Join us for an insightful conversation with the iconic Matthew Lesko, the man behind the famous question mark suit and renowned as the "free money guy." Discover the myriad opportunities he unveils for real estate investors, including substantial government grants that could significantly impact your investment strategies. Matthew shares his personal journey as an entrepreneur and his unyielding enthusiasm for life and business even at 81. Learn how his passion and purpose have fueled his resilience and success over the decades.
Our discussion takes a fascinating turn as we explore the importance of adaptability in both fitness and entrepreneurship. Matthew and I exchange thoughts on maintaining health and balance. We also reflect on the valuable lessons gleaned from past business failures, and successes underscoring the significance of prioritizing customer acquisition and embracing a customer-first mindset. This segment offers a fresh perspective on evolving business landscapes and the power of adaptability in achieving personal and professional growth.
The episode concludes with a deep dive into the often-overlooked world of government grants and resources available for business development. Matthew shares expert advice on connecting with local government offices and utilizing programs designed to support budding entrepreneurs. We highlight the practical tools like findhelp.org, revealing how these can unlock hidden opportunities and assist in navigating the bureaucracy. Matthew's insights serve as a powerful reminder of the wealth of public resources available, encouraging listeners to persistently explore and make the most of these offerings.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, guys.
Thank you so much and welcome.
This is Stephan Piscano withthe Stephan Piscano podcast.
Thank you so much for joiningus, guys.
If you are listening on Appleor Spotify or wherever you get
your podcasts, please give us arating and subscribe.
We really sincerely appreciateit.
If you're on YouTube, you'regonna be in for a treat.
(00:20):
Today we're gonna interviewMatthew Lesko.
You'll know him as soon as yousee him.
He is the free money guy, thequestion mark suit guy, the
government grant guy, and he waskind enough to spend about 30
minutes with us and specifically, we got into some incredible
grants just free money from thegovernment that's available for
(00:41):
any real estate investor outthere.
So if you listen long enoughand you're a landlord out there,
you're going to learn how youcan get up to a million dollars
to buy property in Ohio.
You can get $250,000 torenovate properties in various
locations across the country,even one that I'm going to
hopefully try to take advantageof as an investor myself, even
one that I'm going to hopefullytry to take advantage of as an
(01:03):
investor myself.
You can get $2,000 for everytenant that you have to help
them pay their rent.
So I really enjoyed theinterview.
I think you guys are reallygoing to enjoy it as well.
Matthew Lesko is an inspirationto me, guys, just as an
entrepreneur.
He's 81 years old You'll hearus talk a little bit about that
in a moment on the podcast aswell Still going faster than
(01:32):
just about anybody.
I know that's half his age, andwe also touched a little bit on
his backstory too, becauseeverybody knows him as the free
money guy and that's what youwant to hear when you talk to
him, and we're going to talkabout that.
Like I said, we'll get into thegrants and all that.
But as an entrepreneur myself,I was really curious to hear a
bit more about his backstory,what motivated him to start such
a unique business, how heovercomes failures and how he
(01:56):
really cultivates success.
So we got into that a littlebit as well, and I think it's
going to really be helpful foranybody out there in the network
.
So I'll be back with you in amoment and we'll be joined by
Matthew.
Thank you.
(03:13):
All right guys.
Thank you so much and welcome.
I am extremely excited todayand I'm kind of bummed my
camera's down so you can't seeme.
I've got a big smile on my facebecause I get to interview
somebody I really admire andnormally when we're doing these
I'm talking to business partnersor friends, and this is my
first time interviewing somebodythat I'm a fan of, so you
(03:34):
probably know him as thequestion mark guy or the free
money guy or the governmentgrant guy.
His name is Matthew Lesko andMatthew, how are you Good sir?
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Great, no, I just.
Things are happening so wellfor me now and I'm 81.
I can't believe that, but if Iknew 81 was going to be this
good, I would have got here alot earlier.
There you go.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
That was the first thing I mean and this is kind of
what I was just rambling at youabout when we were getting
ready to turn the recorder onhere.
But when your team kind ofreached out to me and the
opportunity and I realized itwas you, it was like man,
growing up as somebody, I wasobsessed with investing and
different opportunities.
I kind of had a rough childhoodand didn't have any money and I
was just always obsessed withthe idea of being an
(04:20):
entrepreneur when I was a kidand the two people that I really
enjoyed watching thecommercials and their content
was Carlton Sheets and you andso oh, I remember Carlton.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
I remember Carlton, we were on home shopping
together.
Oh really, oh, wow, okay, yeah,and the guys who took him
national were across the hallfrom me in a little office
building in downtown WashingtonDC.
Oh, wow.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Well, and to the point too.
I mean then, when I startedkind of watching some of your
stuff you're doing now and doingsome research for this
interview, I was like my gosh,he has just as much energy as
you've ever had.
You look great.
I mean it's incredible.
How do you keep so focused andso energetic with everything
you're doing?
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Drugs.
I don't like drugs at all.
