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From $17 and Welfare to Millions in Real Estate Investing | Todd Pigott’s Story

By January 30, 2026Real Estate Pros Show


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Show Summary

In this engaging conversation, Todd Pigott shares his remarkable journey from being broke and on welfare to becoming a successful entrepreneur in the real estate industry. He discusses his extensive experience as a licensed lender, broker, and contractor, emphasizing the importance of hard work, transparency, and ethical practices in business. Todd highlights the challenges of the real estate market, warning against the allure of quick riches often promoted by so-called gurus. He stresses the significance of surrounding oneself with good people and maintaining a strong moral compass while pursuing success.

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    Investor Fuel Show Transcript:

    Todd Pigott (00:00)
    There is nothing more depressing than being absolutely broke. My mother had no money. Our excitement was going once a month when she got paid to me and Ed’s pizza and getting a sausage and green pepper pizza and we were allowed two pieces. All of that is how we lived. It was very much paycheck to paycheck.

    What I learned throughout this process is there’s some key defining moments because I’ve seen it all everybody. I’ve seen welfare broke pot pies, no car, no gas and no utilities.

    Q Edmonds (02:13)
    Hello everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host Q Edmonds. I’m excited to be here today. I’m excited about my guest. This gentleman has 20 years of experience. Expert. Expert at what they do. And you’re going to see it. Once he starts talking, once he gets going, you’re absolutely going to see why I this gentleman is an expert at what he do. And so.

    I’m super excited to have him here. I want to introduce you all to Mr. Pigott Mr. Todd, how you doing today,

    Todd Pigott (02:48)
    Man, I’m having an excell doing good. My dog is doi it’s actually starting w outside. So you wake up ev get some exercise in,

    Q Edmonds (03:06)
    Well, I was with you with everything until you said skip lunch. I believe in my lunch break, but get up, get the fruit, get some exercise. I was with you. But when you said skip lunch, I was like, this guy don’t know what he talking about. Nah, I’m just joking. I’m just messing. But listen, I’m so glad you’re here. I want to dive right in. I would love for you to tell the people what your main focus is these days. Mr. Todd, if you want to give us a little bit of an origin story of kind of how you got started in real estate, we would love to know that.

    And then also tell them what part of the world you’re in, Mr. Todd. So sir, you have the floor.

    Todd Pigott (03:39)
    Man, the origin of my story is somewhat fascinating. I was born, and I’ll keep this as short as possible. First of all, to all your listeners out there, all your listeners, hey guys, thanks for joining me today and giving me an opportunity to be on your platform and share my journey with you. I have fixed and flipped 500 properties. I have lent $1 billion to real estate investors, and we have wholesale.

    hundreds of properties. We 30 employees. We’re located right here in central California. We loan money to investors all over California and central California. And we also do fix and flips in those regions as well as wholesale those regions. But how I got started, that’s a fascinating story. I was really broke, literally on welfare. The church brought us Christmas presents, brought me a jump rope. That was my Christmas one year. We didn’t have any money for utilities.

    We lived on a lot of pot pies and TV dinners. And I worked at a sporting goods store where I had to wear a tie, big five, and it was wonderful. But one day they said, you you need to get more dress shirts and more ties. And I didn’t do that. I was making $2.61 an hour after taxes. I had $17 to my name and I quit. And I went out and sat in my 1972 Ford pickup truck with $17 on my name, pot pies at home. I was on welfare.

    I called Fresno State University and I withdrew. And I withdrew because I could not pay the tuition at that time. Three weeks later, the counselor at Fresno State called me and said, what do want to do? And I said, I want to go into construction and finance. So listen, man, I found you a scholarship. You have a three point eight five and you’re on water polo. We got you a scholarship. And I know that you are broke. Your first year tuition and books have been covered.

