00:14
My co-host Sahil Chaudry. Sahil, how are you today? Hey, I’m doing great. I’m excited about today’s guest. Yes, today we have a special guest, a friend of mine for a while now. She even I have worked on many deals in the past. He’s sent clients our way. We’ve sent clients his way. He’s a fantastic lawyer turned entrepreneur who has a awesome kind of Genesis story of what he’s done over the years to lead him to where he is today. I think everyone’s going to get a lot of really great insight.

00:41
from the insight she was going to share. Shiva, how are you today? Doing well. Thanks for having me and setting this up. Yeah, my pleasure. We’re really, really glad you could join us on this podcast. know, podcasting this is new medium, know, obviously not many out there. we just thought we’ll get out of the curve here. But joking aside, you this is an opportunity for us to share a little bit more about our stories and how we’ve been able to kind of

01:10
beat the odds of entrepreneurship because as we all know, entrepreneurship, most people aren’t successful. most entrepreneurship ventures fail, but Shiva, you’ve managed to build something successful. So when getting into that, know you are a lawyer. We’ll talk a little bit about your background just kind of to jump into it. What’s one myth about credit scores or credit reports that still surprises you that people believe? Sure. You know, it’s funny. I thought all the

01:38
Incorrect information would go away. But thanks to tick tock and Instagram. It’s making making a comeback people putting a lot of stuff out there. I think one of the biggest ones that We we get brought to our team is that if there’s something bad on your credit You’re stuck with it forever the whole aspect of most items except for some bankruptcies are removed within a seven-year period that still is not

02:05
I think fully well known. So a lot of folks think because there’s something negative on there, they’re stuck with it forever. When the truth is most negative items from late payments to collections accounts and charge-offs, what have you, most negatives are gone within seven years. The one exception to that is chapter seven bankruptcies, which are there for 10 years. So I think it’s actually a myth that works against consumers because people think they’re stuck with this and they lose hope. When the reality is,

02:34
even if you didn’t do much with your credit, but you let all the bad stuff come off, eventually your, your score will improve and reset. So I think that’s something I continue to hear. And we’ve been hearing repeatedly over the last, you know, number of years we’ve been doing this and it is something that’s incorrect. There is always a second chance of your credit. That’s great to hear. That’s great to hear. I’m sure that’ll be very comforting for, for some listeners to hear that there’s, there is always a second chance. Um, I feel like in law, that’s something we always, I always try to remind clients that nothing is

03:03
Nothing is final really, especially on the law. It’s always issues. There are always things you can deal with. are always ways to address issues, always ways to argue issues. It’s always good to remember that there’s always some, some avenue, usually you can argue or something you can do to, address the situation you’re in. All right. So, so Shiv, I’m, I’m hearing you talk about kind of this very scary topic for a lot of people, which is, you know, if I ruin my credit score, um, you know, I’ve, I’ve been on the phone

03:32
panicking before worried about something that’s going to hurt my credit score. I feel like that’s in our society that determines can you get a car? Can you get a house? mean, like before you get married, it’s something you have to kind of reveal some kind of part of the package. So you are helping people when they are definitely in need. Is that a personal quality that you’ve always had? you? What was the first time you discovered that? Hey, you know what? I like helping people.

04:00
I like solving problems. That’s actually a more unique quality. When did you first discover that? You know, that’s an interesting one, Sahil. think when I was in college, I went to school at UCLA and I had a chance to get involved with a lot of different student organizations. But one of the ones that always stood out to me was an organization called Project Bright, where we actually worked

04:28
with these young guys who were in Camp Kilpatrick in the juvenile detention for various issues. And you would go up there and mentor them, work with them on school and just life in general once a week. And then we would bring them to the campus at the end of the semester. And that was one time where I was like, okay, these are people who maybe made a mistake, got in the trouble for some reason, overwhelmingly are coming from places and backgrounds where there’s no guidance, no resources.

04:55
you know, tons of poverty, gang activity, everything you can think of. And I really, it was gratifying to see that, you know, you can bring a positive influence to some of these guys. And so that general trend, I think of it carried on, but I always compartmentalized as this is volunteer work. I don’t think it was until much later that I discovered, hey, there are these laws and these issues come up for people and you can not only help them, but you can, you know, have a business and make plenty of money doing so.

