls are on your calendar.

My dad worked hard—but he also made damn sure we never worked a Friday afternoon.

That’s real leverage.

The secret isn’t being busy.

It’s building systems, a team, and a business that keeps growing.

Even if you step away.

So let me ask the entrepreneurs, investors, and 9-5ers in my LinkedIn network:

What does “busy” look like for you right now?

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P.S.

If you want to build real financial freedom without working 100 hours a week...

Join 5,200+ in my newsletter "Unfollow the Herd", teaching you to buy back your time through real estate, systems, and ownership.

👉 marckuhn.substack.com

My wife and I run a 90-minute meeting.

It's why our companies stopped bleeding cash.

Chelsie and I own the companies together, so we run it together.

For a stretch, we'd drifted out of the habit. We were busy. Things felt fine. Then the financials told us they weren't.

So we got disciplined again.

My COO, Jaden, built us a tool that pulled three things we used to keep in separate places into one:

→ Our weekly scorecard
→ Our KPIs by division
→ Our open issues list

Now I log in and the whole business is on one screen.

Each division shows green or red every week: concrete, drilling, construction, snow, and storage.

When something's been red for three weeks, we don't guess. We open that division's dashboard and solve it right there.

We get more done in that meeting than we used to in a week of phone calls.

The boring rhythm is the entire point. You can't fix what you only look at once a quarter.

Do you and your business partner look at the same number every week?

--

♻️ Repost to spread the wealth with your network

Follow me Marc Kuhn for daily posts about building wealth with boring assets and blue-collar businesses.

10 years ago, I was jackhammering concrete by hand.

Now I’m a:

• Developer
• Contractor.
• Capital raiser.
• Content creator.

Instead of doing so much manual labor, I’m:

• Raising money.
• Operating deals.
• Solving problems.
• Doing due diligence.
• Finding opportunities.
• Chasing the next deal.
• Meeting new investors.
• Maximizing returns for investors

26-year-old Marc would have a hard time believing how 36-year-old Marc spends his time.

If you’re stuck in the grind right now, just remember:

The days are long, but the years are short.

Keep showing up.
Keep your aim high.
Keep applying pressure.

10 years passes in the blink of an eye.

But not so fast that you can’t change your life.


𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗱𝗼𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝟭𝟬 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘀 𝗮𝗴𝗼?

- Marc Kuhn

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P.S. If you want to learn more about getting started and getting traction in real estate, join 4,200+ readers getting my weekly newsletter here: https://lnkd.in/g_4j9ksX

Why would I read Rich Dad Poor Dad (teens edition) with my 10-11 year old daughters?

Because life isn't going to hand you anything.

They need to learn this ASAP.

As a parent, you don't need to be a genius on how to get rich.

But you should introduce your kids to ideas from the wealthiest people on earth.

Ask an 11-year girl what it means to be rich.

• Owning a tesla (like Dad)
• Own the Kardashian house
• Unlimited makeup at Sephora
• Closet full of designer clothes

Here's what this book teaches them:

99% of these are liabilities.

This is how you trap yourself in life.

Does it produce income?
If not, it's a liability.

Schools don’t teach kids the practical truth around money, wealth, and lifestyle.

Two things they should know before high school:

1. Assets vs. Liabilities
2. Looking rich vs being wealthy

Talk to your kids about the difference.
You might even learn something yourself.

What are you teaching your kids about money and wealth?

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I've written about how we're teaching our kids about money and wealth in the past in my newsletter.

Check it out here: https://lnkd.in/g-qJ3X-N

Barbara Corcoran turned a $1,000 loan into $66,000,000.

Not bad.

In 1973, Corcoran borrowed $1K from her boyfriend to open a real estate firm — Corocan-Simoné.

7 years later, her boyfriend told her he was going to marry Corocan's secretary.

So she took full control of the firm and renamed it.

The Corcoran Group was born.

Barbara started getting traction by publishing a newsletter that covered real estate data trends in NYC.

She leaned into:

-> Marketing.
-> Media attention.
-> Hot-button trends.

Over the next 28 years, Barbara built The Corcoran Group into one of NYC's top real estate firms.

And in 2001, she sold The Corcoran Group for $66 million.

(After turning down a $21 million offer.)

Remember:

You don't need to start rich to end rich.

Not bad for a $1,000 loan.

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P.S. I'm currently open to connecting with investors who are interested in passive investing opportunities in real estate in 2025.

DM me "passive" to learn more.

90% of entrepreneurs I meet are trapped.

