The Blueprint for Transforming Challenges into Real Estate Lending Triumphs with Fred Shatzoff

Transcript

[Antonio Holman]
All right, successors. We’re here today with Fred Shatzoff. He is a very experienced real estate investing lender in the Newark area.

Fred, welcome to the show today.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Thank you, Antonio. It’s a pleasure to be on your show today, and let your audience get to know more about me and what we do.

[Antonio Holman]
Alright Fred, so are you ready to talk about real estate investing and lending today because this is going to be a little bit of a different conversation. Alright so aside from your busy business life, tell us a little bit about your personal life.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Okay, I am a big time sports advocate especially of the New York Giants, I’ve been following them my whole life, I love to go to as many games as possible, I mean it has become rather expensive to go but I try to go to a few games a year, I also like following baseball and basketball, especially I like to go to minor league games these days and the reason I say that is right here in my area, New Jersey, there’s about three teams that play, you can go to a game for $6, parking is typically free, if you want to get something to eat there, a beer, a hot dog, it’s a reasonable price and it’s a fun night out as compared with if you go to Yankee Stadium, you could be spending $1,000 a night for the family, I don’t know how people do it, I mean because I think back when I was a kid, I would go with my father and in those days, you could bring your own food with you and what we would do is we would get the bleacher seats and at that time my father worked for the Post Office but some of the people that he worked with were ushers there at Yankee Stadium, so you know he would tell him he was gonna be there, he would go find that person, you know obviously he would take care of him, I mean I have no idea how much he took care of him, what did I know about money, they would walk you to your box seats and dust off the seats and you know it was a fun night like that, we used to do the same thing with the New York Knicks, so you know that’s prohibitive, I mean I like to walk, I like to exercise, I like to read, you know because you want to keep your mind and your body active as long as you can because you know you’re never too old to learn anything, so that’s kind of what I like to do to be honest with you.

[Antonio Holman]
Okay, so your business, the company you you work with, let’s see, Everest Business Capital. That is correct. Okay, how long have you been with that company?

I’ve been with them for about five years. Okay, so tell us a little bit about what Everest Business Capital is and what they do.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Sure, okay, so basically what we are is we are loan brokers and our main forte is in the real estate lending space, whether you’re a real estate investor who wants to buy a property, wants to fix it up and then wants to sell it, or wants to rent it, we can help you as far as that is concerned. Those loans are, as I tell people, those loans are relatively easy and some people will say and some people don’t believe it. Well, I’ll say to them, let me ask you a question, have you bought a house?

You know most people say yes. I’m gonna say okay, what kind of documentation did you have to supply? You had to supply last two years tax returns, W-2s, pay stubs, they had to verify your employment, they had to verify your assets.

With these type of loans, you know, they lend strictly to corporations, so technically you could form an LLC today and buy a property tomorrow. We don’t need any financials on the business, so it’s really just getting, you know, the right documentation. A, you got to have halfway decent credit to qualify.

I mean, some loans we could go down to a credit score of 620, typically they’re looking for 680. Anything below 620 is gonna be very difficult. You can’t have any bankruptcies, you can’t have any foreclosures, you need to have some money, you know, to use for down payment and closing costs.

I get people call me, they think they can be a real estate investor with $500. It just doesn’t work. I mean, you know, it’s, you can’t even buy a house with $500.

I mean, you got to have some skin in the game. You know, I’ll tell somebody, look, maybe you can get a money partner, maybe you can get a credit partner. I mean, it’s, you know, that’s really what you need to do if you’re gonna be able to be an investor out there.

Sometimes I’ll say to people, you know what, maybe you should start out wholesaling first because you don’t need any money as far as that is concerned to build up capital. So, you know, you really have to do things in steps and stages. If you have no money and you really want to get into real estate investing, start out with wholesaling.

You can make $5,000 to $10,000 on a transaction. Then if you still need to build up more capital, do some fix and do some flips. Maybe you make $30,000, $40,000 profit on that.

And then from there, then you could get into buying rental properties. It really depends upon what your goal is. I mean, you know, ultimately your goal should be financial freedom for yourself.

And how do you create financial freedom? You know, you have other people paying your bills and you put your money to work. On the other side, you know, we can help someone buy a rental property.

And as far as that is concerned, for the most part, it’s the same thing. We’re looking at what is the rental income on the property versus the mortgage payment. We call it the debt service ratio.