05:24
So I think that one of the gaps for me was that I always enjoyed that helping people out and figuring out part of it. I just think to me, when you said law, I was like, okay, you’re going and billing people by the hour. Not that there’s anything wrong with it. We need that. But it was very much that that’s the type of what I worked in to realize that there was some another way to go about it. Cause I’ll tell you what our clients, they never pay us in our current interagency of our business. They never pay us out of pocket because the fair credit reporting act and fair debt collection practices act.

05:53
our attorney fee statutes, meaning if you settle in, settle out of court or win your fees of your reasonable fees of your attorney are paid for through a settlement and all of that. So as a result, I was able to help people and do this without having to go into their pocket necessarily. And so, yeah, I think it takes time and just exploring to realize that a you enjoy doing this and B how can you do it and make it profitable and viable? That’s amazing. Yeah. It’s interesting that, you know, you’re talking about

06:21
how you help people in the law. There’s so many things you can do with the law. And by the way, we’re on this podcast, we’re totally open to controversial opinions about billable rates and hourly billing. I think we have a lot to talk about with that in future episodes about whether hourly billing is good or bad or not for the profession and for consumers. that said, I think it’s good to know that a lot of consumers when they think, okay, well, maybe can you do a contingency, but people don’t realize, hey,

06:47
This is not really contingency. This is actually, there’s, a difference between contingency. Like you think about a, you know, personal injury case and things like that and what you’re doing. So tell us a little bit more about how that works. So if someone comes to you, if I have a credit issue, how does it work? What, do you help me if, if I’m dealing with some, you know, if I missed payments on my car and now my credit is very low. So we would take a look at the credit report and we would find out first of all, is this accurate? Okay.

07:16
The law says a few things. It says that the information on the credit report has to be accurate. It has to be complete. It has to be timely, meaning not out of date. It can’t be misleading. So we would take a look and say, it meet this? So in the scenario you just raised, let’s say they marked you 90 days late, but in fact you were 30 days late. Or let’s say, and I’ve had this exact case, you were 24 days late and paid a late fee, but they didn’t properly mark it and they marked you as 30 days late.

07:45
In a scenario like that, we would provide you with free of charge a dispute letter, or we would either give it to you or send it off on your BAF. And if they correct the issue, great, you’re all set. We always appreciate the reviews. You can leave one if you want, no compulsion whatsoever. You can go on your way. Or if they don’t correct it, as often happens, then we or one of the attorneys that we work with in our network will go ahead and sue the credit agencies, as well as the creditor, in this case, the auto lender.

08:13
because they all had an obligation to investigate the issue and correct it. So that’s what we look at. Now the reality is most people, with collections, same thing. I might tell someone if they’re being contacted by a collection agency, if you disputed your debt and said it was incorrect, did they market it as such on the credit? Are they contacting you at the wrong hours? If they’re texting you and you send them a text and say, will not pay the debt and they keep bothering you, you can sue them and get the debt potentially waived and removed.

08:42
from the credit and your attorney’s fees paid. So we’ll look at what’s being done, where it is and how that can be dealt with. And if it’s not something that’s illegal, we created some free resources because before we did this, when we were even when we were doing these cases, we used to run a credit pair company where we would address negative items and you would pay us if we got it addressed. We no longer operate in that business, but because we did it, we have a lot of resources. So we’ll give you some free do it yourself stuff or

09:10
suggest a company that can help you in the event you don’t have a case. my suggestion to anyone with credit issues would be have your report reviewed, have a law firm. It could be ours or another’s look at it. Because if there is something illegal happening, then you don’t need to spend money and time trying to correct it yourself. You would, you may be entitled to get it corrected and get compensation for it. yeah. That’s great. Really interesting. Can you tell us a little bit about the early days of your legal career? Did you always

09:39
know you wanted to go into this niche or develop this practice area? I mean, it sounds like you had a really influential experience at UCLA, but upon graduation, how did you start your legal career? Sure. So I went to college there, took two years off, then went to law school. I worked for a really awesome boutique law firm as a legal assistant, Liner Law, for those who are familiar.