    and a little bit of spending money, 800 bucks. I immediately re-enrolled in Fresno State into the construction and finance program, bachelor’s of science, and I played water polo for Fresno State. Water polo ended at different times, five, six, and seven o’clock p.m. And so I needed a job because I only had $17 and I was eating solid-sperry steak with my mom every night, broke. And so what I did is after water polo, five, six, or seven, I borrowed my mom’s vacuum and I went ⁓ building to building and knocked on

    doors and I got a client pay me $65 a month to cl with my mom’s vacuum. And love construction and then enterprises and by the th I had $810 in my pocket w Fresno State in the constr an emphasis on finance. and over 17 years, I built employees throughout three

    Facilities maintenance, pressure washing, graffiti removal, interior service. I did all the targets. I did all the Mervins. I did lot of all the PetSmart. I did Smart and Finals. And then I finished my degree in construction and finance. I still had the facilities maintenance business and I really didn’t like it. I worked 10 years every single day. I worked Christmas. I worked Thanksgiving. But I knew I didn’t like that business. in early 1996, I started flipping some multifamilies.

    while still running my facilities maintenance business. And then soon after that, I got into industrial and then I got into commercial. And then in 05, 04, I started doing residential. So from 96 to 04, I did a lot of commercial, industrial, steel buildings and things like that. And then I went into residential and I bought a burned out property and I started there. That was my very first project. And so then I started to get into lending. My degree was in construction, emphasis in finance.

    And I started to do our lending on our first loan to other real estate investors that wanted to buy properties, fix them in rehab. And so at that point, our business became a multimillion dollar business from $17 sitting in a Ford 1972 pickup truck in the late 80s, early 90s to soon building a multimillion dollar company that was fixing and flipping properties and also starting to lend. I formed Zinc

    in 2005, 2006. And from that, we became a licensed lender. We hold the same licensing as major banks. We became a licensed contractor and a licensed broker. And since that time, our company has about 80 million assets under management. And we do lending to real estate investors. We do fix and flips on our own. And we also wholesale properties to other investors with built-in financing. All of this started with a dream and $17 in my pocket.

    sitting in a parking lot for five hours wondering how in the hell I was gonna make a living with no money, no education, nothing except a pickup truck and a vacuum. And that’s how it all started.

    Q Edmonds (09:32)
    Whoo. So sir, Mr. Todd, thank you. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for your story. Thank you for what I call the gift of your vulnerability. So listen, I have a saying where I say destiny has no wasted moments and you are the right definition of destiny has no wasted moments. There is nothing in your life. It seems like that has been wasted. It seemed like everything that you have went through has taught you something about you and made you who you are today.

    So I guess my question is, what did those moments teach you about yourself? If you had to put it into the language, how would you put it into language? What did it teach you about you?

    Todd Pigott (10:46)
    There is nothing more depressing than being absolutely broke. My mother had no money. Our excitement was going once a month when she got paid to me and Ed’s pizza and getting a sausage and green pepper pizza and we were allowed two pieces. All of that is how we lived. It was very much paycheck to paycheck.

    My mother passed away and I still have the last $5 bill and 11 cents she had in her purse when she passed away. What I learned throughout this process is there’s some key defining moments because I’ve seen it all everybody. I’ve seen it all. I’ve seen welfare broke pot pies, no car, no gas and no utilities.

    God plays an important part of my life. God plays an important part of my life. Family and friends.

    play an important part of life. And I also learned this. And I’m not trying to be a passe lecture, but I’m just gonna tell you, smoking, drugs, alcohol, and getting in with the wrong people will absolutely wreck you. I went through those phases just like everybody else has. And I’m gonna tell you, man, I tell my kids and I tell my family.

    And I put out a podcast about a week or two ago in front of a no smoking area sign man. Get up every day. Get up every day. Set that alarm for six o’clock. You get up and you shave and you take a shower and you eat some fruit or cottage cheese. Do some exercise and get on the stage by seven o’clock. Get on the stage and work hard. Do not lie.