They call themselves business owners, but their business owns them.

I know because I lived that way for years.

If I wasn’t on the jobsite, nothing happened.
If I took a week off, things fell apart.

It took me years to admit I was anything but free.

At that point, I was running myself into the ground more than I was running a company.

• So I hired leaders.
• Built systems that could operate without me.
• Learned to let go, even when it felt uncomfortable.

Now MAK Construction runs whether I’m at the office or at the lake with my kids.

That’s the true test of if you have a job or a business.

Not revenue or headcount, but how long your business can thrive when you step away.

If your company can’t survive your absence, it’s not a business yet.

It’s a treadmill.

What’s the first system you built that actually gave you your time back?

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If you're interested in learning about business, real estate, and investing...check out my newsletter that 5,700 others enjoy.

marckuhn.substack.com

You can’t hit $100K/month doing grandma’s 12x12 patio. I know because I tried...

When I started MAK Construction, I took every job that came my way:

→ Bathroom remodels
→ Driveways and patios
→ Random handyman work

It kept me busy and paid the bills. Margins were fine.

But no matter how hard I worked, I was stuck at $30–40K a month.

You simply can’t do enough small jobs to hit serious revenue.

The turning point came when I stopped thinking small and started bidding big.

Instead of chasing $5K bathrooms, I went after $200K commercial projects.
One big job beats 40 small ones every time.

Then I made three key shifts that changed everything:

→ Specialized.
When you’re good at everything, you’re great at nothing. I focused on concrete and commercial work — became the guy for it in my market.

→ Integrated.
Instead of buying materials retail, I started buying in bulk, stocking what we used most, and tightening systems. That shaved days off projects and protected margins.

→ Delegated.
I stopped being the one-man show running sales, estimates, and fieldwork all at once. I hired for my weaknesses so I could focus on growth.

That’s when MAK Construction scaled to $1M+...then $5M...then $10M.

Today, we do around $25M-$30M a year from our construction projects.

If you're stuck in your small business, know that the next level won't come from working harder. It comes from thinking bigger, leveraging systems, and moving into the leader mindset.

For entrepreneurs on LinkedIn:

What’s the biggest shift that helped you scale your business?

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If you’re an entrepreneur ready to grow to the next level, my newsletter Unfollow the Herd is for you: marckuhn.substack.com

We paid $0 for land on a 72-unit apartment build.

Grafton, North Dakota donated it.

That’s one reason I build in the Midwest instead of chasing “hot markets.”

In big coastal cities, you’re paying:

→ $20–35 per square foot just for dirt
→ 18-month permit timelines
→ Endless competition with institutional capital

By the time the first shovel hits the ground, you’ve already lost your margin.

In Grafton, North Dakota, the city gave us land appraised at $350,000.

Why?

They hadn’t seen new multifamily construction in 30 years.
They needed housing, and we could deliver it.

This isn’t a one-off deal.

Small Midwest towns are hungry for development.
They’ll work with you instead of against you.

The people at city council know us by name.
The city planner and I text directly.
Permitting moves fast because they want progress.

Here’s the difference:

→ In hot markets, capital is king.
→ In small markets, relationships are.

When you build in these towns, you’re not just another developer.

You can actually dominate.
You can shape skylines, not just chase yield.

While everyone else fights over overpriced deals in Miami or Austin…we'd rather quietly stack assets in places nobody celebrates.

The world tells you to follow the herd.

But the best deals are found where nobody else is looking.

Where are you building that everyone else overlooks?

—
I write more about my Midwest real estate strategy in my newsletter Unfollow the Herd.

Join 5,700 others learning how to build wealth where others aren’t looking: marckuhn.substack.com

10 years old. That’s the magic window for making memories with your kids before they grow up.

In April, my daughter and I went on her “10 Trip”.

When my kids turn 10, we hit the road for a week together on a father-daughter trip.

My oldest got her trip a few years ago.

This time it was just Dad and Lola.

Why age 10?

Because it’s the perfect moment:

• She still thinks I’m cool
• No phone (even though she asked every day)
• Still acts like a kid — not a teenager yet

It’s the last window where I can be 10 years old with her. Before life speeds up. Before distractions multiply.

Trip Details:

• Budget: $5,000
• Duration: 1 week
• Theme: Spa, Indoor Skydiving, Shopping (of course)
• Scottsdale → Las Vegas → St. George → Back to AZ

Lola is our middle child. And like many middle kids, she can sometimes get lost in the shuffle.

Not this time. This week, she got 100% of the attention and time with Dad.