10:06
Um, funny enough, I think they’re in the same office building as you guys, or they were at one. Um, yeah, but, uh, so I worked there, did some other stuff, um, and then went to law school. came out of school in 2010. So the market was really bad. Um, so I was interviewing for jobs. I wasn’t really seeing stuff that I particularly, um, liked. And so I, you know, I decided to do the most logical thing, which is I was living in LA, a very high living cost area.

10:36
I’d done the bar in New York as well as now. I said, Oh, I’m going to move to New York with no job. Just kind of try to figure it out. And then what I did, uh, I, I went and interviewed for a couple of document review and other legal jobs. And I was like, Oh, this, this is just terrible. Like it just like, didn’t seem interesting at all. This, that, so I was like, no, I’m going to do something else. So I actually found a Craigslist ad. I decided to become a real estate broker in New York city. Okay. is completely, it’s completely absurd. went and told.

11:06
broker Val about, told Val and Orin, yeah, a lot agree. I’m going to do that eventually. I don’t really know right now though. I just want, need to start making some money and doing something. And they were like, okay, this is unusual, but cool. Go for it. So I was running around New York city, renting apartments out there. As you may know, I think the rules are changing you many, because of the demand being so high, just like LA, they don’t know what didn’t always pay the commission on rentals. So people need help finding a rental. can’t figure it out. They pay us a broker fee. Um,

11:35
So I was out there putting ads, running around the city, picking up keys, opening apartments, getting applications. Some are accepted, some are rejected. I did that for about nine months. It was a ton of fun. I absolutely loved it. I’ll venture to say it’s far more interesting than most legal jobs, I think. I can’t speak for everyone, but a whole lot of them. Then I went, I eventually, got a legal job, worked at a law firm, like commercial lit.

12:01
Um, so it was a mid-size firm. was a great experience. Why did you leave that job after nine months? Because part of, I, to be honest, I think there were a few things. I think one was like, okay, I went through and got this law degree. Do I really like want to do real estate brokering? Number two, I could tell that I was, I was, I was starting to make money doing that, but I could tell that very quickly I could go into a law firm and get a salary and do that. It wasn’t like going to an amla 100 firm, but it was still a pretty good salary and I could make that happen. So I went ahead and,

12:31
did that, I did that for a couple of years, then went to another firm. But what led to tier one and what we ultimately do here was I knew that I wanted to start something of my own. And I kind of wanted to bring together sort of legal and maybe a technology aspect to it. So I decided, I ended up doing some pro bono work where in New York, they have a program called Claro, civil legal aid resource organization. We would go to the courts and help people once a month who I would go once a month.

13:01
who were being sued in debt collection lawsuits. And they were getting sued by junk debt buyers, by credit card companies. And they all cared about their credit. Even like you had folks who had housing vouchers for section eight, but they couldn’t rent an apartment in New York because even for section eight and subsidized housing, the score was too low. And so would hear all these people getting sued on debts. They cared about their credit. That led to me digging into the laws around credit. And my partner in this started out his career as a mortgage lender.

13:30
After he graduated from college, we went to high school together and he used to work with another attorney where they would, he was a mortgage lender until avoid losing deals. They would have people get help with their credit so they could improve their score. So I talked to Tony and I’m like, dude, do you know about this stuff? And he’s like, yeah, yeah, of course. He’s like, is what like, this is what Edward and I used to do and all of that. And so I sort of was like, what if we could combine what you know and what I know and my legal background and this, and we could do this business. So.

13:57
We started just taking people on while we were in New York or in California for free. We would just tell them, we’ll work on your credit for free. And we started figuring it out and seeing how we liked it. And I was doing that for almost a year before I left the job, 28 months. And then I realized that I really liked this and I think we can make a go of it. So I ended up leaving that and moving back to LA and that’s how we got started. that, you know, that takes a lot of guts. think we’re kind of like, you know, we’re, we’re

14:22
Casually glossing over you’re able to maybe say it because you have that quality in you of entrepreneurship and risk-taking but that’s actually a very rare quality and you have also something unique here, which is you’ve got this Empathy where you care about people who are fighting with credit card companies and they’re dealing with debt and they’re in trouble Combined with what seems like a very aggressive entrepreneurial spirit

