in this interview I talked to Mike
Rasika founder of young architect calm
the super cool part is Mike and I have
crossed paths in the past in fact early
on when I started a niche site project
the blog Mike bought one of my early
products the book on Amazon affiliate
marketing so Mike's story is really cool
he is an architect and he struggled to
pass the different exams that an
architect needs to take to go pro and he
documented his journey and took this
blog young architect from a side hustle
into his full-time gig so his story is
pretty amazing and you know he struggled
to get through writing classes in high
school and he tells us the story of that
and now he's an educator and you know
writes all the time so it's a really
inspiring story and Mike is helping tons
of people do check out his site young
architect even if you're not in arc it's
like just to see like the value that
he's providing and without further ado
let's go ahead and get to the interview
hey what's up Doug Huntington here from
niche site project and I'm sitting with
Mike from young architect how are you
doing today so a lot of people probably
don't know who you are Mike so can you
give us a little bit of an intro who you
are and what you do yeah so my name is
Michael Rasika I live I used to live in
Portland Oregon but I about a year ago I
moved back to New York City area I'm a
licensed architect and all my stuff
really started kind of story begins with
me blogging I had a really long
convoluted crazy journey towards
becoming a licensed architect from
getting through architecture school
through getting through my internship
hours through taking my architect exams
and by the time I became a licensed
architect I had realized that the
profession of architecture is
essentially F and it needs a lot of help
architect
no one was helping create more licensed
architects if anything there were just
so many barriers and so much bad
information in the way and so by the
time I had my license in hand I said you
know what I had some previous exam
previous history for starting blogs in
the past
mostly travel blog I said let me start a
little blog about architecture
and I started blogging at young
architect calm and it kind of just
became a little passion project and I
started talking about you know what I
learned in architecture school how I
studied for my exams the resources the
tools that I use and very quickly I just
had a really really positive response
from my community and I started to tell
the story of how I you know it took me
three and a half years took me four and
a half years to pass the architect exam
I failed four times I almost didn't
finish at one point but I figured it out
and this is how I figured it out and it
was really the first time I realized it
took me about a year after I told that
story to realize that no one had really
told that story before to the community
and everything before that was these
exams are easy and everyone's getting it
done and for me to come along and say
you know I did fantastic in architecture
school I had a great career and this
this thing is not as straightforward as
I originally thought it was
so that just resonated with my community
and I kept telling that story and what
started to happen was I grew young
architect comm and eventually I said let
me write a book how about I write a book
and I share everything I know about the
architect exam and I put out this little
black book called how to past the
architect registration exam and people
really enjoyed it they really liked it a
lot what started to happen from there
was people started reaching out to me
and saying Mike I want to hire you I
want to hire you to help me figure out
how to get past my exams I don't care
what it costs my office will pay for it
and I want you to coach me and I thought
about it for a while and I said no I
don't want to do that because the
problem with the architect exam but is
everything about the architects
education and how we practice
architecture it's always a collaboration
there's always a lot of people it's
you're never alone
there's always we're working together
through challenges and projects except
when we get to the architect exam
suddenly everyone's on an island and
it's a self-guided process with no real
deadlines and so I said no I don't want
to work individually with people it
would just kind of feed into the problem
and then eventually as more people kept
asking I said you know what let's treat
it the same way we went through
architecture school and so I said let's
it's like a design studio you guys I'll
create the syllabus the schedule the
program and you guys go study and then
let's come back together once a week and
see what we can learn from everyone
else's experiences because when I was in
design
school I actually learned way more from
the people I went to school with than
the people than the professors
themselves yes I created this group
coaching program that really kind of
started from the blog which grew from
the book which kind of created its own
element and from there I ended up
I've been running that program now for
three years I've taken about 400 people
through that group coaching program and
it's been really successful and then
kind of the next the next level for that
which is what I've done looking I'm
really hard on lately is creating like a
