Today, my guest is Paul Neal. Paul is the founder and Principal Funding Strategist. At Vantage Point Commercial Capital. A firm that focuses on helping entrepreneurs and real estate investors win by funding their growth in dreams in non traditional ways.

J Darrin Gross

I'd like to ask you, Paul Neal, what is the biggest risk?

Paul Neal  

Well, I think the biggest risk that business owners and entrepreneurs face today and into the foreseeable future, is what I call big, big government, big technology, big media, even big banks. We've seen it over COVID, it's been in our face, that there's a there's a, there's a movement to sort of aggregate the power up into the hands of the few again, whether it's a government media, big business is, you know, is a threat to small business and entrepreneurs. Because, you know, we're, we're free agents, we're out there on the street, we're the ones that are building the community, we're hiring employees, we're caring about our customers caring about her families, giving back to the community, we're the ones that want to be able to exercise, you know, free and independent thought. And we have these forces that are aligned against us. And again, you COVID You know, who did they shut down? Well, they didn't shut down Amazon, they didn't shut down Walmart, but they shut down the, you know, the mom and pop that at a coffee shop, they shut down the church, they shut down, you know, anything they that didn't sort of fall into this, this large monolithic group that that could be controlled. And and I'm not saying there's any sort of force behind it, other than the fact that it's just natural, right, that, that, that, that we're sort of in a battle here that we all want control. And it's easier to control, the smaller the smaller number of levers that control, you know, sort of larger, larger economies, and without getting really deep and off of that, and I just think that we're in a fight, and I think as entrepreneurs, that for us to be to survive into the future that we need to stick together and realize that, you know, I don't I don't think our issues are, you know, most business owners that I know, regardless of the color, their background, their creed, whatever, they just, they just want to work with customers and serve people. And they want to do the best they can. They want to work in excellence, and we just have to stick together. And so we can all win together. Because I think when we win as entrepreneurs and business owners, our families when our communities win, and ultimately, society wins.

Today, my guest is Stuart Keller. Stuart is currently the head of Investor Relations syndication division, focused on senior living communities throughout the US.

J Darrin Gross

I'd like to ask you, Stuart Keller, what is the Biggest Risk?

Stuart Keller  

You know, I would say, you know, I think what we all experienced, experienced collectively as a nation in 2020. And 2021, was, you know, a pandemic, that disproportionately impacted the senior population, you know, the impact to you and I was a lack of availability to get a haircut, you know, some small mom and pop a lot of a lot of small stores, and, you know, mom and pop businesses went out went out of business. For for the senior living population, there was COVID restrictions, not allowing new movements into the resident into the communities, you know, just a a significant impact, which hurt both occupancy, which drove down the net cash flow, but also the ability for new residents to want to move outside of their homes where they felt, you know, safe and secure. So I would say definitely, you know, if there was a repeat hope to god, there isn't of 2020 I would say that that's probably the single single biggest risk factor and senior living.

Today, my guest is Leonard Atlas. Leonard is with Mission Profitable Inc. Leonard is an author, speaker and sales trainer working with commercial real estate professionals around the world. And in just a minute, we're gonna speak with Leonard about the 80/20 Pareto principle. And he's got a presentation "From Brooklyn to Bel Air".

J Darrin Gross

I'd like to ask you, Leonard Atlas, what is the biggest risk?

Leonard Atlas  

Just a clarification, do you mean to me or to my clients,

J Darrin Gross  

You can frame it for your for yourself or your clients, however you however you'd like to frame?

Leonard Atlas  

Well, I've spent so much time thinking about my clients. So the biggest risks of my clients is wasting the two commodities that you can never get back. You can only spend, you can never get back. And that's their time and their reputations. And far too many people have confided in me that they waste so much time with the wrong people. They didn't know what this qualification looked like they didn't know how to go about doing it tactfully and politely and not to burn the bridge. And when I say disqualification, it simply means to say to somebody, look, Charlie, this, this particular deal may not be the right one for us, you already got somebody on it. I'm a little late to the game, whatever. But does it make sense for us to stay in touch for future opportunities for future deals, so we're not talking about disqualifying them forever. We're just acknowledging if this current transaction, whether it's a renewal or next, or whatever it is, if this one's already allocated, and I'm too late, and I'm not getting it, why would I want to invest any more time, money and resources into it? So the time and again, that awareness I have reduced once people realize what the time is worth. Because let's face it, if you're making $10 an hour, you're gonna function one way, if you're making $100, now you're gonna function differently. And if you're 1000 miles now you're gonna function even more differently, and you're gonna delegate and more people do other things, and you're gonna stay focused on what you do to make 1000 miles an hour. So time, but about reputation as well. reputations? Well, and I'll tell you something in closing, I did a lot of interim things during COVID. Because there were no workshops, there was no trainings that whole this whole industry shut down for two years, two and a half years. And I met many wonderful people. But I met a group of people that I titled as fakes flakes and frauds. You have no idea? No, I avoided the entire PPP industry. And the PPE industry, I avoided those I was asked immediately masks and gloves because people don't have access to people in real estate. I want nothing to do with that at all at all. But ultimately, I would network and broker and do things and you know, make a living. And you have no idea how many fraudulent bios, fraudulent documents, Photoshop documents, absolute scam artists, people would send me a link and say, look at this person, they would just convicted a fraud from another state from another this from it. And other than that, I had one guy who claimed to buy and sell hospitals. And somebody checked it out to me. And he called me and said, This guy is wanted by the Orange County Sheriff on 89 counts of fraud 89 Counselor fraud. So I say that you because reputation is almost worse than time. Look, you spend time you can't get it back clearly. But when you burn a reputation, and you can't call that person back and they tell you never call me back, I never want to hear from you again. You know that kind of stuff. how devastating is that? And the way to reduce and minimize that is by using ad 20 and having a create a set of criteria. Who are the people that are acceptable for me to engage with and work with And I have no tolerance for fakes, flakes or frauds. That's my own personal thing. So my risk is falsely being associated with the with the wrong people that will waste my time, which equates to money and damage my reputation. So I got injured both for both my clients and myself. Life is too short, there's too much opportunity out there, there really is too much abundance out there. Once you determine your criteria for what is acceptable, what is not acceptable, all of a sudden, now you're guarding, guarding protecting your time and your reputation. I hope, I hope that helps answer the question.