14:49
That’s a very unique combination. So I know we got to hear a little bit about how you developed your legal niche, but what about your entrepreneurial instincts? Like, did that emerge early on? Did you, you know, did you have a lemonade stand? How did you develop that? I was very much not one of those kids come from a family where education is a very big thing and entrepreneurship, you know, I think besides,

15:15
one relative, we really didn’t have entrepreneurs in my family. That’s not a knock on them. They were awesome. But it was very much, get a good job, figure things out. I think what pushed me into it were, there’s a couple of things. I’ve had an abiding skepticism of most employers and working for them. That doesn’t mean I never did it because I had to, but I just never truly believed. And this is not a knock on law firms where I worked or any of that.

15:42
I just never truly believed that I was going to advance in those places. I was like, okay, someone else is going to decide, oh, is he going to be a partner? Is he going to do that? That, and then I just can remember hearing stories of people, oh, I was at this company, I put in all this work and they fired me. Maybe I overdramatized those things in my head, but all of that lurked in the background despite my desire to work at a big law firm. And then when I didn’t get that,

16:09
I was kind of like, dude, okay, whatever. Like you didn’t get it. Like figure something else out. And then being in that real estate brokerage, had all these immigrants and people from all over the world who came in, were realtors and working, they’re hustling and some of them making tons and tons of money. There’s a couple of, there’s a couple of people who are at that brokerage still that I’m pretty certain make more money than almost any lawyer that I know. And it wasn’t just about money, but it just made me realize there’s many different paths to it. So come and just having to go out there and.

16:37
I have all these student loans, all this debt, and I’m just like, you know what? I need to make money. I don’t know what I’m going to do. It’s a commission only job. Being thrown into that environment, very quickly you learn how to figure it out. And then I didn’t get, I didn’t do it long enough to get jaded, but I did it long enough that I thought it was really cool and really interesting. And so part of it has just been for me, so I’ll answer that. Um, didn’t come from it so much as was exposed to it. And then when I was, uh, everything else paled in comparison. So,

17:05
We always say at some point, we move, will we potentially move on or sell our firm, do whatever? Yeah, all that’s possible. But I think the entrepreneurship bug, I was lucky that I didn’t get a job out of school and I got into this because I don’t think on my own it would have happened. Honestly, it was really not getting a job and being forced to figure stuff out that did it. You know? That’s so funny. Yeah. I appreciate that story because I feel like you and I have similar stories. You know, I graduated in 2009.

17:31
And you and I even met, you I think we got along very well. I remember meeting in New York, meeting up in New York and, and then spending some time there many years ago when you’re, when you were still working out there. And, uh, you immediately, I think we clicked because of that entrepreneurial bug and spirit, but also like being forced into it, right? Because, uh, I wasn’t also courted by the, big firms to work there off the bat. So it was like, okay, well, what are your, what are your options now? And I realized quickly that.

17:59
Just like you, was working at small firms in Arizona and I’m like, this is not what I want to do. And these firms are moving so slowly. And I think when you have that entrepreneurial mindset, you want things to happen quickly and now, and you get frustrated with all the inefficiencies in the system. So you want to, you want to change it, know, without knowing much else. So I think it’s that also that naive day that you have that actually helps you in some ways as an entrepreneur, because you don’t know it’s not possible. You don’t know it’s so hard because you just, this is, this is what you want to do.

18:28
Yeah, I knew it wasn’t hard. People are like, would you do it? And the answer I always give is yes. But I’m glad that I didn’t know that when I started, right? Exactly. Exactly. I’d have been like, you know what? That sounds good now. And it’s also your risk tolerance. think one thing I would tell people who are thinking about making the leap. First of all, people here entrepreneurship, it means a lot of different things to a lot of people. I think there’s many ways to come at it.

18:54
Entrepreneurship does not necessarily require venture capital. It doesn’t require you to start a tech company. There’s all different sorts of businesses that nothing against those. are great. There’s also different sorts of businesses you can build and get into. And here’s a consideration. If you’re not sure about it, don’t go quit your job immediately. Dabble into it, find a way to do something on the side. I mean, in my case, I done something entrepreneurial once, but when we decided to start tier one, you’ll notice I said we spent eight, nine months.