And as long as it debt services, you are going to qualify and certainly you’re not going to buy a property where you’re going to have, you know, your mortgage payment is $1,800 and your rent is $1,200. That doesn’t make sense. Now it’s different if you’re turning around and you’re renting out your primary residence, you know, and stuff like that to buy another property and move up and you do that on a temporary basis and you take a loss.

But ultimately if you’re going to buy investment properties, it makes sense to buy a two, three, or a four family because if you buy a one family, now you lose that rental. You lose that one tenant. Now what do you do?

But again, these are all no dock loans. They are, you can get a 30 year fixed rate loan on something like that. There you can own as many rental properties as you want.

Unlike Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, who says you can only own 10 properties, you know, and rates are competitive. I mean, sure they’ve gone up. I mean, two months ago they were four and a half percent.

Right now they’re about six and a half to 7% but so are regular mortgages higher. That’s something you can’t control and you can’t get hung up on that. You got to say, does the property cashflow at this higher rate?

If it does, then buy the property. You can always refinance at a later date if rates come down. But you know, some people get very hung up on all the fees, all the rates, and everything like that.

You’re never going to be a successful investor. Look, when I first started out in the business and I was a real estate agent, at that time rates were 18 to 20% and people were buying houses. We were having the sellers hold the mortgage with 20% down to a 30-year fix with a five-year loan.

So there’s always ways, you know, to put a deal together. You know, you have to want to do it, but you have to have some money. You have to have some skin in the game.

Now going back to the fix and the flip, those are a short-term loan. Typically up to 13 months, it’s an interest-only loan and you pay as you draw the money down. Their rates could be anywhere from say seven and a half to 10%.

It’s an interest-only loan. And typically on that, you can borrow anywhere from 80 to 90% of the purchase price and 100% of the repairs and your maximum ARV also known as after repair value has to be 70 to 75% in order for the deal to work. Again, you know, they are relatively easy loans to get, but you need to work with someone that knows they’re doing and sets realistic expectations because the other day I get a call, you know, that this guy claims to be a private money broker.

And I don’t think this guy has a clue about anything because, you know, he had contacted me two weeks ago, you know, wanted to, he said, I’m looking to borrow money. I’ve been declined by all sorts of lenders out there. Do you have any loans where there is no credit check?

So, you know, I wrote to the guy and I said, no, I says, but you know, if you submit your credit karma report to us, I can have my lender pre flight it and see what we can do here to get your money. So he then says to me, well, I’m having a problem with my credit karma report. So I said to him, wow, you’re the first person that’s ever told me they’ve had a problem with their credit karma report.

And I’m saying maybe he doesn’t have credit karma. So it turns out that he says to me, well, I don’t have a printer. I can’t print my credit report.

He said, well, you could download it. Well, I don’t even have a computer. And I’m like, well, what kind of lender can you be?

And everything. So I look at the guy’s LinkedIn profile. I’m not sure I connected with them.

He says he’s a private lender for two years before that he was a Lyft driver. Now that I see the guy calling me the other day, he says, you know, would you be willing to co-broker a loan with me? I said, sure.

He says, I have a guy that called me and he wants to close on Thursday. I said, that’s not realistic. I said, nobody closes in two days.

You know, I mean, look, the only way you could close, look, the other option for people is there are people out there who have money in IRAs or pension funds, and they are willing to lend that money to private individuals, but you have to know how to connect with those people. Now, I do know someone that does have a zoom meeting every other week where he has these people that have private money, self-directed IRAs with him that will lend out money. You know, basically you can come on to that meeting, talk for five minutes about what you’re proposing, put your information in the zoom chat.

And if an investor is interested, they’ll contact you, you know, but I don’t know what the rates and what the terms are going to be because I don’t get involved. But if that’s something someone truly want, that’s truly considered private money. You have other places that say they’re private lenders.

Well, yes, they are, but it’s not private money. This money is all securitized on Wall Street and it’s all considered hard money and they all do require an appraisal and they all do require a credit check because I said to this guy, I said, would you lend $200,000 to someone without checking their credit? He said, no.

I said, well, so why do you think that I’m going to have a lender? I said, it’s not like lending someone a hundred or $200 that you work with because they’re short and they’ll pay you back Friday or next Friday. You know, okay, you’re taking a chance.