And I got memories I’ll never forget.

This is the real goal of building businesses and investing in real estate.

Not the money, but the time it buys me to spend with my kids making memories like this.

Do you have memories from a special trip when your kids were still young and think you're cool?

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P.S.

In 2023 I took the "10 trip" with my oldest daughter and shared why other parents should consider doing this here in my newsletter:

https://lnkd.in/gpUbAR7J

Most 6-year-olds love to play in the dirt.

I got paid $1/hr to clean construction trailers.

That was my first job. My dad ran a concrete company, and I was the kid organizing wood stakes and 2x12s in the truck bed.

One summer I worked 52 hours.

(They even docked me an hour for napping.)

I got a $52 paycheck and bought a remote control car I’d been eyeing for months.

That moment planted a seed:
→ Work = Money = Freedom.

But here’s the twist...

During the school year, I lived with my mom. We were broke. Food stamps. A car that started on luck. I learned how to survive.

During the summers, I worked with my dad. I learned how to build.

Two different lives. One big lesson:

I didn’t want to survive. I wanted to own.

Own my time. My decisions. My future.

By 20, I realized if I kept trading hours for dollars, I’d always be capped.

So I made a decision most people never do:

I disconnected from the wage mindset.

I stopped chasing paychecks and started building assets. Started chasing scale, not comfort.

I gave up easy weekends to pour concrete.

I gave up complacency to learn about real estate, leverage, and how the wealthy operate.

Fast forward:

→ Made my first million in construction by 30
→ Used my income to build a real estate portfolio
→ Teaching my kids the value of work + leverage

Here’s the brutal truth no one tells you:

You don’t build wealth by playing it safe.
You do it by going all in and betting on yourself.

To have more freedom, you use your income to stop trading time and start building things that make money while you sleep.

→ Buy real estate.
→ Own equity.
→ Create cash flow.
→ Take risks with asymmetric upside.

If you’re still playing by everyone else’s rules, don’t be surprised when you get their results.

What are you building today that will pay you 10 years from now?

I say no to 9 out of 10 deals.

Last month, number 10 was 38 units I wanted.

A seller brought me 38 paid-off units for $1.8 million.

On the surface it looked clean. No existing debt, motivated seller, real cash flow.

So I ran the numbers the way I run all of them.

→ The units produced about $110,000 a year
→ Debt service on a new loan would eat roughly $85,000
→ That put the real value closer to $1.1 million, not $1.8 million

At their price, I'd be putting up a fortune to earn about 1% on my capital.

I passed.

Anyone can say no to a bad deal. Discipline is saying no to a good one when the math doesn't love you back.

We review 15 to 20 deals a month and pass on most of them, and that discipline is the job.

What's a good opportunity you walked away from, and were you right?

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DM me "passive" to learn about opportunities you can partner with us on at MAK Capital.

5M new businesses are started every year in the U.S.

Before COVID, that number was 3.5M.

That’s a massive shift, and many of those businesses need affordable space to run their business from.

I’ve been tracking this closely because it directly fuels our luxury storage developments.

Here’s the reality for most new blue-collar business owners:

→ They’ve outgrown their garage.
→ They need space for inventory, equipment, ops.
→ Commercial rent runs too expensive for most.
→ Traditional 10x10 storage units are too small.
→ Industrial flex space locks them into 1–5 year leases they can’t commit to.

So what do they do?

They rent our luxury storage or condo garage units.

• Our units average 1,000 square feet.
• Climate-controlled. Clean. Secure.
• And most importantly — 30-day leases.

They get space to operate, store, and grow…without getting trapped by long-term commitments.

Rent runs between $500–1,500 per month, depending on the market.

It’s affordable, flexible, and far more functional than a basic storage unit or overpriced retail lease.

We’re seeing:

→ Contractors use them as shops
→ E-commerce sellers as fulfillment centers
→ Service businesses as an affordable HQ

This is the next evolution of small business real estate.

More people want freedom — not a boss, not a cubicle, not a 10-year lease.

They want space that moves as fast as their business does.

That’s why we’re all-in on making Mega MAK luxury storage the go-to brand for these entrepreneurs.

Have you seen this shift in your local area?

More entrepeneurs looking for flexible space and avoiding the expensive, long-term commercial leases.

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Btw we are looking for people who want to help us scale this luxury storage product across the US.

DM me "storage" to stay updated on opportunities and connect with our team to learn more.

Marc Kuhn

My goal as a Dad with 2 daughters:

Teach them "high-agency" life skills.

