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Show Summary
In this conversation, Sebastian shares his journey in the mortgage lending business, emphasizing the importance of leveraging other people’s money (OPM) for real estate investments. He discusses strategies for building business credit, the significance of mentorship, and the value of networking and collaboration in achieving business success. Sebastian also highlights the need for a solid business plan to avoid debt and the importance of helping others in the entrepreneurial community.
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Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Sebastian (00:00)
So for real estate investors out there, you know, a of them use their cash, right? And it’s much better to use OPM, other people’s money to be able to invest into these properties. So if you can get access to.you know, 50 to $100,000 and 0 % interest for typically 12 months. If you’re say, let’s say a fix and flipper, can flick fix and flip, let’s say four homes in a year, you’re using 50 to 100 K of the bank’s money to be able to make those four flips without using any of your own cash. So it’s a huge tool. And one of the best, ⁓ two, one of the best things about business credit is that the business credit cards don’t reflect on the personal report. So you can have the maxed out and they don’t report on the
on the personal report. So it’s a huge ⁓ tool that you can use for investing.
Michelle Kesil (02:16)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Investor Fuel podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Kesil. And today I’m joined by someone that I’m looking forward to chatting with, Sebastian Cordoba, who’s been making serious moves as a business consultant optimizing people’s credit, as well as a licensed mortgage loan officer. So excited to have you here today, Sebastian.Sebastian (02:39)
Thank you for having me and letting me have this opportunity with you.Michelle Kesil (02:44)
Yeah, of course. I think our listeners are going to take something away from how you’re helping business owners optimize their credit and how to support investors on investing using different ways of financing that. So let’s dive in. First off, for those that are not familiar with you and your world, can you give the short version of what your main focus is?Sebastian (03:08)
Definitely, so pretty much, I I sell people money, right? So I’m a business consultant. I help business owners optimize their credit to be able to get access to other people’s money, OPM, to be able to start growth scale their business, right? So I pretty much help the average business owner get access to ⁓ influx of capital to be able to.deploy in real estate to be able to deploy into the business to start and grow a scale and the mortgage mortgage side, you know, I helped the average the average Joe be able to accomplish a dream, which is purchase a property or invest into into the first to the first property.
Michelle Kesil (03:47)
Awesome. And what markets are you operating in?Sebastian (03:50)
So I’m currently nationwide, so I can operate in all 50 states.Michelle Kesil (03:55)
Awesome. How did you get started with this business?Sebastian (03:59)
So I started off in 2019, right off of college, I went straight into mortgage lending. And during that time was actually probably one of the booms when it came to mortgage lending, because rates went down to around two and a half, 2%. And I was cleaning it when it came to mortgages. But obviously, ever since I’ve been transitioning more towards becoming more of my…having my own practice and being my own business ⁓ entrepreneur. So, you know, I started getting into the consulting side of things where, you know, when I first got into funding and acquiring funds myself to be able to, you know, invest into real estate and properties, I was able to obtain myself over a half a million dollars in business credit cards to be able to start getting into real estate. So when I realized that…
I learned something that I can teach others and that was a big opportunity for others. I made the decision to start teaching others and start helping other people get access to funds to be able to start or scale their own business.
Michelle Kesil (04:59)
Awesome. So, yeah, what are some ways that people can get that access to those funds?Sebastian (05:54)
So the most important thing, ⁓ well, I have the three S’s, right? It’s called set up, structure, and secure the funds, right? So when it comes to set up, we wanna make sure that your business is set up the correct way, which is one of the foundations. When it comes to structure, we wanna structure your credit to be able to get the funds. And then obviously the third one is the fun part where you secure the funds. But just to go a little bit deeper.When it comes to the credit report, you want to structure yourself to be very presentable in front of the banks, right? So you want to make sure that you have less than 10 % utilization. You want to make sure that you have no derogatory, no late payments, no collections, no bad remarks in your credit report. In regards to increase, you want to have no increase in the past six months. And you want to have a mixture of accounts sometimes have some high limit cards.
But if you have all of that, you know, and you have your business trucks that career way, you should be able to obtain financing through the business side, which we primarily focus on is business credit cards at 0 % interest.
So for real estate investors out there, you know, a of them use their cash, right? And it’s much better to use OPM, other people’s money to be able to invest into these properties. So if you can get access to.