    Do not cheat and do not misrepresent. Operate with complete transparency, do the right thing and stay away from drugs and alcohol and bad people. Because bad people are narcissistic, they bring toxicity and honestly, I don’t wanna hear about it, okay? I’m gonna go work hard, I’m gonna get to the gym and I’m gonna make something out of myself. And so the pillars for me were exercise, God, family.

    trying to eat right and take care of yourself and just go at it every single day. And as hard as it is, do the right thing. I know it’s tempting at times, but do the right thing. It’s just such a better life knowing that I call it my fishbowl theory. My fishbowl, what’s your fishbowl theory? My fishbowl theory is this, all the fish get to see all sides of the other fish. And if everybody sees everything in the fishbowl theory, then you’re transparent with everybody. We have $80 million here.

    I have lot of investors. I’m transparent with them and honest with them. And I’m also an honest with our borrowers. And I’m also interested with our co-investors on real estate transactions. So we just do the right thing. It’s a lot easier to go home. I have a wife, I have kids, and we go to church on Thursday night. So if we’re gonna say those things, then that means the next time I walk into an Applebee’s and somebody looks at me, they need to know I walk the talk. And so I think for the biggest pillars I could imagine for your team, it’s not all,

    Listen, man, it’s not all in a CD or a book on how to go flip and grow rich. I have made millions and millions. You know what’s important? Who you are. How do you talk to people? How do you treat that host? Listen, man, I was broke and cleaning toilets 25 years ago for freaking $2 an hour. Always treat the janitor with respect. Always treat the busboy at Denny’s cool. know, thank them.

    and make sure that you some exercise that day. You don’t have to be a bodybuilder. Just take care of your body and your brain and take care of the people around you and watch who you’re hanging out with. And the second you start to see maybe that toxic friend or that negative friend, that’s going to freaking drain you. Get out and go find somebody else. And so those are the pillars that kind of shaped me. And that’s how I run my company today with 30 employees here. Listen, man, we have 10 core values on our break room wall. Transparency, ethics,

    fairness, compassion, all of those things, teamwork. And if you don’t subscribe to those core values and take care of yourself, we understand that. And I respect that, but this probably isn’t a place for you. So our core values are very important and we live by those and everybody that joins my team, all 30 employees here also have to live by them. And if they don’t wanna live by them, that’s okay.

    We’re not in China and we’re not in Russia. You can go do something else and you can go pick what you want to do and go do that. But it’s not going to happen here. So those are some of the pillars that I think have really shaped me and gotten us where we are today.

    Q Edmonds (16:25)
    powerful messages, Mr. Todd, powerful. Thank you so much for saying so much of what you said lines up with me as well. And so I appreciate you saying that. I want to ask you this. What is the next real goal for you? Are you looking to solve a scale something next? What’s next for you, Mr. Todd?

    Todd Pigott (16:44)
    obligation internally for me is to scale. ⁓ We are running some TV commercials where we’re investing in technology and AI and we’re investing heavily in workflows in order to do 20 to 30 ⁓ off-market transactions with built-in financing. And we also want a neighborhood of 50 to 70 financing transactions and we want to do ourself three flips a month. How do we do that?

    We do that through a ramp up series, a ramp up within my own internal organization. And that’s what we plan to do. So we’ll be doing a flip every seven days. We’ll be doing an off market property to another investor with built-in financing every 48 hours. And every four and a half hours, we’ll be doing a loan to a real estate investor. our next path is to scale this. I do like work. I do like this business.

    I do not want to own a car lot. I don’t want to own an ice cream store and I don’t want to own a funeral home or a fricking bar. I like what I do. I don’t like golf. you know, I’m really driven every day to come in here and add value for our investors as well as our borrowers. So what do I want to do? I want to wake up. I want to the alarm. I want to go. I don’t want to sit there and watch TV on the couch with my dog. I love my dog, but I’m not going to sit there all day and watch it. So I want to come in. I want to make something myself and add value to others. And so, ⁓ you know, that’s what we plan to do is scale those

    those those three division add something else. It’s man. It’s about taking my This is going to shock yo largest house and the central California in 2 the Lamborghini and I had 46 foot diesel pusher. I sold it all. I got the t shirt at the carnival.