If they don’t pay you back, the word spreads in the office, but no one’s going to give you money like that. I mean, yeah, maybe you might get it from a mother, father, brother, sister, or uncle, but someone who doesn’t know you, they’re not going to give that to you. Now, if you borrowed from a private individual the first time, let’s say, and you had to supply your credit card or a credit report, maybe they wanted to do a drive-by appraisal, you know, and you paid them back and it was successful, then they might lend you the money the second time.

But some people don’t seem to understand, well, these private lenders don’t check your credit because I had another guy tell me that. I said, oh, really? I said, I don’t know of anybody that does that.

I said, are you going to lend somebody $200,000 without checking their credit? Most people are going to say no. Well, so why should someone else lend it to you?

Oh, well, I have an 800 credit score. I said, you know, really doesn’t mean anything because I’ve had people tell me they have an 800 credit score. Most of the time, the credit comes back, it’s lower.

I mean, once in a while, you have somebody that comes back higher, but for the most part, it is lower. I mean, I try to set realistic expectations with people and I say to everyone, I said, look, even though I know you’ve invested before, you really should call me before you go under contract. Let’s run the numbers.

Let’s make sure the numbers work. It’s better to have a second or a third set of eyes, you know, look at the property, but you know, some people don’t and then all of a sudden, they’re in a jam. You know, it’s just like you get some wholesalers, you know, they want to close in two weeks.

Well, it’s not realistic right now because you need to get an appraisal. The real estate volume is very busy. Why not just tell the seller, look, we’ll close within 30 days so that you’re not putting pressure on everybody.

You know, you got to be realistic with your expectations because, you know, one guy said to me, well, that’s what the closing date said. I said, well, let me tell you something. As long as I’ve been in lending, you know, I said, please don’t take this the wrong way, but the closing date doesn’t mean anything.

I said, there’s no some type of delays. You got to be realistic with the seller and with the borrower. I mean, look, we’d all like to close and we’d all like everything in a rush, but it doesn’t work that way.

You know, I mean, things need, you need time to get things done, but there’s sometimes we get things done in 21 days. You know what? You should be, you know, kissing the ground and saying, wow, that was great.

I closed in 21 days or that was closed in 30 days. I mean, you know, the problem is I think some people are afraid to say something to the seller. Well, why?

I mean, you really can’t.

[Antonio Holman]
Why do you feel Everest is a better choice for lender than the other lenders that are around there? Because some of the people you mentioned, they may feel put off to where you’re like, well, there has to be somebody better than talking to Fred or whatever. What do you say to people who say that there’s better options for them?

[Fred Shatzoff]
Well, basically what I do is I explain to the person, look, A, I’ve been in lending for over 30 years. The last five years, I work strictly with real estate investors. We are a broker.

So what that means is we have relationships with different lenders out there and we have vetted these lenders out there. We know which lenders, you know, are truthful, are going to do what they say that they’re going to do. And if we need, you know, let’s say a favor or we need an exception on something, we know that we can get an exception as compared with if someone goes directly to one of these lenders.

And suppose there’s a problem, suppose the credit score is a little low or the value is a little low, you know, you’re not going to be able to get anything done unless you have, you know, worked with them before. Plus come four or five o’clock in the afternoon, you can’t talk to anybody. Okay.

So, you know, if you need help with something, you can reach me seven, eight o’clock, nine o’clock at night. I mean, don’t call me one o’clock in the morning. There’s nothing I can do at one o’clock in the morning, but, you know, in dealing with someone like me, I’ve seen almost every situation.

Plus, you know, I offer exceptional service. You’re going to reach me. I mean, I’ll give you an example.

During the pandemic. Okay. All of a sudden I had loans that were ready to close.

And then all of a sudden all these lenders got afraid. And, you know, I literally, I had to call my borrowers and tell them, look, right now it looks like we can’t close. You know, I says, let me try to see what I can do here.

And I was able to get some of them closed. And I went to one company. They’d been after me to do business with them.

So I called the guy, you know, and it seemed like they were going to be able to do it. I said, well, can we use this appraisal from the other lender? And I think I sent them a text.

He sent me a text that he’s on the phone and he’ll get back to me. You know, the guy is still on that same phone call since two years ago. I mean, you know, now I’ve gotten some emails from him.

I said, oh, you know, I says, well, I’m still waiting for a phone call from two years ago. And now you want me to do business with you? I mean, you know, you can’t be, look, if there’s an issue with something, you can’t be afraid to tell people you can’t dilly dally around as much as you don’t want to tell somebody, you know, the property under appraised or your credit didn’t come in the way that it did.