By the time they're out of the house and off to college, they'll know how to:

• Change a flat tire.
• Back up a truck with a trailer.
• Climb a roof and put shingles down.
• Read and analyze their personal finances.
• Fix what’s broken, and walk a construction site with confidence.

We're raising them to rely on themselves to get through life.

The cool kids on the internet call it "High Agency."

High-agency people don’t sit around waiting for permission, perfect conditions, or someone else to solve the problem. They assume it’s on them to figure it out.

One day, I hope they marry husbands who take care of them. And we'll always be the first to help.

But that’ll be a luxury, not a requirement, for them to solve problems in their lives.

My dad helped me develop this skill from a young age, watching him run a business and working beside him.

I learned the value of figuring it out, doing the work, and taking responsibility.

That’s the same lesson I want for my girls.

Because if they grow up capable, they’ll never be at the mercy of anyone. And that confidence will carry into everything—family, business, and life.

For the parents out there:

What’s one skill you want your kids to leave your house with?

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♻️ Share this with parents in your network
🤝 Reach out if I can be a resource Marc Kuhn

These two rules from Steve Jobs helped me build a $60M real estate portfolio:

“Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”

Simple words.
Big impact.

1) Stay hungry = Be ultra-urgent and persistent

Even when your bank account is full and projects are humming, stay in build mode.

Hunger is the edge.

It’s what kept me grinding through long weeks in the North Dakota cold, pouring concrete before I ever raised capital.

2) Stay foolish = Maintain a creative, childlike mindset

The best decisions I’ve made in business looked dumb on paper:

→ Launching luxury storage in towns no one was talking about.
→ Quitting the “safe” path to build something I believed in.
→ Teaching my kids about real estate, not just algebra.

The greatest entrepreneurs and visionaries understand this.

Think Tesla.
Think Apple.
Think innovation.

To build something really impactful, you need both:

1. The hunger to push boundaries
2. The foolishness to imagine what others can't see

My advice?

Just be a little delusional.

It goes a long way.

Are you staying hungry AND foolish in your business journey?

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♻️ Repost to inspire an entrepreneur in your network
📌 Reach out if I can be a resource Marc Kuhn

Scaling from $1M to $25M revenue didn’t happen because I worked more hours.

It happened because I let go of control—and started thinking like a builder, not just a doer.

Here’s what that looked like inside MAK Construction and MAK Capital:

$1M to $5M

✅ Stopped saying yes to every concrete job that came across my desk
✅ Focused on bigger contracts that actually moved the needle
✅ Built systems so I wasn’t the one scheduling crews or chasing invoices

$5M to $10M

✅ Hired leaders who were better than me at what they did
✅ Created clear swim lanes so the team owned outcomes
✅ Let go of daily ops—and learned to trust the people I hired

$10M to $25M+

✅ Built a leadership board to drive strategy and accountability
✅ Locked in a pipeline 2–3 years ahead, so growth wasn’t a gamble
✅ Used investor capital through MAK Capital to scale faster, smarter

Every level demanded a new version of me.

And for a while, I clung to the old one—the guy who had to approve every decision, be on every job site, carry the whole thing.

But that mindset doesn’t scale. It stalls.

The real shift? I stopped grinding harder—and started leading better.

That’s what it takes to move from owning a job… to owning a business with legacy.

What was the biggest mindset shift you had to make to scale?

Would love to hear it.

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♻️ Repost for entrepreneurs in scale mode
🤝 Reach out if I can be a resource Marc Kuhn

Some of our tenants don't rent storage.

They rent a headquarters.

Standard self storage is a box for the stuff you don't need.

We built the opposite.

Our larger units have an office in the front and room for equipment in the back. A 12 by 14 overhead door you can pull a trailer through. Heat, power, and 24-hour access.

For a lot of our tenants, that unit is their entire base of operations.

→ A contractor runs crews and stores materials from one spot
→ An online seller keeps inventory and ships from the back
→ A service business gets a real home without a warehouse lease

Here's the part I love. A business starts in a smaller unit, and as it grows, it moves up into a bigger one instead of leaving us.

We don't lose our best tenants to their own growth. We give them more room to grow into.

Most storage is built for things. We built ours for the people whose livelihood is inside.

What would change for your business if you had a real base without a warehouse-sized commitment?

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DM me "storage" to learn how we develop luxury storage at MAK Capital.

I run three companies doing $30,000,000 a year.

But I still have my $100k side hustles.