I think it's doing what youwant to do in life and, as long
as you have that and you thinkit's important, so you have
something a little bigger thanyou to worry about.
(05:31):
It's so easy.
I mean, life beats you up.
No matter who you are, you'regoing to get beat up.
That's what being a human is.
You want to do a lot of shit.
Half of it doesn't work, soyou're going to get beat up.
And to get through that, Ithink you have to have something
(05:53):
bigger than you to worry about,or the reason you're doing
stuff, because it keeps you getthrough that stuff, the bad
stuff that's doing happen, and Ithink even to be successful at
anything you want to do in life.
You know we all go out and wefind about seven steps to
success.
Yeah, we got some guru that'sgoing to have five places to
(06:14):
things to do if you're amillionaire.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Say this to yourself 10 times a day in the morning
before you start, right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
No matter what list you get to do, that you're going
to run into a lot of trouble,yeah, and it ain't going to run
into a lot of trouble, you know,and it ain't going to work and
everything, and so, and thepeople I think succeed are the
ones who get through that, and Ithink that's why, for anything
you want to do, you have to havesomething bigger involved than
one of the things is your heart.
(06:40):
You have to really want to bethere so that when you get beat
up, you're going to get your assup and start swinging again, no
matter what, because you wantto be there.
If you don't want to be there,fuck, you're going to go
somewhere else, it's true.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
If you get hit like this.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
This is crazy.
So you have to be involved inthings that you don't mind
getting beat up at.
To be involved in things thatyou don't mind getting beat up
at, because, no matter what youdo, life's gonna be job.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
That's what it's here to do well, you gotta love yeah
, you gotta love the chaos of it, right?
Otherwise, like in real estate,I always tell my wife, and so
I'm uh, I'm 40 years old and soI got ways to go, hopefully,
here, but I tell her I want todo it for the rest of my life.
And so that's when I seesomebody like you that's been
successful for a long time andyou're still doing it at an
(07:31):
extremely high level.
Why would you do anything elseif you love what you're doing?
Speaker 3 (07:36):
The sitting on the beach sounds.
I mean, it's nice.
You need that at times, youknow, to recharge batteries.
But we're here to contribute,we're here to give, we're here
to help other people withsomething, and I think that's
why I think, old people getcranky.
They're not given to otherpeople in a way, whether it's
(07:56):
through real estate or whateverthat you're involved in and that
, I think, keeps me and exercise.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Oh, that's right.
Yeah, I wanted to ask you aboutthat because I'm the fattest
ultra marathon runner you evermeet.
Oh, really.
But you know, most of them arepretty lean like you.
From what I read, you're a biglong distance runner, I guess,
right.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Well, I ran all.
I was a short fat kid, so Idon't know if you're an old fat
guy.
And so I fight weight everysecond of my life.
It's just another little job.
It's sort of like women andsexual harassment, you know a
side job they always have.
(08:42):
There you go, there you go, andI just and when I got on the
navy I really want to loseweight.
The only way I did was byrunning, and I don't compete,
never, did, never.
Ran marathons, never.
But I'd run five, six miles aday and I did that for 50 years.
I think that's great, wow.
But now I mean the doctors atthe time when I was doing that
(09:04):
said oh you know, in your 40syou're going to have to quit,
yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Your knees.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Right Into my 70s.
And what stopped me was not themuscles, not the bones, nothing
, it's the brain.
Your brain doesn't work asquickly, so I was tripping and
falling on my nose three days ina row and I said this is it, I
can't do it and you can't reactfast enough and you know when
(09:33):
you're running and things, andespecially in an urban area, uh,
I just couldn't react.
I had to give it up, uh, andthen I started walking and I
would have to.
Walking six miles like takes ahalf a day, it's boring too.
Yeah, it's now.
I do ellipse, you know, in thegym.
And so I could burn 700 caloriesin an hour, so that's pretty
(09:55):
good.
And but then also what Ilearned I never did this, I was
never a weight guy.
You know, not weighing, butlifting higher.
And I started doing that and Iliked that.
I mean, I'm not a muscle guy,but it gives me more balance.
I found that very helpful usingthe weights for some reason,
(10:19):
and yeah, and I feel veryhealthy, very good.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
You look great.
You look great man.
You just made me think I didn'tknow.
You were a Navy guy too.
My brother's a chief in thenavy right now, so really.
Oh man, the chiefs run the navyyes, sir, yeah, he's pretty,
he's pretty proud of that.
He's well, I'm proud of him.
But but yeah, oh no, that'swonderful.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
No, I was there three years, two months, nine days,
okay, okay, but who was counting?
Speaker 1 (10:42):
well, I mean, and I I guess my my big question I
wanted to touch on and then Idefinitely want to get into some
of the grants and some of thespecific opportunities are
available for people in mynetwork right now and anybody.
But I was curious I waslistening to the Ted talk that
you did about 10 years back andyou mentioned that you had a
couple of businesses originallyand then it ultimately there was
(11:05):
some failure there.
Can you?