video course program was you know my
area boot camp program it's it's not I
always say it's it's a program it's not
a class it's not a course I'm not gonna
teach the content you know I'm gonna
coach you through how to do this and
teach you how to teach you to yourself
but I've also now started teaching the
content with one of the guys from my
program who's just a he's a brilliant
professor and he's just really good at
explaining this stuff and so him and I
have teamed up we've been teaching
content now and on a video platform
called the young architect Academy where
it's like an online video I just think
if it kind of goes well it sounds like
so you've been at it for about three
years on young architect is that right
yeah I started the blog in January of
2014 so I'm approaching five years now
as a as a blogger okay and in the
beginning let's go back like in the day
2014 period that first year did you get
traction like right away it sounded like
people resonated with your story but I
know a lot of times in the first year
we're trying to figure out what yeah
yeah yeah well I knew see part of my
challenge was I was studying my butt off
working on my exams and getting licensed
and there's nothing creative whatsoever
about the passing these tests I always
say the only thing that you're creative
about you could be creative with is how
you study because it's all about
following rules you know giving the
right answer not taking risks and being
safe and how we're trained as architects
is the completely separate mindset and
so in some ways everything that brought
me success as in architecture school was
my handicap on these exams and so as I
was getting closer to my exams I felt
like there was a big part of me that had
been suppressed for years was I wasn't
making art I wasn't
expressing myself I wasn't putting
things out there and so as soon as these
I didn't have to study anymore I said
I'm gonna blog I'm gonna just rant and
rave and that was already good at I've
already had a little experience doing
that and so as soon as the blog actually
was shortly before I wrapped up my exams
I started blogging under my own name to
just kind of get my feet wet you know
start to learn am I using Squarespace am
I using WordPress you know kind of
figure things out like that and I was
just blogging under my name without
really a direction just to kind of
figure it out and then once my exams
were done I got clarity about this idea
that I'm gonna start a blog for the
future of the architecture profession
and I ended up just using all that
content I was kind of writing and just
moving it over to my own domain and from
there just start ranting and raving but
you know one of the things I had learned
very early on is that I don't remember
who taught it to me but it's that to
have a successful blog it's really 20%
writing and creating content and 80% of
holding people's hands and bringing them
to your site and say hey look listen I
wrote this article for you here's a link
click the link and go read it and so
very early on I was pretty much driving
and tapping into all the resources where
people were hanging out who needed this
information I had made that connection
very early on that if you're gonna
create content for certain people you
have to deliver it to them and bring it
to them and drive the traffic back to
your site and so yeah that so I was
getting traffic pretty early on and then
before I even started this blog project
I said if I'm gonna pour my heart and
soul and all of this energy into a blog
it has to make money and so back then I
was using Amazon the is Amazon
Associates program to talk about books
that I studied and so I remember it was
January of 2014 right when I first
started studying I ended up making like
two or three hundred bucks my first
month of on this brand new blog through
Amazon affiliates you know I didn't
realize it at the time but January is a
very popular time for this type of topic
so people were we're devouring this
content and clicking my links and buying
these books and then after that it dries
up so I made a lot of money in the first
couple of months and then it was like it
went dropped down to like 20 or 30 bucks
a month and I was like oh my god what
did I do wrong
so it sounds like you knew early on that
you needed to do some marketing right
let people know about this site and you
mentioned you had travel blogs in the
past writers yes experience blogging you
just tell us a little about those yeah
first off I barely graduated high school
because I couldn't pass a standardized
test in writing I was just I just
couldn't pass it I was a special ed
student with writing reading and writing
and I just I did awful in school pretty
much my whole life until I got to
architecture school I've always been in
love with computers and I've always in
high school I was on LiveJournal writing
about everything in the world but I
couldn't pass the standardized test
about writing a silly essay about
something when I was in college I got
into cycling and I ended up doing a
bicycle ride from Boston to New York
City and while I was researching that
ride I learned about these people who
were cycling across America and they
were journaling about it the word blog
didn't even exist back then it was like
2000 2002 or 2003 and so I became