A $500K fixer in Scottsdale, one block from our family's airbnb. Sitting in a neighborhood of $1M homes.

I didn't need to do this.

I'm already running active builds across construction, luxury storage, and a rural housing development. I don't have a shortage of work.

I chose this anyway.

The flip won't move the needle on my net worth.

But every flip teaches you something new:

→ How sub-trades actually price work in this market
→ What materials cost in Arizona vs North Dakota
→ Which finishes a Scottsdale buyer will pay up for
→ How fast permits move in a hot market
→ What the resale comps actually say (not what Zillow shows)

This is the kind of stuff you only learn by writing checks and getting your hands dirty.

15 years of building doesn't mean you stop learning.

It means you start choosing which lessons you want next.

The deal goes on market early May. Goal: sell for a profit and use it to build more in Arizona.

I'm not in this for the flip margin.

I'm in it for the next twenty deals that come because I learned this market.

The richest people I know aren't the ones who got to "enough" and stopped.

They're the ones who got to "enough" and kept playing because they love the game.

--

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If your income stops when you stop working, you don’t have wealth—you have a paycheck.

I don’t care how nice your house is.
I don’t care how many hours you work.
I don't care if you're a top 1% earner.

If your kids grow up watching you trade time for money until you're burnt out and bitter…

They’re going to do the same thing.

That was almost me.

I spent years on job sites—sweating, grinding, chasing the next paycheck. I thought I was building a future.

Turns out, I was ensuring I never got off the treadmill.

Because while I was earning...I was building:

• Zero equity.
• Zero ownership.
• Zero peace of mind.

After landing in the hospital from panic attacks, overworked with little to show...my mindset towards money shifted.

I didn't just want freedom, I wanted to teach my kids what schools failed to teach me about money.

→ Own assets that cash flow
→ Buy equity, not liabilities
→ Learn how to invest, not just chase income
→ Play long-term games with long-term people

You don’t need a finance degree to build wealth.

You need a mindset shift—and the courage to follow a path that is different than the playbook 99% of the world follows.

When you Unfollow the Herd, it looks like:

Starting a business.
Buying real estate.
Investing in your skills.
Betting on yourself.

And most importantly—setting your kids up to know more about money at an earlier age than you did.

Because they’re watching everything you do.

So the question isn’t just “How do I build wealth?”

It’s “What kind of blueprint am I leaving behind?”

Agree?

--
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👉 Reach out if I can be a resource Marc Kuhn

Construction isn't just a job to make quick cash.

We see it as a career.

The turnover rate at my construction company is very low.

It's something I'm proud of...

But it's not by mistake.

When I was a kid, my dad owned his concrete business. In industries like concrete/construction, most guys expect just to work themselves to the bone. The tradeoff is you can get pretty good pay at a young age.

But my dad did things a little differently.

We got off early on Fridays.
We didn't work weekends.

In our industry, that wasn't normal.

I've tried to implement that way of thinking in my own business.

And the goal is to show our team that construction can become a career — not just a jobs that you churn and burn until your body gives out. That you can move up in the company, that you can participate in our upside, that you're not just a laborer, but someone who knows how your role fits in with our goals — and what that means for you.

Every entrepreneur will tell you the same thing:

It all comes down to people.

So even if things like fewer hours or fewer benefits help your bottom line in the short term, it's almost never worth it in the long term.

Find good people and incentivize them to stick around.

Pretty simple when you look at it like that.


𝗣.𝗦. 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗱𝗼 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗱𝗼 𝘁𝗼 𝗸𝗲𝗲𝗽 𝘁𝗲𝗮𝗺 𝗺𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱?

It's cold in North Dakota 4-5 months a year.

My son and I share hobbies to make it better.

Hobbies are what make us who we are.

Without friends, hobbies, or family... All there is work and sleep.

And that's no way to live life.

As a young entrepreneur, I'm always trying to think about:

-> "How good am I doing as a dad?"
-> "How good of a boss am I being?"
-> "How is my relationship with my wife?"

And I catch myself returning to the same questions:

-> "Am I being a good friend?"
-> "Am I taking time for others?"
-> "Am I taking time for my hobbies?"
-> "Am I delivering for my investors?"
-> "Am I delivering for my customers?"
-> "Am I on the level I want to be with my faith?"

Don’t just think about these items...

Rate yourself in them every month — and be honest.

Don’t get so wrapped up in business and forget what life is really about.

Be present. Be happier.

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗱𝗼 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝘀𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝘆 𝗽𝗿𝗲𝘀𝗲𝗻𝘁?