Tell me a little bit about that.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
The evolution yeah, well, I always wanted to start a
business.
I mean, that was it.
I was never a student, but whenI got out of the Navy I felt I
wanted to get an MBA and Ifinally found somebody to let me
in, because they wanted my GImoney.
Yeah, and graduate school it'seasy for some reason, and I had
(11:27):
trouble every class inundergraduate school.
Uh, so I got mba and I startedbusiness.
My mba was in computers.
I even had I started a computersoftware company that failed,
another company that failed.
I said this is crazy, yeah,crazy.
Then what really happened?
I was trying to do it like theytaught me in school.
(11:48):
I read in books and all thatkind of stuff.
When I was starting businessesI thought, whoa, who won?
I did all it by the rules andeverything like that.
I said God, I paid for all.
I got the LLCs and the fancyoffices and all that kind of
stuff and and I was sol and nomoney and no business and
(12:13):
business went out of business.
And who won?
the guys I bought all this stufffrom so the third time I said,
hey, you know, uh, and I didn'thave fun because I was doing it
like you're supposed to do andlike a robot kind of yeah right
(12:34):
and robotic about it, uh, nosoul in it.
And I said I'm not having funand I'm not succeeding.
So this is crazy.
Is life like not having fun andnot succeeding?
Then I said, well, you knowwhat?
I could have fun today andmaybe succeed or not.
Before I was not having fun andnot succeeding.
(12:56):
At least I'll have fun.
You get one out of two.
Yeah, I have fun.
When I started having fun.
That's when things changed.
Also, what changed is I started.
Okay, what's the most importantthing in a business?
It's not whether you're an LLCor I mean, it depends on the
business, of course, but most ofus that start, but it doesn't
matter you know, and you'reworried about the government
(13:18):
finding you, man, that theycan't deliver the mail on time.
It'd take them three years tofind you.
You know, if you didn'tregister or something like that,
you don't need to be an LLC.
Nobody calls me up hey, are youan LLC so I could buy your
product?
Nobody does that.
So I figured the only thingthat's important to your success
(13:39):
as a business is a customer.
everything else is croutons andthen the salad doesn't matter
yeah and if you don't have acustomer, you don't have a
business.
So to me it's also.
It's flipping around.
Now you have to get customersfirst.
What the hell's when people goout and spend all this money on
what they're going to do andwhat they're going to give and
(14:01):
everything, and then go lookcustomers, and customers don't
want to buy it you know, uh, andyou got to do that first, and
so much easier to do that nowthan ever before.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Uh, because before, at least when I grew up, not you
, if you remember, if you wantedto have a sell something, you
need a store yeah, well, youknow, let me ask you about that
because that's something I'vebeen just personally talking a
lot about lately, because it'sfunny for me.
So I got in, I started buyingreal estate when I was 19 and I
(14:31):
started in.
Well, yeah, it was a $300 lotin Denny, new Mexico, so it's
not that impressive.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
but Wow, hey, anything is impressive if you're
doing it.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
No, thank you.
Well, funny for me as somebodythat I used to be the young guy.
Now I see all these peopleyounger than me and the tech
industry.
I always looked at it as a hugeasset that, like you just said,
makes everything so much easier.
But I think it's getting sotech heavy, we're losing a
little bit of the human to humanAbsolutely.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Absolutely no, and it's that way with information.
Now it's so tech oriented.
People are just using thetechnology to find opportunities
and stuff like that, and that'swrong, because if you go to
Google, all you're going to findis ways to spend money.
Yeah, google wants to get moneyfrom you, and so there's no
(15:23):
opportunities there, andparticularly there's no
opportunity if you don't havemoney.
So what are you going to do inthis country if you don't have
money and you want to start areal estate business or
something like that?
Now, I mean real estate.
I mean I think there's a lot ofopportunities coming up in real
estate.
That's going to be at locallevel, okay, yeah, and if you're
(15:45):
in real estate, I'd start, nomatter who's in, who's you know
well, we know who won, but nomatter who won, we have to
concentrate on real estate.
We need more of that stuffBecause we don't have enough
housing.
It's too expensive and they'llcome through from the federal
government, but locally, likeright now I keep running into,
here's a Toledo.
(16:06):
Toledo just got a milliondollars for people to buy old
homes and that's grant money.
So you don't have to pay back,that's for investors like you,
and then $250,000 to renovatethe homes to make them sellable.
So you create housing.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
You're going to have to tell me about that one more,
yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:27):
Well, here's what it is.
It's different everywhere.
Everyone's going to bedifferent.
The thing is, you want to knowwhere those things are coming
from and where they are and it'sgovernment, so it's going to be
in your county.
You want to go to your countyand you could call 211, call 211
and ask for the countygovernment for your county, and
(16:51):
the key word is communitydevelopment.
That's where most of this stuffcomes from.
Ok, community development.
You want to make an appointmentwith the bureaucrat that
community development money withthe bureaucrat in charge of
that community development money.
You don't have to be.
They have to talk to you asmuch as they do to Donald Trump.
