I almost bought a Benz. My Dad made me buy this instead.

Where It All Started

Today is my greatest mentor’s birthday. My Dad.

Almost twenty years ago, at 24 years old, I made my first real investment: a 17-unit apartment building.

Four years before that, I was a senior taking mostly freshman-level classes with a 1.7 GPA. Two years earlier, I had dropped out of college and was working six days a week as a telemarketer for a start-up mortgage brokerage.

I’d pray for rain on Saturday mornings so more people would stay home and pick up the phone. I manually dialed two phones on speaker to double my output, hanging up one the second the other was answered and going all-in on my P:30. Those phones ringing, me “singing” sales, it was a rush.

Lessons You Don’t Learn in School

Growing up in my parents’ small business near Wrigley Field in Chicago, I watched my Dad connect with people effortlessly. His emotional intelligence stood out immediately. He greeted customers in their native languages, and people came from all across the Midwest just to do business with him.

I carried that lesson forward. I learned how to say “hi, how are you” and “thank you” in more than 20 languages, with perfect pronunciation, often within the first 30 seconds of a call. Rapid rapport wasn’t a trick. It was respect.

The Investment That Changed Everything

One night, after bringing home my biggest paycheck, I also brought home a brochure for a new Mercedes-Benz CL550. I asked my Dad if he’d be okay with me buying it.

I’ll never forget his response.

Making money is easy. Keeping it and growing it is hard. Give every paycheck to your mom. Put that Mercedes brochure in the trash. Your first investment will be in an apartment building.

That was the day I learned that being a great Loan Officer meant being a great entrepreneur. Turning active income into passive income.

And that’s how we ended up here.

This exact corner.
This exact entrance.
This exact spot.

Seventeen units. And zero clue what I was really doing.

But I did have one thing, a father who taught me that if you stay hungry, stay humble, and stay close to God, you will stay winning.

Today, two decades later, we stood here again. I still own this building.

What Really Builds a Career

For my fellow Loan Officers reading this: I talk a lot about scripts, systems, leadership, and process. But the real foundation of your business is built long before you ever take an application.

It’s built by the people who raised you, shaped you, and believed in you before there was proof.

GO! get a mentor like my Dad.