My dream is to do $50,000,000 in revenue next year.

So why am I building boring buildings in rural North Dakota?

In tight economic times…

We go out and find the margin jobs.

The top-line revenue number isn’t flashy.

But the margins can be incredibly attractive.

It’s good to have big goals.

And you certainly never want to sell yourself short.

But 100 pennies spends the same as a dollar bill.

Flashy is good for attention.
Efficiency is good for success.

--

P.S. If you want to passively invest in these "boring" buildings, DM me "passive" and I'll send over more details.

At 30, I said Yes to every real estate deal I could.

At 36, I say No to 15-20+ deals a month.

Grew MAK Construction to $30M revenue saying Yes.
Grew MAK Capital to a $60M portfolio saying Yes.

Yes to building houses.
Yes to the random real estate deal.
Yes to anything that would pay the bills.

That’s how most people start: Hustle Mode

But what gets you from $0 to $10M won’t get you to $100M.

At some point, saying yes becomes a liability.

You say yes to too many things, and suddenly:

You’re busy, but not growing.
You’re working harder, but not wealthier.
You’re stuck in the weeds, missing the bigger picture.

In 2026, I’m saying No more than ever.

• No to building 10 homes (eats time, doesn’t scale)
• No to chasing small deals and shiny objects
• No to being everywhere, for everyone

Instead, I’m doubling down on:

→ Luxury storage developments in markets we love
→ Large multifamily projects, strategic acquisitions
→ Scaling what’s working—without spreading thin

Saying No to 10 small projects so I can say Yes to the 1- 2 large opportunities that move the needle.

Great things are built by doing less, better.

Are you in the Yes phase of your career?
Or are you in the "less is more" season?

--
♻️ Repost if you're saying No more in 2026

📌 Join 5,200+ investors getting real estate, business, and wealth-building insights in my weekly Saturday newsletter: marckuhn.substack.com

Half my construction revenue is other people's projects.

That's on purpose.

Most developers who own a construction arm use it only to build their own deals.

We do the opposite. We keep our general contracting business roughly half third-party work and half our own developments.

For years I drifted away from that balance and leaned too hard on our own projects. It cost us.

Here's why the 50/50 split is the sweet spot:

→ Third-party work pays the overhead in slow years
→ Our own developments become the bonus, not the lifeline
→ The team stays sharp bidding against the open market

When your own pipeline slows down, an in-house GC with no outside work becomes an anchor. With outside work, it stays an engine.

The boring discipline is keeping both pipelines full, even when one is booming.

If your busiest revenue line dried up tomorrow, what would carry you?

--

♻️ Repost if this helps an operator you know.

Our Grand Forks storage facility is almost 100% full.

So we're building something I never planned to build:

Contractor shops with office space and a private bathroom.

Here's how we got there.

When a building fills up that fast, you watch who's inside.

The contractors weren't storing gear and heading home.

They were running entire businesses out of the units.

→ Taking calls inside the unit
→ Meeting clients out in the parking lot
→ Asking me for a desk and a bathroom

A full industrial lease is too much for most of them.

Too expensive. Too long. More room than they need yet.

They wanted a professional base that fit their stage.

So the next expansion phase adds two things.

More heated units, because demand keeps proving that model.

And the contractor shops. Office, bathroom, room to work.

A home base for the local plumber, electrician, or builder who outgrew the garage.

We build everything ourselves through MAK Construction.

So when demand points at a new product, we move on it.

The tenants showed us what to build by how they used the space.

We just paid attention to it.

What has a customer taught you about your business by how they used it?

--

DM me "storage" to learn more about the luxury storage asset class.

The secret to 10X-ing your success:

Be willing to look stupid 80% of the time.

I’ve failed more times than I’ve succeeded.

→ My first few years in business I struggled.
→ My first rental property scared the sh*t out of me.
→ My first big real estate development was messy.
→ My first million felt impossible (until it wasn't).

In 2019, I started investing heavily in mentors, coaches, and surrounding myself with people 10X smarter than me.

You know what I discovered?

Every successful entrepreneur is just a regular person who didn’t quit.

They just kept going.
Kept learning.
Kept building.

And eventually…

• The lessons became leverage.
• The pain became profit.
• The scars became strategy.

No one gets it right on the first try.

So if you’re in the middle of a setback, good.
✅ You’re in the right place.

Because the only way to win in business…

Is to stay in the game long enough to succeed.

Most people never start building towards their dreams because they're afraid to look stupid.

But that's actually the secret ingredient.