addicted to reading about these blogs
about people who are cycling across
America I was like I have to do this I
have to have to do this and I obsessed
about it for years and then in 2005 I
rode from Virginia all the way out to
the coast of Oregon and I actually
blogged the whole thing and I wrote
about all the people I met along the way
all the experiences at the time when I
was starting that trip when I was
planning it everyone told me you were
nuts you are not gonna be able to
accomplish this I'm not gonna drive to
Colorado to pick you up when your bike
falls apart like everyone told me like
don't do this this is stupid but I did
it anyway and I blogged about it and it
was an amazing experience and then I did
that 2005 in 2007 I wrote I rode I was
getting ready to graduate architecture
school my best friend said hey you want
a ride cross-country again so I said
sure so we did a second trip from Bar
Harbor Maine to Portland Oregon and I
blogged that trip as well and I ended up
staying in Portland for ten years that
was a one-way trip and then 2016 after I
quit my job I ended up writing a third
cross-country cycling blog as well so
yeah I've been writing about bikes in
architecture that's it's amazing how
much writing that you've done and you
know you can pass the standardized test
which is not a very effective test a lot
of people would argue anyway and
ironically Doug I don't actually
identify myself as a writer or really
even a blogger
for save because I've learned I don't
know just through all this stuff I've
learned there's a huge community of
people who walk around calling
themselves writers and they don't
actually write anything and write on
they never write the book they wanted to
write they don't write the blog and they
there if you ask them what they do
they'll tell you the writer and at the
end of the day I'm really an architect
who writing is just one of my many
skills that I like to do and you're like
educating I mean now it's an easy lead
since you literally have stuff where
you're helping people study and you're
an educator and a teacher so awesome at
this point I did a little research so
you're doing young architect comm
full-time at this point right you're not
practicing I don't have time for some
old lady's remodel project anymore I
passed that work off to other people but
yeah this young architect thing is and
you know in a weird way it's I always
say it's probably the most important
project I've been more fulfilled by
being my own boss and working on the
ceiling architect stuff and helping my
community and helping I always say you
know my job my role in all this isn't to
look cool it's to kind of work behind
the scenes and help other people be
successful to support the profession now
when you went full-time and you you left
your firm because I take it you left
some full-time gig right what was what
were some of the big challenges working
for someone else and probably imagine
kind of a structured environment -
anything goes you're your own boss yeah
that was really hard for me it was
really really hard I had also started
another business it was the same time I
started young architect I was listening
to a podcast and I forgot who it was but
I was listening to a podcast and someone
was talking about the amazon fulfillment
by amazon program if you're not familiar
with it but it's essentially the Amazon
Prime program where people are going
into stores and they're seeing what's on
sale and they're buying products at 70%
off and they're selling on Amazon for
four or five times the price and I said
I've also always been good with eBay and
Craigslist and selling things so I said
you know what let me try it and so I
ended up starting an amazon fulfillment
by Amazon business at the same time I
started the blog I ended up making a lot
of money at it I got really good at it
and so I was working this Amazon
business and I didn't care what I was
buying what I was what it was I was
finding Barbie
and toys and and just weird stuff and as
long as I could make a profit so I
started that business in a weird way you
know I've never heard any entrepreneur
talk about this but it kind of became a
cash cow for me to finance my young
architect project you know an architect
didn't make any money it costs actually
I'm one of my big mistakes was I spent
so much money trying to figure out how
to do this and hiring you know people
that I didn't really mean and buying
books that weren't really that helpful
no no it was the cash cow to help me get
some capital to finance a young
architect and to just put extra money in
my bank and help me get some money saved
so I started that without even realizing
what I was doing and then it was about a
year and a half down the road I used to
work for the city of Portland Oregon I
was a facilities project manager my rule
was to get construction projects done
for the city so I played the role of the
owner and I would hire architects
contractors engineers and play the
middleman I mostly worked for the cops
to be honest with you it was I was the
middleman between the police officers
who needed their precinct renovated with
you know the design team that would make
that happen and as things were you know
I I was doing really good in my job it
was a great job but I essentially hit
the ceiling and I just couldn't grow any