Today, my guest is Jaspreet Baveja.  Jaspreet is the director of funds strategies. And he has a BA in Management Information Systems from Florida International University and a computer engineering degree from Penn State University. He has been investing in real estate since 2013. And full time since 2019.

J Darrin Gross

I'd like to ask you Jaspreet Baveja, What is the Biggest Risk?

Jaspreet Baveja  

Oh, man, I think I think shifting market trends is the biggest risk, because you never know exactly when it's going to start, you could be in the middle of a transaction when it hits you the hardest. And that makes you lose a deal. Because the market shift changed the valuation, the market shift changed the loan, the lender was willing to give you the market shift changed the rent rates you were expecting to put on your underwriting. And so it's the overall market. Because whether the market is changing because of interest rates, or geopolitical or any, you know, natural risks like Hurricane Ian, that we have now, anything that changes the market to shift, I think is the biggest risk because that is something that is not entirely in your control. And like you said, it's not easy. If you have an insurance claim, sure, it's easy to transfer risk to that insurance company and say, Alright, well, that's what we got you for, let's file a claim. But if you have a deal that's going south, because the property was worth 25 million when you put the offer in for 25 million, and now the market shifted, because the rent rates slowed down, and the interest rates went up. And the biggest job provider that was in the market in that particular area just decided to up and leave like Apple decides to leave San Jose for all this, you know, for some reason, that's going to be a big market shift that you as an operator or as an investor or anything, have no control over. And so that's going to automatically shift all your underwriting all your projections of returns. And so I think the biggest risk is the market shift, whatever the cause may be.

Today, my guest is Joanna Frank. Joanna is the CEO of Fitwel, where she advances design and development practices to foster healthy and engaged communities. And in just a minute, we're gonna speak with Joanna about healthy building designs.

I'd like to ask you, Joanna Frank, what is the Biggest Risk?

Joanna Frank  36:51  

the people in your buildings, because as we've talked about it is people that really decide value by what we value as people and our society translates into the value of your asset. So that kind of comes back to why location, why is this location more valuable than another location it is because we, as people value those attributes. And we can see that and we can correlate it with real data, right. So we as people value being in a neighborhood that is walkable, and there is a lot of data, a lot of stats that shows the direct correlation between the increasing amount of walkability of the location and that increase in value. So, so we as people are going to, we're going to decide when a building or when a property is really good for us and good for our businesses way before the physical risk that we're going to see if we're talking about climate change as an example. flood risk is a good one, just because if you're looking at flood risk from a When will my property flood physically, that is obviously the risk to the bricks and mortar way in advance of that physical event of flooding, that property is going to lose value, because of the perception from people of the risk of that flood, I am not going to move my business into that building, because that building is in a flood zone. And I don't want to take the risk of whenever that flood occurs because of the disruption to my business because of putting my people in harm's way. So the value and the risk associated with that flood is happening way in advance of the physical flooding, because we as people aren't going to be building that into our assessment of value. Likewise, the temperature change, right, some cities, some regions are going to become less and less optimum for people to thrive, and therefore that's going to start to affect people's willingness to move there. Right? If it's 120 degrees on the high street, like that is no longer an optimum environment for people it is actually suboptimal, right. So now you have an issue about value for that real estate, the buildings will be fine. But as people will say, I don't want to live that right, that's too hot. I don't want to have air conditioning on all the time. And then of course, we can have a whole energy conversation. Likewise, air quality, the air quality is going to affect my quality of life, my tenants and my my family. I'm going to start to bake that into whether I value this location or how I value this location. So it is people that are really driving value of real estate and it is people who are going to be the greatest risk factor because of climate change. And because of all of these other societal changes way in advance of buildings starting to have the Like, you know, physical implications on buildings?