I had the opportunity to listen to Mike A. Myers, an extremely successful business man and community developer. He has developed many high-end neighborhoods and golf courses all around the nation, especially in Texas, including several by my home in Houston. He owns several banks and has been involved in tons of other investments. He gave a large donation to UT to help construct the Mike A. Myers Track and Soccer Stadium:
He is also on the board of many companies and is very involved with the university.
A Quick Background on him:
-He attended UT and later went to law school here also.
-One summer he moved to Michigan to sell books door-to-door. He said still to this day he has never experienced so much rejection as his door-to-door days. He also said learning how to handle rejection helped him immensely in the business world.
-In his junior year of college he started a mobile catering service which ended up being pretty successful.
-He then opened two restaurants, including one very speculative property inside a military base. Both were wildly successful and he had over 40 employees.
-At a very young age he got several high-up internships in Washington D.C.
-After making loads of money from various investments, he decided to build a 750-acre luxury community in Dallas. He put up much of his own money, totaling about 25% of the total capital. He raised the other 75% and got started with the project. One of the largest oil price spikes in history struck and vastly increased the cost of the project, nearly wiping him out completely. In the end he came out successful.
-He later started a bank which has since expanded to several banks.
Towards the end of his speech he said the following five things were his own rules for success:
- Find a mentor.
- Keep your options open.
- Have as few responsibilities to other people as you can.
- Stay focused.
- Get Lucky.
He was a great speaker and I definitely learned a lot from his talk (especially some very interesting facts about real estate development). At the end of the speech I spoke with him for a while, discussing his developments around my area and joking about Herb Kelleher. I also got a nice picture with him to add to the collection:
