The Legacy Martial Arts Business Podcast · Legacy Martial Arts Consulting

Episode #11 Jesse Topp: How Martial Arts Saved My Life

·53 min·3 clips

Jesse says a $1 million commercial building can sometimes be controlled with $400,000 down and creative financing.

1. Legacy Martial Arts Business Podcast Episode #11 centers on Jesse Topp's story of martial arts, recovery, and business growth. 2. Nick Astigli hosts Jesse Topp, the owner of Topp Martial Arts in Port Elgin, and Jesse explains why he says Jiu-Jitsu 'saved my life.' 3. The episode asks how martial arts became both a survival tool and a business platform for Jesse. 4. Jesse says he started Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu around age 15 and earlier trained Japanese Jiu-Jitsu with a self-defense focus. 5. He says drinking and drug use pulled him away from training until a violent situation forced him back to Jiu-Jitsu about 10 to 12 years later. 6. Jesse describes landing in closed guard, parrying punches from the ground, and using techniques he could not consciously name at the time. 7. He says that incident changed his psychology, pushed him to study martial arts again, and led to sobriety. 8. Jesse says he has not drank or drugged since then, which he places at about 10 years. 9. He credits Sarah, his wife, with supporting the early school because she trained with him and wanted to be involved. 10. Jesse says his first training space was a 500-square-foot unit in a strip mall, started with old dirty mats, and was originally just a place for him and Sarah to train. 11. He says personal-training clients started bringing kids into the space, and the kids' program took off. 12. Jesse says he shifted from competition-first thinking when he realized other martial arts teachers looked financially strained and he did not want that outcome. 13. He argues that martial arts professionals deserve compensation for 20 years of training, physical wear, stress, and family pressure. 14. Jesse says the turning point came when he started treating the school like a business and paying attention to sales, taxes, and recurring revenue. 15. He says buying buildings during the pandemic came from 'creative financing' and from learning how to speak to lenders in commercial terms. 16. Jesse gives the example of approaching a lender with two years of books, 300K in gross sales, and a request for 60% loan-to-value instead of showing up with no records. 17. He says one deal started with 25K and later became a property worth about 1.5 million, which he presents as evidence that leveraged real estate can compound. 18. Jesse's practical tone is direct, blunt, and instructional, with Nick steering questions toward school-owner applications and financing steps. 19. School owners who want to buy property, build equity, or understand creative financing would get the most from this episode. 20. Listeners wanting a light chat about competition history and nothing about money may skip it.

As heard by us

A grounded talk for school owners thinking about buildings, financing, and the next step.

The episode opens with Nick Astigli and Jesse Topp revisiting old competition memories before turning to practical guidance for martial arts school owners.

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Why you'd press play

Want a straight path from renting your space to owning the building?

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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