You know what? They’re going to have more respect for you. Maybe they’re going to get upset, but you know what?

At least I was truthful with them. And I try to take a consultative approach where I give some recommendations on some things that you can do to improve.

[Antonio Holman]
Yeah. That’s one of my biggest, biggest things that I need in my life is proper communication. To me, it seems like the simplest thing that we can do.

And so many people fail at it on a daily basis. And I don’t understand the reason.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Yeah, absolutely. It’s like if someone sends me, you know, documents via email, you know, and look, you may be busy, you know, I just sent back a quick email received. Thanks.

So at least I’m not sitting wondering, gee, did he receive the paperwork, you know, that he sent me? Or you could say received, we’ll review it later. If I need anything, I’ll let you know, at least you’re acknowledging that you received it as compared with, you know, drop dead silence, wonder and say, gee, did they receive it?

Why aren’t they at least acknowledging, you know, I mean, you don’t need to write, you know, a novel of war and peace to somebody, they just want to know that you received it.

[Antonio Holman]
What’s the one word or phrase that got you interested in the lending business? I’m quite curious about that.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Well, ever since I was a child, I always liked math. I liked numbers. And, you know, I went to school to become an accountant.

I did some accounting for a couple of years. I really didn’t like it. I didn’t like being confined in the office at all.

And I was saying, well, you know, maybe I’ll do something else. So I saw a sign at a real estate office that they were looking for real estate agents. I went in there, you know, I talked to the guy, I liked what he had to say.

And, you know, I went to school at night, got my real estate license. You know, I liked it. I mean, and, you know, I had some lenders approached me about, you know, coming to work for them.

And, you know, the one thing that I, I liked numbers, I liked real estate. I guess what enticed me was, okay, you know what? I don’t know.

I was like 23, 24 years old. Okay. I’m going to get a paycheck every week.

I’m going to get a draw against my commissions and I’m going to have some benefits and I’m going to have some retirement. So, so I kind of fell into the business is kind of what happened and it evolved over time. And, you know, it’s very, I mean, it is interesting.

I mean, there’s so many different facets. I mean, because this was many years ago, I don’t know, 25 years ago. I was started doing some business with a real estate agent and they were building what we call modular homes.

And some people may not be familiar with what modular homes are. Basically what they are is, you know, it’s, it’s a home that’s built in a factory in different pieces. Now you don’t see it as much anymore.

So I actually went out there to the factory where they built the homes. And, you know, what’s very interesting is the house is built in a controlled environment. It’s basically, it’s the same as a stick built home, but the difference is, you know, while the home is being built, it’s not sitting outside dealing with rain or snow or heat or humidity.

It’s built in a controlled environment. The home can be customized any way that you want. And then what happens is when it gets to the location, you know, they put it on to the foundation and, you know, there’s times I remember, you know, you’re in a neighborhood.

I’m like, okay, come on, go out in the morning. And all of a sudden, like, wait a minute, wasn’t there a vacant piece of land here? And you realize that, okay, that’s a modular home, but these things are, it’s unbelievable the way that they’re built.

I mean, and I think I went to two or three different factories just to see how it was built. It’s amazing the way that it’s built and the quality of construction on something like this.

[Antonio Holman]
Yeah, I really like the whole modular home thing. Now, it’s really starting to kick off because, you know, they’re starting to realize that the costs of building homes, stick built homes, you got workers out there, you got to pull permits and all of this stuff throughout the entire process. It’s expensive and it’s extremely time consuming.

That’s true too.

[Fred Shatzoff]
You’re right.

[Antonio Holman]
So you work more.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Exactly. And the quality is, you know, because the first time you think about it, you’re like, oh, it’s probably going to be a piece of crap and something like that, but it’s really not. Right.

I mean, it’s unbelievable. Yeah. And to watch it and talk to these people, it really, you know, really opens your eyes up.

That’s for sure. What’s the favorite part about what you do? I like the fact that, you know, when we’re at, at the closing day that we got everything done and we got everything done, you know, relatively smoothly because every, every deal is gonna have a little hiccup, whether you realize it or not.

I mean, I’ll give you an example and this is something that I never had this happen to me before. I had a guy, his last name was, I think his last name was Smith. Okay.

And very common name. So with these type of loans, besides doing a credit check, they do a background check just to see if there’s anything else on there. So all of a sudden they tell us that there’s an $18,000 tax lien.

Okay. So I said, okay. So I talked to the borrower and he said, I don’t know anything about it.

