 He says he always had an interest in real estate. His life could have gone either way. Thompson spent time in prison for armed robbery and a weapons crime, but used that time to study and to reset his thinking. I started off as an electrical apprenticeship. I went to school for electric. During those years, you also work a lot around other trades, plumbing, drywall and finishing, flooring, things like that. And so I learned construction from the ground up.