more and young architect was taking off
I'm starting to struggle a little bit
was showing up at work every day I was
kind of seeing starting to see the light
at the end of the tunnel and then I I
wrote my book the book was out and I
felt like for a very long time I was
working 40 hours a week for the man and
then I was working 40 50 hours a week on
my passion projects and this silly
Amazon business and so eventually
everything kind of came to a halt
and I said I just can't do this anymore
there's just been too much my young
architect at that time was creat was
bringing in probably about half of my
gate job income and the Amazon business
was fulfilling the rest of it I was
essentially almost collecting to pay cut
paychecks at that time and then I just
it was really it was a lot of baggage
for me to just kind of quit job I felt
like I say to all time I felt like I was
breaking up with a girlfriend who I knew
for a very long time it was just one it
just wasn't working out but I let it go
longer than it should have and now I
just got to cut the cord and do the
right thing and that was kind of what it
was for me
gotcha that's a great analogy I haven't
heard that before but that's pretty good
yeah so how long were you I guess how
long did it take before you you quit
your full-time job I started young
architect in January 2014 and by
September of 2015 I was ready to step
away from the day job yeah all right so
about eight 18 19 20 months something
like that yeah and a half okay that's
cool that's cool and I think I mean
that's what I recommend to people
generally if they're like hey should I
quit my job or should I try and double
dip and figure out how to make this work
I mean do you I mean you obviously did
that but if if someone asked advice from
you yeah are you like make the leap and
you'll figure out how to you know get
the parachute to come out on the way
down or are you risk-averse no I say you
know I feel like if I didn't make that
leap
I was holding me back from growing to
the next to the next thing
and so as soon as I let go of that day
job a million other opportunities opened
up in other things for me one of them
was you know cycling across the country
again I wanted to I had done those trips
a long time ago and I've been so busy
being an adult and an architect and
building my career I I let that that was
that used to be a big part of who I am
and I just gotten very far away from it
so I said you know what
I'm gonna take this cross-country trip
and I actually started planning the
cross-country trip before my 2016 trip
before I had quit the job and actually
one of the pivotal conversations was one
of my best friends said to me I was
telling I was like dude I'm gonna ride
cross-country in the summer 2016
well the glove usually but what about
your job and I was like well I'll have
to bank up some vacation time or we'll
have to figure it out I'll take a
sabbatical and I was coming up with all
these excuses and after I said all that
I said you know what I gotta stop making
excuses for this job this job isn't
isn't running my life if the job isn't
gonna let me I'll quit my job I'll get a
new one I'll get a new job if I have to
but this I can't be making excuses like
this I got it I have to go do this thing
and just a quick note on the retail
arbitrage via FBA I take it you're not
doing that anymore since young
architects
yeah let it go okay yeah it was bringing
in good good money bringing good money
and I always say it was it was a job
though I know a lot of people are very
passionate about it there's a whole
community and people are really proud of
the businesses they built doing this but
to be honest with you it was just a job
to me physically I was working on this
Amazon retail arbitrage business but
mentally I just I didn't it was it was a
lot of manual it was a lot of physical
labor I used to walk through Target
every day on my way home from work and
when I wasn't commuting to the office
anymore I know how to go out of my way
my goal was to always make it easy
fishing as possible and it was just
something I did behind the scenes while
I was mentally brainstorming and
thinking about you know architect it was
as good as I am at it I ended it at the
end of the end like in the middle of
2016 I was like I can't do this anymore
now it's a pain-in-the-butt job and so I
just let everything I had sitting in
their warehouses liquidate and that was
probably one of my big mistakes do I
probably should have kept that cash-cow
role in just a little bit a little bit
longer one of the big mistakes
I also made to with you know quitting
the day job was I quit the day job and I
had a lot of momentum and I had a lot of
enthusiasm but I racked up a bunch of
dead I racked up debt with a
cross-country bike ride with I hired a
bunch of people that help me do things
and I think I've probably hired them
maybe a little bit prematurely I wasn't
quite ready to to be taking on these
larger project I think I scaled up a
little bit too fast but at the end of
the day I racked up about 20 grand in
credit card debt with the you know with
the intention of you know this young
architect things gonna just just just
it'll take care of it and so you know
one of my big advice for everyone is to
be super super diligent if you're gonna