So I think the guys for, I said, Jerry, um, you know, you have a very common name. It may not be yours. I said, you know, let’s see what happens.

And then the lender sends me the LexisNexis report. Okay. And I send that to the borrower and, you know, we start to find out that he said, yes, I was involved with this corporation.

Yes, I did live at this address. And this was seven, eight years ago. So, you know, he tried to contact the department of taxation in Pennsylvania.

You know what that’s like, you can’t get anybody and send an email. They give you a kind of standard boiler plate and answer. So I said to him, well, this corporation that you were involved with, do you still talk to the business partners?

He said, yeah, I do. So I said, why don’t you reach out to the business partner? And I had to push this guy a number of times.

He was just a little too laid back. So he finally gets a hold of them. And it turns out that this corporation had declared bankruptcies.

Okay. So, you know, he gets me the bankruptcy papers. I send it into the lender and they said they still want proof that this tax lien is paid.

Now all along, I’m thinking to myself, and this is a state tax lien, because I know if you declare bankruptcy and you have an IRS tax lien, that still does not go away. And I’m saying, I think it’s the same thing with a state tax lien, but I’m not sure. So, you know, I look and we get the schedule of bankruptcy, the debts, it says state of Pennsylvania, it says some other states, cause it was some kind of personnel company for staffing.

And it says state of Pennsylvania tax lien, the amount of the debt is unknown. And I’m like, wait a minute, this is chapter seven. I said, I thought chapter seven is strictly for personal bankruptcy.

Let alone, why is this, you know, debt listed as unknown on here? So I’m the kind of person that I’m a very hands-on guy. I’m a problem solver.

So I turn around and I see a phone number for the attorney and I call the attorney and leave a message. And I’m saying, I’m probably not going to hear from this attorney. I figured this loan is dead.

So the attorney calls me back. He was very nice. He explained to me, you know, you can file chapter seven for a business.

It’s very rare. He said, we felt that this was the best way to go. I said, okay.

And I said, is there a reason that there’s not an amount of the debt listed on there on the schedule for these various states? He said, well, we didn’t know the exact amount plus, you know, even if we did, they don’t disappear with a chapter seven. I said, okay, that’s kind of what I thought here is what I said.

So I called the borrower. I said, I think we’re going to be dead here. I said, I don’t think we’re going to be able to get this loan clause.

And this guy knew quite a bit about some of the credit laws and he, and he wrote a very detailed letter explaining the whole thing. Now, the mistake the guy made was when he, he left the corporation. Okay.

And he never got separation papers. So we send it into the lender and you know, two days later, the lender comes back and they approve the exception. Now, in the meantime, I called a few of my other lenders just to see, and they all pretty much told me you’re going to be dead.

He’s probably going to have to wait another six months and then it’ll be completely gone. And one guy said to me, well, you happen to get the right guy. I said, well, why did I get the right guy?

Well, I’m a tax attorney and I know these rules and I know everything. So I told that to the borrower and then, you know, we got this email that the next, I think the next morning, I didn’t say anything to the lender. What I found out, I said, let me see what they determined.

And, you know, we got it closed, but most other people would have done nothing to try and help the guy. But I’m like, wait a minute, you know, if his name is on the bankruptcy and he didn’t sign, you know, as I think he was the chief operating officer, you know, his name really should not have been listed on it because he really wasn’t part of that corporation he had left. But the problem was he really didn’t have any proof.

So, you know, most people won’t get involved, but if something isn’t right, I’m going to get involved and I’m going to try and help somebody. I mean, a lot of people won’t do that.

[Antonio Holman]
Right, right. So you love the aspect of helping, which that’s good because a lot of people just go and they go through the motions and they don’t necessarily care about what they do. So I can really appreciate that.

[Fred Shatzoff]
Yeah. I mean, I try to look at things from a common sense perspective. I mean, I don’t look at things and say, oh, this is what the rules say.

These are blinders.

[Antonio Holman]
Yeah.

[Fred Shatzoff]
You got, you got to think a little bit outside the box. And unfortunately, you know, they don’t teach that in school and most people don’t know how to think outside the box. You got to become a little solution oriented.

You can’t just sit there. Oh, we can’t do it. Sorry.

No, you know, you got to try to think and say, well, how can we work around this if we can work around it? Sometimes you can’t work around it. But in this particular situation, I’m saying there has to be a way to work around this.