You know, yeah, and they'reavailable to you, and if they
(17:16):
ever have a meeting for peopleto apply for something, show up
at that meeting, yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Well, let me ask cause it's a unique niche, right
, and I would have to admit well, and actually, do you know the
number of, uh, roughly how manygrants you've helped people get
in the last 40 years?
Here?
It's got to be billions, rightoh, absolutely no.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
I I've sold four or five million books you know, uh,
you know, and what's nice nowwhat I have is a service for
twenty dollars, and I get morepersonal satisfaction that
because we have a service nowfor twenty dollars, other people
help you.
Besides me, we have membershelping members.
(17:58):
We got about 15 000 people nowand they help each other get
grants.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
So and that's the lescoehelpcom.
I think I saw it.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
Yeah, right, and they're better than I am because
I've been doing this 50 years,so you're just starting.
It's hard to me to relate tosomebody just starting how to
spell grant.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Yeah, sure, sure.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
And so someone who's so excited they just found out
the first time themselves.
Speaker 1 (18:24):
Yeah, Well, it's kind of hard to believe, right like
when you first hear it.
For you it's old hat at thispoint because you've been doing
it and you've seen it besuccessful.
But I remember watching yourstuff then and I was like man,
like can I really get 1200 forxyz, you know, and is that the
biggest if?
Speaker 3 (18:40):
you if you call mary gallagher, just a deal.
That's better than me, you know, because I'm selling you
something and that's what isimportant and that's what I
think stops.
And people and people go togoogle to look yeah, and you'll
never find anything there anyway.
It's a fire hose of informationand that's why it's people you
(19:02):
have to talk to people.
Here's another thing, I thinkfor business, everybody should
know that we have the governmenthires mentors for any kind of
business for free for you tohelp you find money.
Help you find money, legal help, any kind of help you need for
free, and the SBA runs a website.
(19:22):
You got to write this down, soit's sbagov, and then slash
local dash assistance.
Local dash assistance is allsmall letters.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
And for everybody watching this on YouTube, I'll
put this in the description link, all the links that we're
talking about.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
I'll put this in the description link, all the links
that we're talking about, andyou put in your zip code.
And you put in your zip codeand they'll show you local
organizations that getgovernment funding.
These are experts in startingand expanding any businesses and
knowing the resources for youto help, and all the free
resources not Google will helpyou with 2 million resources, or
(20:06):
2 billion.
I'm telling you the truth.
That will all cost you money.
These people know thegovernment and nonprofit
organizations that give money,and that's where you get and
their services for free, andthat's where you want to make
appointments with them, say yourbusiness, real estate or
(20:33):
whatever and and understand howthey could help you.
You don't ask them for money.
You ask them for help, andthat's the important thing,
because they point you tosources, uh, and then, if you
ask them for money, they say, no, we don't have money, so you go
away.
No, what they have, though, isvery important, more important
than money, and so you, you'regonna get get.
You know you're going to loseout that way, so it's so
important to do that, and it'sall free and I'm sure, as a real
(20:57):
estate, yeah, I mean, that'sthe best place, and actually,
for community development officeis the other porthole for doing
that to try to find localprograms.
Now there will be dozens more.
There's probably about 70 or 80local programs in every city
(21:18):
that are government-related.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
And this is all over the country.
This isn't just like LA and NewYork, oh, absolutely.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
Every city, county, whatever, definitely, and it's
all free country.
This isn't just like la and newyork.
Absolutely every city, county,whatever, uh, definitely, um,
and it's all free.
And I mean trump.
His whole family business isbuilt on government programs.
There has been so good at it.
He was investigated all thetime yeah, that's a story for
another.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Yeah, I mean what?
What percentage?
Because I know there's justthousands and thousands of these
grants out there.
What percentage go unclaimed?
Do a lot of them just sit there?
Speaker 3 (21:53):
A lot.
Yes, it really depends, buteven the more common ones.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
I mean.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
I got listings that you know anywhere from 20 to 30
percent of the people that areeligible don't apply.
That's the more thing.
How much of the people eligibledon't apply?
And, by the way, another littletip is good.
You're a real estate developerand you go to the county and
you're not getting theinformation you need.
(22:20):
Yankee around, you call thisnumber 202-224-3121.
202-224-3121.
Now that's the Capitol Hillswitchboard.
Ok, you want to call them andask for your elected official?
(22:42):
You have two senators and onecongressman.
You could ask for all three orjust go down the list.
You call.
I would start at the senatorsbecause they have bigger staffs
and say, hey, this county ismessing me over.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
See, they have that Not to cut you off.
We're doing a development inBend Oregon right now and it's
been a huge pain, so I'll takeall the help I can get.
So yeah, Absolutely no.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
You, you, you and you go right down the lever.
Here's how to find out all yourelected officials you go to
commoncauseorg, Okay, and youput in your zip code and you'll
see, you know not only thefederal, but the county
officials, the state officials,and you just bug every one of
(23:31):
them but it's true, because, ok,that's a program and they want
to help you do something good.