Agree or disagree?

--

♻️ Repost to share this with an entrepreneur or investor who needs to see this to keep going.

I keep the 20 to 30% most developers give away.

It comes down to one thing: I own the build.

Most developers are great at putting a deal together.

They raise the capital.
They line up the land and the financing.
Then they hand the actual build to an outside contractor.

That is where the profit leaks out.

The contractor stacks a markup on top of every cost.

On a multi-million dollar storage facility, that is real money walking out the door.

I built my business so it never leaves.

MAK Capital finds and develops the deal.

MAK Construction builds it.

Mega MAK Storage operates it.

We own every layer.

→ We control the cost from day one
→ We control the timeline start to finish
→ We control the quality on every job

That control is the whole game.

When you own the process, you own the profits.

The margin most developers pay out, we keep in the deal.

It doesn't go in my pocket.

It goes back to the project and back to my investors.

That is vertical integration.

It took 15 years to build. Most developers never will.

That's the moat.

What's the moat in your business in 2026?

--

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I bought a drilling company for $605,000 on a handshake.

Here's the full year-one breakdown:

This one drills soil, not oil. Geotech borings for builders.

I bought it to solve our Q1 winter cash-flow gap.

The deal was seller-financed. A 2-year note at 0% interest.

I put $70,500 down and got to work.

I underwrote it at $750,000 in year-one revenue.

It actually did $950,000, with about $260,000 in profit.

I reinvested every single dollar back into it.

→ Went from 2 rigs to 4
→ Targeting $3 to $3.5M this year
→ Running around 30% margins

Drilling runs near 40% margins. Construction runs 5 to 10%.

The best part is that I barely touch it.

Chris runs it. He used to be my lead concrete guy.

He took it over and made it his own.

That's the rule I hold every business to now.

It should survive 30 days without any one person.

That includes me.

What boring business in your area is quietly printing money?

--

I broke this down in full in my newsletter, Unfollow the Herd.

Read it here: https://lnkd.in/g9A7UnnR

Tony Robbins owns 110 businesses. $10B in revenue.

Guess what his favorite asset class is?

He says private equity returns the highest on anything he's done.

I believe him.

I was listening to him on The Iced Coffee Hour podcast with Graham Stephan when they asked him about his investment strategy.

Private equity.

• Not stocks.
• Not bonds.
• Not crypto.
• Not even real estate funds.

Direct ownership in businesses.

You know what's crazy? He pays fees. Management fees. Carry. All the costs people complain about.

And it still returns more than anything else in his portfolio.

This is what the wealthy have figured out.

Because when you own equity in a real business, you're not hoping the market goes up. You're controlling the asset that generates cash flow.

Public markets: You own a piece of paper that goes up and down based on what other people think it's worth.

Private equity: You own a piece of a business that produces cash flow every month regardless of what CNBC thinks.

And if you own enough of it, you have a say in who is running the business, what strategies they use, and how to make it more efficient.

Stocks on your Robinhood app are great because they're liquid, you can buy and sell anytime you want.

But safe and liquid also means you're playing the same game as millions of other people.

All reacting to the same news.
All getting the same returns.

Private equity is different:

→ You control the asset
→ You improve operations
→ You increase cash flow
→ You decide when to exit

That's why the wealthy put money into boring businesses nobody else wants.

Construction. Hotels. Drilling companies. Storage facilities. HVAC companies.

Not sexy. But they print cash.

And cash that you control beats a stock portfolio that moves based on Fed announcements.

I've tried it all.

Built a stock portfolio. Built a real estate portfolio. Operate businesses.

My businesses always outperform.

Because I can control the outcome. I can't control what the S&P does tomorrow.

If you had $100K to invest today, would you put it in the stock market or buy equity in a boring business?

---

♻️ Repost to spread the wealth

Follow me Marc Kuhn for daily posts on building wealth with boring assets and blue collar businesses.

Luxury storage isn’t what most people think it is.

It’s not rows of bays stuffed with RVs and boats.

At one of our 60,000 sq ft locations in North Dakota, there’s one boat. It’s parked outside.

The rest of the tenants are business owners.

→ Contractor who loads his truck every morning straight from the unit
→ HVAC business owner with all their tools on site
→ Florist with climate-sensitive inventory
→ Bar owner storing seasonal gear
→ Amazon shop owners

They need functional space that is affordable, flexible, and secure. Luxury storage checks those boxes.

Not to mention, most business owners don’t want to sign a 5-year industrial lease with triple nets and a bunch of empty square footage they won’t use if they don’t have to.