you know, 50 to $100,000 and 0 % interest for typically 12 months. If you’re say, let’s say a fix and flipper, can flick fix and flip, let’s say four homes in a year, you’re using 50 to 100 K of the bank’s money to be able to make those four flips without using any of your own cash. So it’s a huge tool. And one of the best, ⁓ two, one of the best things about business credit is that the business credit cards don’t reflect on the personal report. So you can have the maxed out and they don’t report on the
on the personal report. So it’s a huge ⁓ tool that you can use for
Michelle Kesil (07:42)
Awesome, that’s such good advice. How can people access other people’s money? there like an easy or like, yeah, how do you recommend that to your clients?Sebastian (07:52)
I mean, like I said, it really comes down to the foundation. The foundation is your credit and your business structure. If you have both of those in place, you should be able to start building relationship with some banks. So I always recommend that you build relationships with what we call different tiers of banks. You have the big banks like the Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America. You have tier two banks, which are more regional banks like PNC, KeyBank.truest, right? And then we have three, the third tier, which is credit unions. If you have a mixture of all three and you start building relationships, start moving money through there, the banks are always willing to give out, you know, money to you, right? So if you start, you know, with your credit, your business funding, your business structure, and be able to start building a relationship with these banks, it could be a huge tool for you to start, you know, getting, let’s say 25K from
Big Bank, 25K from a Regions Bank and 25K from a credit union. Now you just got 75K at 0 % interest. And if you then learn how to liquidate those cards if you need cash, because it’s very possible to liquidate those cards and still use a 0 % interest, get the cash and deploy it into like a down payment for a Harmony loan or into a mortgage or a DSCR loan.
you have many opportunities to be able to use the bank’s money to get some cash flow from these properties.
Michelle Kesil (09:13)
Awesome, that’s such helpful advice. So what have been some of keys to keeping your business running smoothly?Sebastian (09:17)
Thank you.The keys of keeping my business running smoothly is definitely the fact that I do good business. Obviously, the money is good. Making money from helping others is good, but I get more satisfactory from being able to actually help people and educate them throughout the process. Just by having good customer service and being able to actually help my clients go from point A to point Z.
not only helps them get access to funding, but it also helps me to get access to more referrals. So I take care of people, they take care of me. So if I’m able to not only take care of the client, they’re always going to respect me and they’re always going to trust me because I help them. So they’re going to be able to refer me to other entrepreneurs and business owners. And I always give the opportunity
to my clients to not only work with me but also make money alongside with me, right? So I make somewhat of an affiliate, an affiliate and a partnership with all my clients because obviously all business owners know other business owners, right? So if I can help you get funding but also help your circle, your family, your friends, it goes a long way because now I’m helping a huge community of people and they’re always going to want to.
keep referring people but also start building some generational wealth between their inner circles and communities.
Michelle Kesil (11:19)
Amazing, that’s so beautiful. I love that you’re helping so many people.Sebastian (11:23)
I love it too. That’s my goal is to be able to help my goal for next, I’ll say for next year is to be able to help a thousand plus business owners.Michelle Kesil (11:32)
Awesome, love that. How are you supporting real estate investors?Sebastian (11:36)
So with real estate investing, I help a lot more people, you know, I educate people more on the fact that they can use an OPM of the people’s money, but also a lot of real estate investors are, you know, very old school when it comes to deploying money into their properties, they’re using a lot of cash. So if I can educate them on how they can use zero percent interest funding to be able to…you know, start getting into these properties and flipping them or using them at short-term rentals. Let’s say in Airbnb, you know, a lot of Airbnb investors, they love to use the 0 % interest because they get to furnish their properties and start getting paid before they have to actually pay for that, for those furnishings with their own money, So a lot of Airbnb investors, like to…
have money not only for the three months up front, but also have money for the furnishing. And they technically just got into Airbnb property that’s possibly netting them a couple thousand without using any of their funds. So it’s a huge tool that real estate investors, they can make money without using their own money at all.
Michelle Kesil (12:44)
Amazing, that’s so exciting. Love that. So, what are you most focused on solving or scaling next in your business?Sebastian (12:53)
My goal now is ⁓to be able to have ⁓ a very streamlined process to where not only do I help you with your foundations, with your credit and your business formation, but it is also to get you the funds, but then it’s like, what’s next? If you need help with getting into a real estate property or getting into Airbnb business or getting into maybe a cash flow in business, whatever it is.
I want to be able to help you throughout everything so that it’s like a one-stop shop. Not only do you help do your own personal financing, your business formation, get the access to the capital, but also if you need that extra step, because I know a lot of people in real estate, real estate, it’s a great tool to make money, but if you don’t learn or if you don’t actually do it yourself or have the right mentor,
you could be getting yourself into a huge amount of debt. So I want to make sure that people are able to have confident people that they can work with and strong mentors to where they can be able to go from point A to point Z with the seamless process and not have to worry about them getting scammed or them getting into debt because they’re losing, they’re doing everything on their own. It’s always much better to…
work with a ⁓ blueprint that already works.
Michelle Kesil (14:57)
Yeah, absolutely. Are you finding that a lot of people are getting into those situations where they’re maybe getting into that debt or not sure what to do next and are having to build their way back up?Sebastian (15:11)
Definitely, mean, that’s one of the things about me is that I want to make sure that if I am getting you, you know, let’s say 100k in funding, that you do have a business plan or plan for it because, you know, having a lot of money, influx of money that you might have never seen could be a negative thing for you. So I want to make sure that if I am getting you the funding that you are, you do have a plan for it. If you don’t, then how do we get you?How do we get you that plan? How do we get you the mentor to be able to help you throughout the process so you don’t get into those predicaments? But yeah, I do see it a lot. I do see people get in debt because they trusted the wrong person or because they try to do everything themselves instead of learning the process and stuff like that. So it’s definitely seen that, especially now with how debt is at an all-time high.
you know, a of people just rather, you know, either do everything on their own or just, you know, risk it all.