So they, so everybody involvedwith your program lives there,
will vote for them.
Yeah that's what it's all aboutRight, exactly, program lives
there will vote for them.
Yeah, that's what it's allabout.
Right, exactly so.
And then what's so neat?
When they do you a favor likeyou're gonna vote for that son
of a bitch, no matter what?
Speaker 1 (23:52):
oh, you sure would.
Yeah, I don't care what sideyou're on.
Yeah, you give me free money.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
Yeah, this is how they get re-elected.
I mean, I I'm looking at aletter here I just got from a
congressman's office.
Congress Congressman Dan Ryandelivers on a promise of
government that works for allsectors, secures $30 million
owed to constituents by federalgovernment.
Here, congressman Ryan, histeam of expert caseworkers
(24:21):
secured $30 million owed topeople in his constituency and
he also got money for businesses, for nonprofits, for everybody.
Oh yeah, here For businesses,organizations, communities he
got another $21 million for them.
(24:41):
See, that's the system.
This is why Elon Musk ishanging around Donald Trump.
The biggest pot of money is inthe government.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Even the guy who's worth $250 billion or whatever
it is.
Yeah, that's interesting,because that's one of the things
we're passionate about on thereal estate investing and just
investing in general, is thatthere's a small percentage of
people that have access to theknowledge that most of us don't
get, and so is it true with thegrants, too, then, that some of
(25:15):
the people at the top are theones utilizing these the most Is
that?
Speaker 3 (25:19):
No, I mean yes because they're asking for it.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Yeah yeah, because they know.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yeah, you didn't ask for it.
You went to Google and thinkyou could find a place to ask
for it, and you can't.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Yeah, does it help you at all that you're in DC?
That's just a coincidence.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Well, it is a coincidence.
You don't have to be, but itdoes in a way, because it's so
organically, I learn more abouthow the government works.
I mean, I run into people atparties who work for some agency
, so there's some osmosis that Ijust get comfortable with the
(25:59):
bureaucracy by living here.
People outside have this visionknow some dragon or whatever.
yeah, that stops them, I mean mymembers.
They're just afraid to evencall the government.
You know and you don't.
I mean, these are people thatyou and me doing it and you know
(26:20):
, I just know so many of them.
It's just simple for me, uh.
But if you haven't, you have,you know, a mental thing
stopping you.
And once you get over that andsay, holy shit, this works, then
you're not going to stop.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Let me ask you I'm sure this is probably one of the
questions you get asked themost, but for everybody that
gets to listen to this or watchthis in my network are there
again.
I know it's tailored to yourspecific situation to some
extent, and I know that there'sthousands of these all the time,
but are there any grants rightnow that just pretty much
anybody could get if they wantedto, or any that you're really
(27:00):
excited about that you want tohighlight?
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Well, I think the most exciting thing for the
average person out there issomething called findhelporg.
Okay, are you online now?
Yes, sir, okay, go tofindhelporg.
Okay, put in your zip code okay, okay, say you, you, you own a
(27:31):
lot of property, okay, uh, so,and you people can't pay your
rent yeah okay, put in rent uh,let's see, I got housing goods,
health money open the uh.
Up the left hand corner there'sa little search thing.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
You see that uh, yeah , I did.
I did that.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
It said there's 2379 programs in my okay okay, now
after look up in that left-handcorner again, okay, and put in
the keyword rent okay, oh, homerenters yep home and renters
insurance how many do you havethere now?
Speaker 1 (28:12):
let's see 32 programs .
Speaker 3 (28:16):
Okay.
So there's 32 programs in yourzip code to help people pay
their rent.
So if you have a renter thatcan't pay their rent, you say
start calling these.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Gosh.
Well, you're going to make mepopular with my tenants.
Yeah, Exactly.
Speaker 3 (28:33):
Yeah, they don't know and they're hiding or whatever,
and that's too bad.
Yeah, here I saw one, a newprogram I forget where it is a
new program, I forget where itis that a lot of landlords don't
want to take vouchers.
(28:54):
Section 8 vouchers yeah, yeah,so what they're doing is giving
the landlords $2,000 so theytake the vouchers.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Oh well, hey, okay, good, yeah see.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
I mean, it's that kind of stuff that's happening
all the time.
It's underneath the radar.
It's amazing the opportunitiesthat are out there and you just
got to stay away from Google.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Well, yeah, you're going to a place that's designed
to extract money from you, notgive money, like you said.
One more question, backing up alittle bit how did you
personally get into the grants?
Was there, did you get oneyourself, or what was it that?
I mean, I got a bunch.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
I don't need them anymore.
Actually, a recent one I gotwas uh, uh, a covid from the sba
gave me twenty20,000.
Okay.
Yeah, so you're still gettingthem yourself Wow, okay, yeah,
and I didn't need it.
Yeah.
And so, instead of sending itback, I said I'm going to use
(29:58):
this to give grants to mymembers.
See, my members need money.