make this leap be really really careful
with the debt because I didn't know it
at the time you know my income goes up
and down to plan accordingly for that I
just and and to be honest the dug it
took me a really long time to get rid of
that debt even after you know everything
I was in the green with all of her stuff
I was still chipping away at that debt
for a very long time it was one of my
one of my biggest mistakes and all this
very very good to know and I think
it's hard for people to budgets when
they don't know like potentially the ROI
in the future do you have any tips Mike
on like how someone can make some
assumptions come up with a budget so
that they don't end up in a in a hole
right yeah I'm terrible with money and
knowing that I ended up back a couple of
years ago right when I was starting I
was kind of in the middle of digging
myself into this hole with my credit
card debt I reached out to one of my
business coaches and said listen I this
is gonna this is gonna kill me and I
don't know what's going I don't know if
I'm making if I'm ahead or if I'm the
green or I'm in the red and where I'm at
how much debt I have and I ended up
hiring a bookkeeper and kind of she's
kind of a fancy bookkeeper she she
manages all of my what's coming in
what's going out at that time I had a
lot more transactions because the Amazon
business she made sense of where I'm at
financially and she also does
forecasting and budgeting and helping me
get a sense of where I'm I'm at
financially so I let her handle all of
that and she updates me and we work on
it together
but there's no way I could have ever
made sense of any of this financial
stuff so my advice would be to hire
someone that's good at that to help help
anyone so in me for me it was I had to
hire someone so I could make the art and
make the money and I think you know from
my I'll add my two cents into but you
know one thing I'm gonna underscore for
people that don't understand the
business model that you had especially
with the Amazon FBA like you're buying
you're holding inventory for an amount
of time and you don't know like when
it'll sell or exactly I mean I guess
when you set the prices you kind of have
an idea about what it's gonna sell for
but at the end of the day like there's
some flexibility like you said you had
to liquidate and you were like you know
what let's just clear the warehouse
let's get rid of it so you don't have to
pay for any of those fees but anyway
it's complicated it gets complicated
fast and then from my perspective I do a
lot of content for Amazon affiliate
sites so in that case it's kind of
unclear when the ROI will kick in and
then once it does it does really well
but it may not so it's kind of sketchy
and I think you know like you said if
you have a you
bookkeeper or at least someone with more
experience depending on what you're
doing to help you forecast make some
assumptions at least you won't go too
far under and if you're you know
bookkeeper probably is working with you
once a month I suspect so you're never
further than like one month of like you
know in the red and then hopefully you
can correct next month or something so
interesting well that that's a great you
know mistake that people can learn from
you on that's a great one
yeah all right it sounds like you have
like deep internal motivation especially
for a young architect and the journey
that you went through are there times
when like your motivation wavers or when
you thought about like giving up like
hey this isn't working I'm in 20 20 K
deep debt here so motivated let's talk
about this last night with one of my
friends was I'm as weird as it is is I'm
not money driven its money in a weird
way a lot of people just want to make a
lot of money and that's the goal for me
that that is the goal and I want to pay
my bills and I want to look comfortably
but after that what do I really want to
accomplish and one of the things that is
probably just as important sometimes
even more important is I really like the
recognition and I really like to be
acknowledged for what I've contributed
and what I've accomplished and one of
the things that I've really received in
a very profound way was just people
reaching out something to say Mike I was
following you for three years and I just
passed my last exam and I couldn't have
navigated this world if you didn't exist
thank you and to have those messages and
to have that constant reaffirmed like
constantly being affirmed reaffirmed or
acknowledged for this this body of work
that I've been creating and what might I
mean ultimately my mission is to help
the next generation of architects be
more successful than any other
generation that's the goal because what
I was seeing getting to the point you
know the people no one was helping
anyone do that as weird as it is to say
so to have that acknowledgement is
really in a big way kind of what's been
the fuel on my fire thing to keep going
and to just kind of embark on all these
projects you know I write a lot of blog
posts I've had a talk my business coach
but I spent all this time and energy
writing all this blog content it's not
monetized and at a certain point like if
that's good but
I gotta chill out a little bit and make
some money for the business but but yeah
I really you know having that
acknowledgment and being of service it's