Michelle Kesil (16:08)
Yeah, absolutely. I think maybe some people think that they have the capacity to do it on their own, even though someone else can really help them and give them more support.Sebastian (16:19)
Yeah, I’m very big on mentors and mentorship because you’re able to obviously pay somebody for their knowledge and their time, but it’s very important for the fact that you can skip the line, right? You don’t have to go through the obstacles and failures yourself. You can already work with somebody who already been through the obstacles and failures who won’t let you get into those problems and stuff like that. So a mentor is a very big.thing in my life. I’ve spent many, you know, couple, I would say more than six figures in mentorships and they’ve taken, they’ve taken me a long way for the fact that, you know, they helped me skip that line and teach me what I would have, what it would have took me five years. They teach me in let’s say one month, you know, it’s a, it’s a huge time, huge timeframe that you save yourself.
Michelle Kesil (17:02)
Yeah.Absolutely, I 100 % agree. So what’s maybe an obstacle that you struggled with when you were working on your business that you have overcome and now you have lessons to share with others?
Sebastian (17:20)
⁓ That’s a very deep question. ⁓ I would say definitely one of things I’ve learned is to work smarter not harder. Sometimes we want to do everything ourselves. Sometimes we want to learn everything ourselves. And it’s very important to delegate when it comes to business and investing and stuff like that. You want to make sure you delegate to the right person or have a team behind you to be able to.Michelle Kesil (17:23)
youSebastian (17:46)
take care of certain tasks because you would want to be the person that does it all and knows it all, but it’s very important to delegate and save your precious time. Not only that, but also one of the big things I’ve learned and have learned the hard way is not every client or not every deal is the deal for you, right? Sometimes you get, you fall in love with a specific deal or a client and you don’t want to move.past it because of the money, but sometimes not every client or every deal is ideal for you, right? Either some clients might bring you headaches or waste your time, or the deals are maybe the deal looks good, but it’s not happening because it’s just not made for you, right? And we’ve always been in those positions where we think it’s a home run deal, but if you keep getting denied for something or maybe the deal isn’t falling through.
You too much in love with specific deals and sometimes you just have to move forward and know that that just wasn’t your deal and you saved yourself so much time.
Michelle Kesil (18:45)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, that’s some good wisdom. It really separates you showing that you’re here for the long-term vision and not just like that quick transaction.Sebastian (18:55)
Exactly.Michelle Kesil (18:56)
Yeah, awesome. So what are some things that have supported you in growing your business and creating your network?Sebastian (19:03)
Definitely the fact that I’m a I would say I’m a great networker I love networking with people not only that but I love collaborating with people I’m all about collaboration or competition all day every day, right? I think there’s so much opportunity for everybody To make some money and to make some money together, right? There’s no need to compete with anybody especially in the same industry, you know ifIf you know something that somebody doesn’t know, why would you hold it back when you can be able to teach them and basically pay it forward to where generations from here and on there will always be able to benefit from it, right? And just networking in general, I I get myself in the right rooms. I always like to get myself in the rooms where I’m not the smartest person. I have a lot to learn.
So I like to get myself in rooms where I feel uncomfortable and where I can learn so that I can not only learn every day, but also be around like-minded individuals and individuals who I look up to and want to one day be able to get at their level.
Michelle Kesil (20:04)
Yeah, I love that. That’s so important. Thank you for sharing relationships for everything in this space.Sebastian (20:09)
Relationships are everything and and that’s another thing. You know, I’ve learned I’ve learned the hard way as well as in real estate I would say, you know in real estate not you can’t you can’t Nobody has loyalty in in in real estate a lot of people, know look for themselves or just look for their own views but ⁓ you know, that’s why I’m very big on collaboration becauseThere’s no need to be selfish when there’s just enough money for everybody.
Michelle Kesil (20:35)
Absolutely. So, before we wrap up here, someone wants to reach out, connect, learn more from you, where can people find you and reach you?Sebastian (20:43)
So definitely the best place to reach me will be on Instagram. So my Instagram is sebaloans. It’s spelled S-E-B-A-L-O-A-N-S. S-E-B-A-L-O-A-N-S. That’s where I have not only my content, but you can book a call with me and see how I can possibly help you. I don’t charge for consultations or seeing how I can.help you get in a better position. All about helping people, to me is helping over money any day, but obviously I also don’t want my time wasted. So if I can help you optimize your credit or help you get access to funding or help you get into your dream property or your dream business, I’m more than open to helping anybody I can.
Michelle Kesil (21:28)
Well, I appreciate your time, your story, your perspective. Thank you for being here.Sebastian (21:32)
Thank you so much for having me. Appreciate you.Michelle Kesil (21:34)
And for the listeners tuning in, if you got value from this, make sure that you’ve subscribed. We’ve got more conversations with operators just like Sebastian who are building real businesses. See you on our next episode.