19:23
And if I had known, I’d have been like, you know what, I would quit the job immediately if I knew that then and started this. Cause we’d be even further ahead with eight or nine more months of experience, but find a way to dabble in it, get into it, make sure you actually like it, start messing around with it. And then if you really find it is then figure out your financial and whatever, know, familial situation and then yeah. And then consider doing it. Yeah. So I got a question about entrepreneurship. So how, how important is it?

19:49
Do you find it’s better to just act when the opportunity arises or do you feel it’s better to think plan, you know, really, really make sure that you’re making the right decision before you, jump. I guess there’s no one right answer to that. Plunkage. It’s a great question. The general answer I would give is that you’re going to have to do a certain amount of just leap and jump to figure things out. That’s a reality. Um, I think early on in a business, you probably need more of that, uh, which is.

20:18
Which is, it’s sort of the one, the paradoxes of entrepreneurship. Cause early on is when you have less resources and less clarity later on, if you had to make a little overtake of some risk or something, you could do it early on. You don’t feel like you can, but that’s when it’s the most paramount. So I would say that early on you should to figure out if you like it, you’re going to have to start doing some amount of work and seeing how you feel about it. And at a certain point you’re to have to take the leap and just say, you know what? The parachute will open on the way down.

20:47
Uh, or not, but hopefully it does. As you noted, a lot of work out, but thankfully not the same like jumping out of a plane. But I think early on you have to have that mindset. Okay. Later on, you’d want to get very strategic. Once you’ve grown to a certain size and say, okay, I have multiple opportunities. What do I want to pursue? Do I want to do this or do I want to do that? Is this strategy going to work well for both my interests, my brand and the long-term, the needs of the market? So.

21:16
But early on, you don’t know all that. Like I have a lot of friends who went to these amazing business schools. You know, learn all this stuff about strategy and you do this. And I’m like, okay, that’s fantastic, but that works for big companies. And it’s even debatable whether it works for them because they have problems left and right. Does it work for entrepreneurs and startups? No, you need some strategy, but the best strategy is going to be get out there and start figuring stuff out and doing it. That’s going to be the number one thing you can do. So early on, that’s what it requires, but later on you have to get more.

21:44
think it out and do that. So I think it’s different stages of the business, but try to de-risk it by figuring out if your finances are in order and also making sure you like this. Cause there’s nothing, it’s going to be annoying if even if you were decent at it, you hate it. If I’d hated working with credit and consumers, it would have been terrible that I left the law firm and did this for something I don’t like. Try to figure out if you actually enjoy this. That’s easier said than done, but I think it’s important. Yeah, I a hundred percent agree. And it’s so, so interesting because like,

22:12
I think a lot of entrepreneurs, lot of like, especially the younger people, feel you see all these flashes of wealth on social media. know, entrepreneurs have hit it big and made millions, you billions. And you, and they said, Oh, let me do that because you know, there’s a lot of money in it. The thing is there’s a lot of money in a lot of things. And I found that you got to do something that really, think, like you said, you’re excited about and that you can wake up every day to work on and push hard on.

22:39
I’ll tell you, in my experience, it sounds like you’ve tried so many different areas of law, and I tried personal injury, I tried other areas that are lucrative, but I realized I just didn’t like it. I didn’t feel good. I felt like a little bit slimy doing these kinds of things. As cliché as it sounds, you’ve got to be able to sleep well at night. You’ve got to be able to sleep well. And even if your bed is not a $10,000 bed,

23:01
you’ll still sleep fine on a $500 bed. it is better you sleep well on that than a $10,000 bed. I don’t care how expensive your bed is, if you’re still not sound here, if you’re still thinking about things here, you’re never gonna be able to have a restful night of sleep and have a peaceful life, which I think a lot of us want. So I think what you’re talking about is really make sure you understand what you want and what makes you happy and makes

23:31
It could just keep you waking up in the morning and driven, which is, think, so such an important message. Thank you. I agree with that completely. You think doing something you don’t like, mean, you might say people like, oh, I’ll do it for a little while. Well, you know what? There’s truth to that. You got to be pragmatic sometimes, but a little while becomes a long while. And then people end up unhappy. And I think one of the reasons why lawyers are stereotypically a profession with lore.