    What what what you know, So today I sold all that stuff goal of getting a Lamborghini there’s nothing wrong with that. beneath that. Be a team playe to the Super Bowl. So my ob not a car or not a larger a 46 ft. Diesel pushers. and done that and there’s n But that doesn’t drive me today

    And I want to get to three deals a month in our zinc realty department, zinc realty department, three deals, flip every seven days. I want to do a wholesale transaction with built-in financing every 48 hours. And finally, about every four to six hours, we’ll be doing a loan to our real estate investors and helping those people create wealth and freedom one property at a time. So that is my next stop.

    Q Edmonds (19:27)
    I love it. Well, listen, you just ended saying you want to help people. And so I want to get your perspective when it comes to relationships, relationships in business. Is it important building relationships? Has it served you well? Like, what is your perspective when it comes to building relationships?

    Todd Pigott (19:46)
    That’s another great question. So I’m just going to say it. We’re actually really strict here. We’re a licensed lender. We have access to the same database as the police and the courts. You cannot get access to that database unless you have a permissible purpose under federal guidelines. And we also have access to all three credit bureaus. And I’m going to be up front with you. You talk about relationships. You bet.

    I think relationships are very, very, very important. Find yourself a lender or a co-partner or a mentor like we can be and align yourself with them. Okay? However, back to my point, we have access to the backend of criminal and federal and state and local records on any single person. And we also have the three credit bureaus. On anybody that does business with our company, we run those things. Why?

    We do not work with subprime people or people that are bad. We just don’t. Now, if you had a DUI, we can absolutely get past that. We can absolutely get past that. I think everybody listening out there probably says, well, I probably should have had a DUI at some point. Yeah, unless you’re under a rock, you probably made a mistake. And mistakes are fine. What we look for is intent. When you’re intently domestic violence, intently

    having a felony and tent for stealing or your credi don’t pay anybody. We do not is not a relationship that important. They’re very i here to work with people journey to create wealth honestly, we will check y have intent in your histr or not paying people or n

    We won’t even do a loan with you, even if it’s at 50 % loan to value, we won’t do it because you know what? Those are the people that call in, drop F bombs and are just not good people. So relationships are very important. I told you earlier, pick who you hang out with. And what we do is we run those checks on people and we hang out with good people. We hang out with good people that aren’t lying, cheating and not paying their bills and they’re not domestic violence and they’re not criminal theft. Again, DUI?

    I’m not saying a DUI is permissible. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m just saying if you made a mistake somewhere, we all have, that is, and you have come full circle, we’re fine with that. But relationships are very, important to us. We’re strict on good people.

    Q Edmonds (22:29)
    Yeah, I love it Mr. Todd. Listen sir, I thank you so much. If someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, collaborate with you, learn more about what you’re doing, how can they get in contact with you sir?

    Todd Pigott (22:41)
    Great question. We have a mortgage fund for investors out there that want to invest alongside of us. We have a fix and flip division. If you want to join our team or if you want to buy a property with built-in financing from our marketplace or you just need money for your next fix and flip. You know, we offer high leverage here in California and super high leverage within what we call the zinc community, which are 11 counties around our office, 10 million people here across central California. If you want to learn more or I can help you, I can help you in your journey. And if you’re a good person.

    I can help you in your j reach out our phone number ⁓

    Zincfinancial.com and if I can help you, if I can give you some advice or whatever you want to do, I’m here to help you my friend.

    Q Edmonds (23:45)
    Mr. Todd, thank you so much, sir. Listen, I want to thank you for your story. Definitely want to thank you for your time because you know your time is very, very precious. So thank you for your time and thank you for your perspective. Thank you for your mindset and bringing that to this platform. I really appreciate you,

    Todd Pigott (24:01)
    an amazing

    Q Edmonds (24:09)
    Absolutely, I appreciate you. No doubt that you did. So listen, you cannot tell me you did not get value from this conversation So definitely check out mr Todd But definitely make sure you subscribe here because I keep telling you we’re going to bring up keep bringing up amazing people Just like mr. Todd. So thank you again, sir and everyone else. You have a great day

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