been super important to me
very cool you mentioned a business coach
so it sounds like you you do invest in
that are you part of like mastermind
groups as well either private aid or
anything like that which are yes I've
done a bunch I actually started with it
was Nick Loker did a mastermind here
many years ago and I jumped right on it
and I actually stayed in his mastermind
group for quite a while and working with
other people who are just getting
started up as I've gone down the road
and had more experience I've backed away
from the mastermind situation because I
feel like I know it's just a group
dynamic sometimes I vibe really well
with the people in the group and
sometimes it's just not there
and I don't want to share I don't know
it just it's just uncomfortable so but
I've always you know I've I found a
really good business coach who was kind
of already in my circle who is very
familiar with my goals and what I was
trying to accomplish and I started
working with him for a long time
and ended up doing another kind of a
group coaching program and then I have
another woman now who I work with
but coaching for me has been one of the
best investments for me to make sense of
this all in my early kind of in the
early years of these probably an
architect what I needed in some ways
more than anything was to have someone
on my team saying yes Mike you can do
this I believe in you your community's
gonna love it this is gonna work out
it's all gonna work out keep keep going
you're doing a great job in that I
didn't have that I don't I don't I don't
get that from my community from my
friends who are all practicing
architects they they don't understand
internet business or blogging or social
media or any that stuff they're making
buildings and so to have someone kind of
just really supportive and really
encouraging at the beginning was super
super profound for me and when I quit my
day job I actually never even told my
parents I didn't tell my parents because
I didn't I didn't want anyone that
wasn't in my behind me saying you know
what are you doing alright why are you
leaving your comfortable government in a
job with excellent retirement benefits
to embark this entrepreneurial thing
it's not gonna work out what are you
nuts
oh so I never told them I never told him
and I didn't find out for like six or
nine months until after I quit
but I think that a big early on having
someone to just stand behind you and say
yes you can do it that was just profound
for me and it and coaching has always
paid for itself
and I have a coach now and kind of what
how I work with her now is she's um
she's really good at branding marketing
messaging and public speaking and I'm
that's essentially what I'm doing now is
I've been traveling around the country
giving lectures about the architect exam
and entrepreneurship in the architecture
community writing writing good letters
could what's the messaging of this blog
post I'm trying to write a lot of
copywriting and so she's kind of helps
me she kind of coaches me through a lot
of that stuff very much and you just
touched on you know the speaking tour
that you enter can you just tell us a
little bit about that yeah so a couple
of years ago and actually when a couple
years ago when I met my current business
coach she told me what she does and I
said oh I love to public speak I'm just
not quite ready for that yet and I
wasn't I wasn't ready for it
and then as time went on I started to
realize meeting my community and seeing
them face-to-face and talking about what
I've been working on a young architect
and how to pass the exams has is really
powerful it's powerful for them and it's
powerful for me and I ended up doing
more public speaking I ended up reaching
out this conference of Puerto Rico
reached out to me like Mike we want you
to come give your lecture about the
architect exam I said yeah I'll do it I
got this other idea I want to make this
other lecture on entrepreneurship here's
my idea under like yes we want it oh now
I'm on the hook gotta create this
entrepreneurship lecture but I ended up
with in the past two or three years I've
just been going after every single
speaking opportunity to talk with people
studying for their exams to talk to
other architects to meet with students
and give them information speaking
doesn't bring in it's not a huge source
of income for me I get paid I don't know
100 200 bucks a lot of times I just do
these things for free what it does is it
gets my message out there it brings
people back to my site people sign up
for my program and buy my products
because I've met with them and then I'm
not a fan of cold weather I just I
haven't sick of doing the winter times I
just I'm a wimp in the cold and always
have been and so I was I'm in New York
and suddenly it's the middle of winter I
said you know what I'm
going on in Florida and visit my mom and
if I'm gonna go down to Florida why
don't I stop at a couple of places and
give a couple of lectures and so I laid
out this map I run my a reboot camp on
Sunday Monday night so there's only a
couple nights in there in the week and I
ended up laying out this map and the
whole thing just grew out of control and
I ended up creating this whole tour
speaking to her and I drove from New
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