23:56
career satisfaction. Like I really asked myself, cause I think I really enjoy what I do not. Doesn’t mean I enjoy every moment of it or every aspect of it, but generally I do. But what I came to realize is a lot of lawyers, I think the profession attracts a lot of folks, maybe not on this call, but in life in general who have a higher degree of risk aversion. And as a result, people go into things that are considered safer. You know, I’ll go and read threads on Reddit from kids that are in law school and I’ll be like, Oh, I need to make sure I go here so I can get this job.

24:26
at this big law firm so that I can be guaranteed. I think that’s awesome if they got a job at that firm. But I think that them thinking that’s the only way to go about it and to take that approach is not necessarily the only way to live or to be. You talked about how it’s important to think about when you’re applying for jobs or you’re looking to create your career. It’s not just what you’re going to do, but it’s if I it correctly, it’s who you’re going to be.

24:53
and like how you’re going to live. there’s something deeper it seems like in terms of your decision making. There’s some sort of a life philosophy. you tell us a little bit about that? And the reason I also ask is because I think Bunkage brings a lot of that into our firm. the beginning of once a week, we have a team meeting and he starts off the team meeting with a morning meditation. And I think that’s because there’s an emphasis on

25:23
in his personal philosophy related to how are we being not just what are we doing? So in your view, do you have a perspective or point of view on kind of being versus doing? do. I love, I love that question, Sahil. So I think being a sort of getting into a state of flow of, know, where you, A, align with something, it feels like you’re calling and B, whether because of that, whether because

25:52
It is truly your calling or what are you because you believe it is. And so you take interest in it. That that’s another question, but I do think that’s the case, um, that there’s a certain sort of, hear people say it and then I think that they’re doing their good at a certain state of flow that they do or a certain place they’re meant to be. I profoundly believe that exists for most people in some capacity where that one thing or two things are out there for us. And so I think a lot of it is achieving that alignment.

26:21
And there’s many ways you could do it. I meditate as well. So I could confirm for that as being a source of inspiration or maybe even clarity, if not inspiration sometimes. But I think, yeah, I think that my, my sort of overarching philosophy is that you should find something you enjoy and that, you know, that leaves the world at least a little bit better off in some place. That whole thing that Steve Jobs said about make a dent in the universe. Really it’s about finding something that you’re good at and that you also enjoy and so that you can flow with it.

26:51
And then my daughter component I add to it is that it has a positive impact on the world. And if I can say that, then yeah, I think it’s something I want to be doing. Yeah, that makes sense. I think that’s something actually you saw and I think both think about too, you know, being going, I haven’t gone to IndieCore and spending time in India, you know, living in kind of poverty for, for a while. It’s, I think it’s something, it’s a struggle. think we all share on this call and I think many, many people do maybe, you many listeners is I love the quote is that I wake up each morning.

27:19
struggling with the choice of whether to enjoy the world or whether to change the world. And it makes it for like a very challenging morning. I forget who said it, but it’s that duality, that dichotomy that we live in that makes life challenging, but also exciting and interesting. And I think it has a lot of, it’s multifaceted in terms of that desire to change as well as enjoy the world. Because I think we ideally want to do both.

27:48
And do. And sometimes in that struggle and in that doing it, you’ll, you’ll figure out what makes sense. think that that’s a great quote. I do want to, I mean, we’re kind of, you know, at this point, we’re getting pretty lofty here and I want want to give some of the listeners, you know, some practical tactical information in terms of their credit, in terms of the kinds of things that you think people need to look out for.

28:17
In your experience, are the top reasons clients come to you and what would be a reason that someone should reach out to you? What are justified reasons for someone to be concerned about their credit? I think a lot of people feel like, okay, I’m just an individual. I’m fighting this giant multi-billion dollar company. I’m going to lose. But what changes the game when you get involved?