Yeah, that's why I only charge$20, and they're all looking for
it.
So what I started as a grantprogram, give me one sentence
what you would use with $1,000and we'll give out the $20,000.
And that went over so well now,and the business is profitable.
(30:20):
I never thought it would becharging only $20.
And so now we give $70,000 outjust to members every month.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Oh wow, yeah, I mean wow yeah.
I mean that's amazing.
And all they have to do is justsay here's what I'll do if you
give it to me.
Speaker 3 (30:33):
Yeah, one sentence, that's great, and I thought you
had to be Bezos or somebody todo something like this.
But yeah, I mean just a littleschmuck like me giving out
grants.
It just amazes me.
My people need it.
(30:56):
I mean, we have.
I don't know if it means muchat all, but half this country
cannot afford a $500 bill.
If the bill came in theirmailbox, you know that they owe
$500, they don't have that money.
That's half the country and wehave a lot of poor people.
We are, of all the countriesthat are developed, the
(31:17):
developed countries, that'sabout 30.
We are number two in ourpoverty rate.
That means the percentage ofpeople that are in poverty.
That means the percentage ofpeople that are in poverty we're
the second largest.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
The largest is Costa Rica.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
I was just going to ask you the largest, and I said
God, we're only number two, wegot to get out there and become
number one.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
No well, it's amazing too.
There really is a great dividein in our country with
information, I think, more thananything else right, which is
key thing.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
That's what keeps me going, because, like this,
people have funny money problemand they go to google and you
just got a worse money problemand that's what we're trained to
do.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
Right, it's all by design.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Yeah, absolutely so.
It gives me something to do for10, 12 years.
Yes, sir.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
Well, hopefully longer than that, but I mean no,
but that's why people like youare so important.
And, like I said, that was me.
I mean I moved 33 times beforeI was 18 and we never owned
anything.
And then I see people likeyourself on television.
I go gosh, wow.
So you're telling me it'spossible to do X, y, z, and just
that knowledge that it'spossible is a big deal.
(32:35):
It's helpful, exactly.
I have two more questions foryou and then I'll leave you
alone.
That's okay.
You mentioned the lescohelpcom,which I think that sounds
incredible.
So, if I'm hearing you right?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
Oh yeah, Make sure we send you a free link to get
into it so you can look around.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, that'd be great .
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
And basically, if I'm hearing you right, how that
works, there's a lot ofeducational content there.
There's probably some links toresources, but then really, yes,
and more than that.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
That's where you apply to our grants.
That's where, but they're forpaying members, but also it's
one-on-one help.
I'm on there answeringquestions and every day we have
probably two, three, four hoursof members who help other
members with questions.
(33:23):
That's great, and we're alwaysloading it up with new programs.
Speaker 1 (33:28):
Sounds really effective, because then it can
be tailored to whoever'sspecific situation Exactly.
Speaker 3 (33:34):
That's what I think.
Tell me what you need, We'llnarrow it down.
Now what we're trying to do isget people to get on the phone.
People have this fear oftalking, particularly the
government bureaucrat yeah, Allthese people and ask them for
help.
People want to help becauseit's human nature and you have
(33:55):
to give them an opportunity.
And then also see, calling agovernment agency for help is
different than calling somebodya salesman.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
Yeah, it is.
Speaker 3 (34:06):
You're not going to get hung up on when you're
asking Exactly Because asalesman wants to get hung up on
when you're asking, exactlybecause a salesman you know
wants to get money from you, sothey're going to kiss your ass
right.
Uh, the government officialgets paid no matter what, so you
don't control anything on them.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Well like you said it can be a benefit to them
because if they help you thenyou're another vote that's going
to be in there, exactly.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Now, that's the elected officials, but the
people down really writing thechecks are different, and that's
why they had to be extra niceto them, okay.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Well, and then, aside from the let's go helpcom there
, do you work with people on aone-on-one coaching basis?
Speaker 3 (34:45):
What are the others That'seHelpcom is one-on-one.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Basically it is, I guess.
Yeah, it's just on a wide scale.
So that's the program at thispoint.
Speaker 3 (34:54):
People don't want to join.
You can learn a lot what I doon YouTube, so it's YouTubecom.
Matthew Lescoe, one word, and Iput links in there like we're
talking now and everything.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Yeah, links in there like we're talking now and
everything, yeah, and you've gotabout 280,000 subscribers on
there.
It's a pretty massive following.
Well, perfect, my friend.
Is there anything else that Ihaven't asked you that you'd
want to share with my audience?
Speaker 3 (35:18):
Well, remember this is your government.
You should use it.
You pay for it.
The rich people are using thehell out of it and it's there
for everybody and there's nomagic to it.
It's just maybe a pain in theass.
So you may have to take a halfa dozen phone calls to get the
right, but that's life.
You're going to have to do thatcall in Comcast too.
Speaker 1 (35:39):
Yeah, and Comcast doesn't give you two grand at
the end of it, exactly, comcastis only going to take your money
and still pay any ass work then.
