I was born 1976 in Oakland, CA. Growing up it took a while for me to "get it." Fortunately, it was not too late. In the year 1997 I was kicked out of my house. At the time, I went to a Junior College, and was not serious about my life. Growing up basketball was and still is a passion of mine (I still play once a week). Things didn't work out as planned with my basketball aspirations after high school. I basically gave up on basketball during this time period. Toby, a close friend of mine, received a basketball scholarship from a University in Colorado. He told the coaches about me and my ability. They flew me out. At first I was reluctant to go. I ended up getting a basketball scholarship. Going away was one of the most pivotal two years of my life. Being away from home in California, I began to see things differently and started to make improvements with my character.

After college I obtained an outside sales position selling "outdoor advertising." During the same time (year 2000), I was a co- founder of a basketball apparel company called YPA. We sold products domestically and internationally. Some of the following we accomplished:

• We went to grammar schools speaking to the kids on being positive, and to follow their dreams as well as have our players put on demonstrations
• We held free basketball camps.
• Had all star basketball games that had players come from all over the US and Canada.
• We were featured on ESPN, DIME and SLAM Magazine (these two magazines have an international audience for basketball fans).
• For TV, we were on CBS (in the Bay Area) and other independent TV stations in the Bay Area.
• Had our players play all star games internationally (Africa, China, Canada and Japan).
• Had multiple articles and interviews on radio stations and newspapers.

Our brand resembled the connection bike riders have for Harley Davidson, but our following was for people who enjoyed basketball. Players/customers even got our logo tattooed on themselves. Go to www.youtube.com and type in the search filed "YPA Basketball." There you will see clips of our two street-ball DVD's we produced.

One day I was on a plane to LA. I sat there reading a book about stocks by Peter Lynch. A guy next to me said, "Do you like what you are reading?" I said, "It is cool, I am learning some new things." We started a conversation. I told him I was going to LA, because YPA was participating in a traveling dunk contest hosted by ESPN (called City Slam). He was on his way to Orange County. He mentioned that he was a Venture Capitalist from Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park, CA (FYI, Sand Hill Road is equivalent to Wall Street for start up companies. Virtually, all of the companies in Silicon Valley got its funding from this one street! This is not a long street either.) Before he became a VC, he told me how he went to Oxford and was on the legal team to help Netscape go public. If you don't know Netscape was the first popular Internet Service Provider before Yahoo and Google. What was a trip, he looked probably at best 10 years older than me. He was/is a VERY intellectual gentleman. I told him about our basketball apparel company. I made sure to get his card. Along with my friend/CEO Courtney, we ended up meeting with him in San Francisco. We gave him the run down of the company along with handing him our "street ball DVD's." In the discussion, he liked what he heard. He said that "we took the company to the 10 yard line, and he would take us into the end zone. We gave him a copy of the license deal we made (several months previously we had signed a distribution deal that we were very disappointed in. We had products in Champs but no money in our pockets). He said he would take a look at it and see if he could find/negotiate a way for us to get out of the contract (remember he was an attorney).

A few days later he emailed us with these exact words, "I read the contract...this is beyond bad, I can't believe your lawyers let you sign this." When I read that it felt like someone hit me in the stomach with a bat. We ended up talking on a regular basis to get things resolved. At times, the VC and the distributor would talk/email one another and at times there would be a conference with us involved. He did all he could, and tried to negotiate the product lines but the stupid distributors we not agreeing. One occasion we went to the VC's house. He said he could get us 10 million seed money (if the contract we had was not in place). After going back and forth, nothing happened. Our company started to lose morale. We had a great product, great customers/fans, but no money in our pockets.

In January 2006, I made a tough decision and stepped away from the company. When I stepped away, I was approaching 30 years of age, and no one warned me, but the 30th birth day is a trip. It caused me to reflect on my life. I had potential, and I was not satisfied with my financial position. Several months after that, I was severely in credit card debt, unemployed for a couple of months. I was unemployed because we once had an opportunity where we were going to go to the Dominican Republic for a basketball promotion. A sports marketing agency contacted us. The trip was to be for something like two months. I thought that this was a once in a life time opportunity. So, I knew I was rolling the dice when I told my employer, that I was quitting. I figured that after I return I could easily get another job. Well, guess what happened, a couple of days before I quit the deal we had to go the Dominican Republic hit the fan. The deal was dead and we didn't go.

I ended up getting a contracting job, but was still not where I wanted to be. In the month of August, 12 2006 I had 12.98 in my checking account and 14.34 in my checking.  During this time period, I switched my focus to real estate. I attended seminars read all I could (and still do) when it comes to real estate. From that I evolved into wanting to do commercial real estate. When I first decided that I wanted to be a real estate investor, I went after the residential side. I bought home study kits, went to "real estate boot camps" read lots of material online along with books to know how and what to do. I first decided to go after foreclosures. I knocked on doors of people in default, had a web site, sent postcards to others out of my driving distance and had a live operator answer my calls. To compliment that, I went after expired listings of luxury homes in the Bay Area and tried to get an option on the home (an option is getting a contract to buy a property from the seller. The difference is the buyer has the right to buy, but they are not obligated.) While doing the residential route, on a couple occasions, I forwarded leads to people I knew who were in the mortgage business. So after thinking, "hey I am giving away leads, I need to keep that money in my pocket!" I thought, I should do my own loans. This lead to me wanting to get my real estate license. Around the same time of all of this, I started learning more about investing in apartments.

I wanted to find company's that worked with commercial real estate. I went to www.ccim.com and located people that were CCIM (more on CCIM later) and I emailed probably about 40 people. The email explained my interest in getting my foot in the door and if I could arrange an informative interview with them. One of those persons that I emailed me replied. His name was Ed Craine, and he welcomed me to meet with him. I was impressed with the experience, and what I could learn under the direction of the staff. I ended up joining the team. Having a Marketing degree, I know how wise it is to be "narrowed and focused" on my target. I wanted to own apartments, so it made a lot of sense for me to focus getting financing for those that needed financing for apartments as well. My only focus was now on investing in apartments. By learning how the financing works I would be able to close my own deals. So by educating myself on what I want to achieve, I simultaneously help out others who want to invest in apartments.