28:45
The first part of that Sahil, as far as what you should look at, is there something on your credit report that you believe is incorrect or where you’re being treated unfairly? If you’re looking at your credit report or your collections accounts, what have you, and you feel like there’s something unfair, okay, incorrect or unfair, or it just doesn’t seem right to you, I think it’s worth reaching out to us because we can do an analysis and see from a legal standpoint, whether that’s the case or not. And even if it’s not something illegal,

29:13
try to give you some actionable advice you can move forward with. one important question that I think Sahil raised is taking on these billion dollar entities and how do you deal with it? Here’s the thing, the law is very clear. It says if they do not correct the issue and it’s incorrect and they don’t correct it, we have grounds to sue them. Because myself and even more than me, some of the attorneys that I partner with and work with have been doing this for quite a while.

29:41
We know what the legal process is. These cases go to federal court. They can’t endlessly delay things. We have a right to discovery. Keep in mind that the longer they drag a case, they do have to pay attorney’s fees, which can end up being quite hefty for these guys. So I think all those things combined with the reputation of the firm that they’re going up against makes them likely to resolve it. Now there are situations where these go to jury trials. It’s very rare. And we would only let a client go that far if we were A, very confident in the case, B,

30:11
More than all of that, the client wanted and see, we thought we could recover a substantially larger amount at a jury trial for the client versus there. But I’d say that it is possible to take these guys on. They face a ton of legal risk if they actually end up in court in front of a jury. given all of that, if you know what buttons to push, you can get a lot of results. So yeah, I wanted to shift then a little bit in our conversation to real estate. You mentioned you were a broker in New York and now

30:39
Um, I, know that you are developing real estate here in LA, um, perhaps other places. Tell us a little bit about how you got into that. Uh, how, did you get your foot into real estate? I know it’s not always easy if you don’t have a lot of capital. So what did you do to get in, uh, maybe without, you know, tons of capital and what are you doing now to build, to work in the real estate world today? Sure. Great question. I, I, I’m very passionate about real estate because I saw firsthand it’s the number one source of self of

31:08
number one source of self-made millionaires in America is from real estate. I read that stat many years ago and it always was in the back of my head. So when I came back to LA, I wanted to get involved. I wanted to get involved even when I was in York, working in real estate in some capacity. I have the proverbial mentor. In my case, it was a good friend of the family of my parents who, you know, was an entrepreneur himself. He had a bunch of computer stores and used that to buy

31:38
buy houses and apartment buildings in the San Fernando Valley. In that time period, I met my now business partner, Sanjeev Bhatia. Sanjeev had come to the US from India and built his portfolio, all working full-time in a job. Sanjeev was more involved in multifamily. He started out in LA doing that. And so we would share ideas and eventually we started partnering with other investors as limited partners. That was about four years ago after owning rentals on our own and buying apartment buildings.

32:06
in LA, both the city of LA and elsewhere within LA County. We manage in-house, so we have a team that manages under our supervision, buy properties that are value-add, meaning that the rental income could be higher and work on getting that up over time. And we’re building ADUs in some of our properties. And we recently launched a fund so that we can acquire, partner with investors to deliver some great returns and acquire more properties. So we’re very passionate about real estate. I think for all the flak it gets,

32:34
I think LA and Southern California are one of the best markets to invest in. was just at a conference in New York City with a lot of big people from the real estate fund and private equity world. And as much as people admitted that these big cities have operational challenges, they offer a ton of opportunity. So yeah, it all started with my journey in leasing. And I’ll always remember this. I’ll share this one story. There’s a very well-known real estate family in New York City.

33:02
the Manicharian family, M-A-C-N-O-C-H-E-R-I-A-N. And the grandfather came to the country many years ago, originally from Iran, and they built up this business back in like 1950s. One time, guys, I was leasing an apartment, and I remember going in and we had to pick up keys from a brokerage to go show an apartment. And there was a wall, okay? Now at the top of it said Manicharian keys for all these lockup apartments. And

33:31
It went from the top of the wall down about another five feet and it had just addresses of apartment buildings around Manhattan and Brooklyn, mostly Manhattan that these people own. And I always remember that visual of standing there because I’m like, you know what? At some point, the guy who built this fortune was someone who didn’t have anything and started out and built it up and he did it. So I always go back to that story. That’s when I really realized the amount of wealth people could build.

33:57
over the long run. It’s really a get rich slowly game, but it is possible to build a legacy and do a lot of call stuff. But that story always stands out to me. And, you know, and I think it is possible. I’ve seen it firsthand. Amazing. Amazing. That’s great. So how do you want to maybe do like the rapid fire round? We can get a couple of questions for you. What’s one book, film or TV show that shaped how you think about money or the law?