Well hey, thank you very muchfor doing this, matthew.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
It's my pleasure.
Yeah, nice to meet you.
Well, have fun real estate.
I guess you will.
You've been at it a long time,since 19.
Good for you.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Hopefully I'll be doing it for another 40, 50
years here, I hope.
I think it'll still beimportant.
All right, well, thank you,mike, thank you.
All right, guys.
Thank you so much and welcome.
This is Stephan Piscano withthe Stephan Piscano podcast.
Thank you so much for joiningus, guys.
If you are listening on Appleor Spotify or wherever you get
your podcasts, please give us arating and subscribe.
We really sincerely appreciateit.
If you're on YouTube, you'regonna be in for a treat.
(00:20):
Today we're gonna interviewMatthew Lesko.
You'll know him as soon as yousee him.
He is the free money guy, thequestion mark suit guy, the
government grant guy, and he waskind enough to spend about 30
minutes with us and specifically, we got into some incredible
grants just free money from thegovernment that's available for
(00:41):
any real estate investor outthere.
So if you listen long enoughand you're a landlord out there,
you're going to learn how youcan get up to a million dollars
to buy property in Ohio.
You can get $250,000 torenovate properties in various
locations across the country,even one that I'm going to
hopefully try to take advantageof as an investor myself, even
one that I'm going to hopefullytry to take advantage of as an
(01:03):
investor myself.
You can get $2,000 for everytenant that you have to help
them pay their rent.
So I really enjoyed theinterview.
I think you guys are reallygoing to enjoy it as well.
Matthew Lesko is an inspirationto me, guys, just as an
entrepreneur.
He's 81 years old You'll hearus talk a little bit about that
in a moment on the podcast aswell Still going faster than
(01:32):
just about anybody.
I know that's half his age, andwe also touched a little bit on
his backstory too, becauseeverybody knows him as the free
money guy and that's what youwant to hear when you talk to
him, and we're going to talkabout that.
Like I said, we'll get into thegrants and all that.
But as an entrepreneur myself,I was really curious to hear a
bit more about his backstory,what motivated him to start such
a unique business, how heovercomes failures and how he
(01:56):
really cultivates success.
So we got into that a littlebit as well, and I think it's
going to really be helpful foranybody out there in the network
.
So I'll be back with you in amoment and we'll be joined by
Matthew.
Thank you.
(03:13):
All right guys.
Thank you so much and welcome.
I am extremely excited todayand I'm kind of bummed my
camera's down so you can't seeme.
I've got a big smile on my facebecause I get to interview
somebody I really admire andnormally when we're doing these
I'm talking to business partnersor friends, and this is my
first time interviewing somebodythat I'm a fan of, so you
(03:34):
probably know him as thequestion mark guy or the free
money guy or the governmentgrant guy.
His name is Matthew Lesko andMatthew, how are you Good sir?
Speaker 3 (03:44):
Great, no, I just.
Things are happening so wellfor me now and I'm 81.
I can't believe that, but if Iknew 81 was going to be this
good, I would have got here alot earlier.
There you go.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
That was the first thing I mean and this is kind of
what I was just rambling at youabout when we were getting
ready to turn the recorder onhere.
But when your team kind ofreached out to me and the
opportunity and I realized itwas you, it was like man,
growing up as somebody, I wasobsessed with investing and
different opportunities.
I kind of had a rough childhoodand didn't have any money and I
was just always obsessed withthe idea of being an
(04:20):
entrepreneur when I was a kidand the two people that I really
enjoyed watching thecommercials and their content
was Carlton Sheets and you andso oh, I remember Carlton.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
I remember Carlton, we were on home shopping
together.
Oh really, oh, wow, okay, yeah,and the guys who took him
national were across the hallfrom me in a little office
building in downtown WashingtonDC.
Oh, wow.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Well, and to the point too.
I mean then, when I startedkind of watching some of your
stuff you're doing now and doingsome research for this
interview, I was like my gosh,he has just as much energy as
you've ever had.
You look great.
I mean it's incredible.
How do you keep so focused andso energetic with everything
you're doing?
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Drugs.
I don't like drugs at all.
I think it's doing what youwant to do in life and, as long
as you have that and you thinkit's important, so you have
something a little bigger thanyou to worry about.
(05:31):
It's so easy.
I mean, life beats you up.
No matter who you are, you'regoing to get beat up.
That's what being a human is.
You want to do a lot of shit.
Half of it doesn't work, soyou're going to get beat up.
And to get through that, Ithink you have to have something
(05:53):
bigger than you to worry about,or the reason you're doing
stuff, because it keeps you getthrough that stuff, the bad
stuff that's doing happen, and Ithink even to be successful at
anything you want to do in life.
You know we all go out and wefind about seven steps to
success.
Yeah, we got some guru that'sgoing to have five places to
(06:14):
things to do if you're amillionaire.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Say this to yourself 10 times a day in the morning
before you start, right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
No matter what list you get to do, that you're going
to run into a lot of trouble,yeah, and it ain't going to run
into a lot of trouble, you know,and it ain't going to work and
everything, and so, and thepeople I think succeed are the
ones who get through that, and Ithink that's why, for anything
you want to do, you have to havesomething bigger involved than
one of the things is your heart.