And, you know, thank God we, I persisted and pursued and the guy, you know, the guy sent the letter to me and said, what do you think? I looked at it and I said, Jerry, let’s change a few of these paragraphs. And we changed it.

I read it again. I said, no, let’s change this. And then I said to him, what do you think?

He says, okay. He says, all right, you know what, let’s, let’s send it in. Let’s see what happens here as far as what is the one they’re going to do.

And, you know, we got lucky that that much I will say, I mean, you know, but you know, like I said, a lot of people just won’t do that. So that’s another reason why someone should deal with someone like me, because if there is some kind of an issue, I’m going to do the best that I can to get it resolved.

[Antonio Holman]
Along with that story and your previous stories. I know, I know you’ve been through a lot of ups and downs. Okay.

Now, when throughout all these years of you doing business, when was the time and tell us that story about when you felt most unsuccessful?

[Fred Shatzoff]
I would say probably early in the beginning of my career, maybe I was two years into the business. And at that time there were a lot of savings and loans and a lot of companies going out of business. And, you know, we got a phone call, it was a Friday at three o’clock that we are closing this afternoon at five o’clock.

I mean, I’m like 25, 27 years old, you know, you have all these loans in process and I’m like, all right, what am I going to do now? So I literally spent, you know, the day on Saturday, you know, calling all these borrowers and letting them know, you know, I have some bad news. I said, but, you know, hang on a little bit, let’s try, let’s try to see what we can do here.

And, you know, I mean, obviously it didn’t get much sleep that weekend, but we were able to cut a deal with another lender where they took over our pipeline and our loans. And, you know, we were able to get loans closed with this company. You know, we really didn’t stay there too long.

It wasn’t the best situation, but at least, you know, we were able to help most of these people. So at least, you know, they didn’t lose out on their house. That was, you know, really a scary time for me.

It wasn’t so scary that I’m saying, gee, what am I going to do? How am I going to pay my bills? I mean, because, you know, it’s not like now, look at the cost of gas.

Look, you go to the grocery store, you can’t get groceries. Now the latest is people are having trouble getting baby formula. It wasn’t like that at that time, but it was more, you know, you’re worried about, you know, telling the, you know, a, these people may not be able to get their home.

And look, the hardest part was telling the people, but, you know, I just said to myself, well, you can’t sit there and dance around. Like some people try to dance around and give a story, you know, just, you know, you just tell the people, this is what’s going on, you know, give us a couple of days. Some people decided they were just going to go apply elsewhere.

I said, that’s fine. That’s up to you. I said, I can’t hold you hostage here, but I said, but at least I’m telling you what’s going on rather than you hear it through the grapevine.

I mean, some people, you can’t be afraid to tell somebody what, look, what’s the worst that’s going to happen? You know, you get some people that are going to threaten, that are going to come there to the office and harm you and all that. And yeah.

Have I had some people come to the office and start to yell and scream? Yeah. I’ve never had to call the police.

Now today it’s a little bit different. Everything’s done through the internet. What are they going to do?

You know, I mean, but you can’t be afraid to tell people, you know, if there’s bad news, look, life’s not perfect. It’s, it’s not all smooth. There is ups and there are downs and you have to just, you know, be manly enough about it and learn to deal with it because it’s not perfect.

You know, you’re going to, you’re going to lose family members. You’re going to have people that are going to get sick. People are going to get cancer, you know, people are going to get killed.

I mean, it’s, you know, you don’t want to see it happen, but it’s just part of life.

[Antonio Holman]
How did you get through that? What did you do? Did you stay in the lending world or did you have to actually change industries briefly?

[Fred Shatzoff]
No, I mean, I stayed, look, I stayed in the lending world. Look, we were fortunate within less than a week, we were able to, you know, cut a deal with another lender where they took over our pipeline and our loans. So, you know, we went there and worked with that lender.

I think maybe we were there six months or a year. I mean, because we saw they were, you know, the greatest lender in the world, but you know, under circumstances, what were you going to do? It was either that or completely walk away, you know, and let these people find their own loans and that, you know, now it really becomes even more of a nightmare.

So, at least they were able to use the appraisals and all this other stuff. We just had to get the appraisers to change the name of the lender.

[Antonio Holman]
What’s the one positive goal you’re focused on in your business today?