34:27
that shaped how I think about money or the law. So there’s a book I often recommend to people. It’s a very quirky recommendation. And I won’t say that it’s quite about money, but it is about entrepreneurship. It’s called, Choose Yourself by James Altucher is the author. Okay. But what that book did, I read it back about 11 or 12 years ago when it came out was James had this mindset that it was possible to sort of, he would say,

34:55
create art, create business, create these things, and to bring your talent and your vision and sell it to the world. And so that book of choose yourself and come up with ideas and use your creativity and your resourcefulness to generate it, I think how that shaped my thinking on money was, if you can scratch that, sort of pull that lever of creativity and of just being scrappy and being resourceful as a way to make money.

35:23
Okay, perfect. think we should include that book in the show notes. We’ll definitely, we’ll definitely include in the show notes. Yeah. The next question is in LA, what is the hidden gem in terms of a neighborhood as a real estate market right now?

35:41
Give us the secret. If was anyone else, I’d plead the fifth. I’ll give you guys a real answer. I think, okay, here’s what I would say. It depends on what you’re trying to do. I think where I think we’ll do well over the next… So I’ll give you two. I’ll give an answer for the city of LA and then the county of LA. In the city of LA, where I think we’ll do well over the next probably…

36:11
15 years, 10 to 15 years is palms and areas bordering mid city. So we’re talking at the south end from probably Venice Boulevard, the north going up to a little bit north of that. And then it may go more north as you stretch. that’s north, south, and then east, west. West side of it would be about the 405 freeway. East would probably be about maybe La Brea, maybe even Crenshaw for being generous.

36:40
But there’s a lot of pockets and corridors in there that I think over the next 15 years, even if you bought a single family house and rented it, certainly if you bought an apartment building, I think it’s both possible to get into the market because a lot of stuff is turning, but also likely that you’ll do well over the long run. That’s an area that if you’re willing to deal with all the LA rules and rent control, I think you’ll do very well. County of LA, I’d say I’m extremely bullish on the South Bay. I think areas like Torrance, Hawthorne, Lomita, that whole corridor, Gardena.

37:09
are gonna continue to be very desirable places. You’ll notice I left Manhattan and Redondo Beach off, not because I don’t think they’ll do well, but because they’re expensive. I think Torrance, where I grew up, I’m a little biased, but I think they’re hot thorn in all those areas. Well, here’s letters of intent. We’re giving you gold right now. We are literally giving you the secrets here. okay, here’s one more question.

37:38
in the law. Do you love it or hate it? AI in the law, overall, I love it. I think that accessibility to legal services is important. I think that better delivery of it’s important. I think AI is going to change so many aspects of the law. Lawyers have traditionally been more resistant to change, but I think everything from writing agreements and contracts to how court cases are litigated.

38:08
discovery, valuing cases. I think AI has some real opportunities and threats overall, but in the law, I love it. And I’ll say this, more than AI in the law, far as like, oh, like directly disrupting lawyers. I think lawyers will be able to better serve clients with chat bots and all these intelligent tools that can keep people updated and give them information and so forth. When without us having to, you know, have the same.

38:35
amount of time committed by the attorney that the client ultimately pays for, you still can give a lot of value. So I am excited about AI and the law. I’m excited about AI in general. I think the next 10 years is going to be absolutely fantastic how technology is going to impact so many things in law and business. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, this has been great. know, Shiva is always a wonderful to talk to you. Every time I chat with you, I learn something.

38:59
And I appreciate you being a friend and all the advice and insight you’ve shared over the years and us working together and hopefully continue to work together on many things. I need to pick your brain a little bit more about real estate in the South Bay as well too. So it’s a fantastic opportunity to learn and grow. So I really appreciate your friendship and being here as well with us.

39:22
Ladies and gentlemen, is it for Letters of Intent. We will have many more episodes coming. We hope you found this very helpful. If it was, please like, share, follow. Your likes and follows and subscriptions really help us in growing this channel out. And we have many more exciting topics ahead, so we can’t wait to chat again. And for now, that’s Letters of Intent. Thank you.