With us, they get 1,000 sq ft bays. They’re climate-controlled, well-lit, and very clean.

Each unit comes with a garage door, a side entry, basic power, and a simple 30-day lease.

Nothing fancy, but exactly what these tenants need.
Once they move in, they rarely leave.

Turnover stays low, collections stay clean, and the operational noise is minimal—especially compared to multifamily.

It’s not about storing excess junk either.

These local operators simply need space to run their business without the overhead of traditional commercial leases.

That’s where the value is.

And that's why we're building millions of square feet of Mega MAK Storage and looking for partners to grow with us.

The MAK Capital team knows.

I never shut up about it.

Have you explored developing or investing in the luxury storage asset class yet?

- -

If you're exploring real estate opportunities in resilient niches like luxury storage, DM me and I’ll share what we’re working on now.

Why is the same concrete job $100,000 in May and $200,000 in December?

Simple:

I’ve been working in concrete since I was 6.

It’s a tough niche — especially in a cold-weather state like North Dakota.

In November, the weather turns quickly.

Leading up to that, we fight to get as much concrete into the ground as possible so we can continue to build throughout the winter.

Winter construction in E.X.P.E.N.S.I.V.E.

Typically, a $100K concrete job will be 2x the cost by the time you factor in cold weather.

In development, time really is money.

Pushing through cold weather can keep your projects on time.

And even if you don’t lay concrete or work in North Dakota…

There’s a lesson in there for every business.

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗯𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗳𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗻𝘀?

--

P.S. I shared my free guide on How to 10X Your Company in 2025 with my 4,800 newsletter readers.

Check it out for free here:
https://lnkd.in/gcbXMM_e

There’s a last time for everything in life.

Last day of school.
Last day of work (hopefully).
Last time you cheer on your kids from the sidelines.

My oldest daughter recently walked away from cheerleading.

She was one of the best.

But she wanted a new challenge—basketball and volleyball.

Most people didn't get why she wanted to start over when she was doing so well...

But I've learned this lesson before in business:

Being great at something doesn’t mean it’s still helping you grow.

Sometimes the hardest thing to do is to leave something that’s working.

But if you never make room for the new
…eventually you'll get stuck in the old.

Every “last” creates space for a “first.”

New job.
New career.
New identity.
New goals.

Don’t hold onto a version of yourself that you’ve already outgrown.

Has comfort ever held you back in your career or life?

I didn't fear losing my paycheck in my 20s.

I feared keeping it for too long.

By the time I was 20, I knew I didn't want to take the “safe path” that I saw ahead of me in life:

• Work 60 hours a week
• Stack liabilities with no assets
• Take a 2% annual raise, maybe a bonus
• Retire when I'm too old to enjoy it

So I made a choice, and it led to starting multiple companies and becoming a commercial developer.

"Do I keep playing the game I was handed? Or learn the game wealthy people actually play?"

Along the way, I figured out that anyone can learn how to build wealth if you knew where to look...

• I found operators. People who owned real businesses. They showed me how to build companies that could run without me grinding 24/7.

• I studied the wealthy. Real estate. Ownership. The tax code. Entity structures. Leverage. The things no one teaches in school, but wealthy families teach at the dinner table.

• I learned by doing. Made mistakes. Lost money. Said yes before I was ready. Every deal, every hire, every tough call made me sharper.

You don’t need to quit tomorrow.
You don’t need the perfect plan.

You just need to start studying the right game.

• Follow the people who own assets
• Learn how they operate, invest in relationships.
• Build or invest for equity—not just a paycheck.

Figuring this out unlocked a whole different part of my brain. When I was a kid, growing up some of the time in a trailer park, you don't think "I can build wealth"

But turns out, it's possible if you reprogram your mind to believe it and put reps over many decades.

What forced you to get serious about building your own path as an entrepreneur or investor?

Fear of being broke is a common one.

Marc Kuhn

My best investors showed up in a bad market.

That's not a coincidence.

Easy money gets nervous the second things get bumpy.

It wants out at the first bad headline.

Patient capital reads the same headline and asks a different question:

"Does this change the 10-year story?"

Usually it doesn't.

→ Patient partners hold through the noise
→ They add when others panic
→ They compound instead of churn

A hard market filters your capital for you.

You end up with partners who actually understand the game.

I'd take ten patient dollars over a hundred nervous ones.

What separates the money that stays from the money that runs?

--

DM me "storage" to learn how we develop luxury storage at MAK Capital.