[Fred Shatzoff]
Um, I mean, no matter how bad things are, you know, I try to stay positive and I try to say to myself, there’s always somebody that’s in a worse situation than I am, you know, and I try to stay as positive as I can, you know, if I, you know, get upset or something bothers me, you know what? You just, you leave the office or you go take a walk or you do something to relieve your stress because, you know, you can’t dwell on something forever. Stress will kill you.

[Antonio Holman]
Yeah, yeah it will. What’s the favorite piece of technology you tend to use every day?

[Fred Shatzoff]
Um, I would say, you know, I like using my laptop much better than my cell phone. Some people do everything on their cell phone, but, you know, my biggest problem on the cell phone is you could type something four or five times and, you know, your fingers, not that I have big fingers, they’re normal fingers, but you look at a cell phone it’s and the screen is too small. Yeah, it’s that.

I mean, you know, so yeah, I mean, you know, to do everything on a computer you get some people they do everything on their cell phone. I don’t know how you do that. I can’t.

[Antonio Holman]
I don’t either, it drives me crazy. Absolutely. How many loans right now are you working with at the moment?

[Fred Shatzoff]
Right now, I probably have about five to seven loans in process. I mean, you know, it’s very competitive out there. It’s not, and when I say it’s competitive, you have a lot of investors bidding on the same properties.

So, it’s not so much that, you know, I have a lot of competition. There is a lot of competition, but, you know, for the most part, look, if people do business with me once they’re going to come back and do business two, three, four times and, you know, let’s face it, if you get a referral, it’s much better than someone that is, you know, cold and blind. Although, you know, we do get people like that too.

It’s just a matter of building up that trust and that relationship so that they’ll do business with you.

[Antonio Holman]
Fred, if anyone wants to get a hold of you and utilize your lending services or anything like that, what’s the easiest way for them to connect with you?

[Fred Shatzoff]
They can either call me at 551-272-9067 or they can send me a message [email protected] or they can visit my website everestbusinesscapital.com and they can send me a message through there.

[Antonio Holman]
Since entering into your business world, what do you feel you’re most grateful for?

[Fred Shatzoff]
Um, I guess, you know, being in the same industry for a long time, you know, almost my entire career, you know, whereas you see some people make a career change two or three times, you know, so, I mean, I’m grateful for that. Look, I like it. Look, it’s not physical labor.

I mean, this is the kind of business that you could, at least I feel I could do, you know, the rest of my life as long as my mind is sharp and I’m able to think. Obviously, if I can’t think, you know, then I’m not going to be able to do the business. It’s not like someone who’s a roofer or a carpenter.

I mean, you can only do that for so long, you know, then you’re really going to start to hurt as far as aches and pains and everything along those lines are concerned.

[Antonio Holman]
So, before I hit you with the last question, just want to tell you thank you very much for being on the show today. I really enjoyed hearing your insight over the years because a lot of us don’t get that opportunity to hear people who have been through this for so many years. So, I really thank you for being on the show.

[Fred Shatzoff]
No, thank you. I mean, it was, you know, it was my pleasure. It was really, you know, a lot of fun.

I mean, it really was, you know. Sometimes you think you don’t have anything to tell or share, but you start to realize and you start to think about that. I mean, I could probably sit here and go another 2-3 hours, you know, but, you know, I don’t know if my voice would hang on that long.

[Antonio Holman]
Finally, Fred, what’s your definition of, instead of real estate investing success, I’d like to say business success. What is your definition of business success?

[Fred Shatzoff]
Okay, yeah. I mean, I would say, look, you know, business success is someone that has been in business for a long time, has, you know, not been sued, has been able to change with the technology because when I first started out, we had to handwrite all the applications. We had beepers.

We had to go find a pay phone. Nobody had fax machines. Nobody had email or anything along those lines.

So, you know, I think to be able to survive and change with the times, I mean, it’s not easy. I mean, you have to learn some new skills, but, you know, but that’s what keeps you, I guess, vibrant and young. You know, some people, well, you know, I can’t do this or I can’t do that.

You know, you can. Look, what I’ve always done is from learning something new, I take some notes, write some things down. You might have to ask the same question two or three times, and then eventually it becomes habit.

[Antonio Holman]
Successors, I hope you’ve enjoyed my quick conversation today, and I hope you’ve gained just a little more insight into achieving your financial freedom and reaching your goals. For more real estate investing content like this, and a lot more, please visit UnitedStatesRealEstateInvestor.com. That’s UnitedStatesRealEstateInvestor.com.

Thanks for listening. And as always, stay grateful, stay successful, and be free.