(06:40):
You have to really want to bethere so that when you get beat
up, you're going to get your assup and start swinging again, no
matter what, because you wantto be there.
If you don't want to be there,fuck, you're going to go
somewhere else, it's true.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
If you get hit like this.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
This is crazy.
So you have to be involved inthings that you don't mind
getting beat up at.
To be involved in things thatyou don't mind getting beat up
at, because, no matter what youdo, life's gonna be job.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
That's what it's here to do well, you gotta love yeah
, you gotta love the chaos of it, right?
Otherwise, like in real estate,I always tell my wife, and so
I'm uh, I'm 40 years old and soI got ways to go, hopefully,
here, but I tell her I want todo it for the rest of my life.
And so that's when I seesomebody like you that's been
successful for a long time andyou're still doing it at an
(07:31):
extremely high level.
Why would you do anything elseif you love what you're doing?
Speaker 3 (07:36):
The sitting on the beach sounds.
I mean, it's nice.
You need that at times, youknow, to recharge batteries.
But we're here to contribute,we're here to give, we're here
to help other people withsomething, and I think that's
why I think, old people getcranky.
They're not given to otherpeople in a way, whether it's
(07:56):
through real estate or whateverthat you're involved in and that
, I think, keeps me and exercise.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Oh, that's right.
Yeah, I wanted to ask you aboutthat because I'm the fattest
ultra marathon runner you evermeet.
Oh, really.
But you know, most of them arepretty lean like you.
From what I read, you're a biglong distance runner, I guess,
right.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Well, I ran all.
I was a short fat kid, so Idon't know if you're an old fat
guy.
And so I fight weight everysecond of my life.
It's just another little job.
It's sort of like women andsexual harassment, you know a
side job they always have.
(08:42):
There you go, there you go, andI just and when I got on the
navy I really want to loseweight.
The only way I did was byrunning, and I don't compete,
never, did, never.
Ran marathons, never.
But I'd run five, six miles aday and I did that for 50 years.
I think that's great, wow.
But now I mean the doctors atthe time when I was doing that
(09:04):
said oh you know, in your 40syou're going to have to quit,
yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Your knees.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Right Into my 70s.
And what stopped me was not themuscles, not the bones, nothing
, it's the brain.
Your brain doesn't work asquickly, so I was tripping and
falling on my nose three days ina row and I said this is it, I
can't do it and you can't reactfast enough and you know when
(09:33):
you're running and things, andespecially in an urban area, uh,
I just couldn't react.
I had to give it up, uh, andthen I started walking and I
would have to.
Walking six miles like takes ahalf a day, it's boring too.
Yeah, it's now.
I do ellipse, you know, in thegym.
And so I could burn 700 caloriesin an hour, so that's pretty
(09:55):
good.
And but then also what Ilearned I never did this, I was
never a weight guy.
You know, not weighing, butlifting higher.
And I started doing that and Iliked that.
I mean, I'm not a muscle guy,but it gives me more balance.
I found that very helpful usingthe weights for some reason,
(10:19):
and yeah, and I feel veryhealthy, very good.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
You look great.
You look great man.
You just made me think I didn'tknow.
You were a Navy guy too.
My brother's a chief in thenavy right now, so really.
Oh man, the chiefs run the navyyes, sir, yeah, he's pretty,
he's pretty proud of that.
He's well, I'm proud of him.
But but yeah, oh no, that'swonderful.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
No, I was there three years, two months, nine days,
okay, okay, but who was counting?
Speaker 1 (10:42):
well, I mean, and I I guess my my big question I
wanted to touch on and then Idefinitely want to get into some
of the grants and some of thespecific opportunities are
available for people in mynetwork right now and anybody.
But I was curious I waslistening to the Ted talk that
you did about 10 years back andyou mentioned that you had a
couple of businesses originallyand then it ultimately there was
(11:05):
some failure there.
Can you?
Tell me a little bit about that.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
The evolution yeah, well, I always wanted to start a
business.
I mean, that was it.
I was never a student, but whenI got out of the Navy I felt I
wanted to get an MBA and Ifinally found somebody to let me
in, because they wanted my GImoney.
Yeah, and graduate school it'seasy for some reason, and I had
(11:27):
trouble every class inundergraduate school.
Uh, so I got mba and I startedbusiness.
My mba was in computers.
I even had I started a computersoftware company that failed,
another company that failed.
I said this is crazy, yeah,crazy.
Then what really happened?
I was trying to do it like theytaught me in school.
(11:48):
I read in books and all thatkind of stuff.
When I was starting businessesI thought, whoa, who won?
I did all it by the rules andeverything like that.
I said God, I paid for all.
I got the LLCs and the fancyoffices and all that kind of
stuff and and I was sol and nomoney and no business and
(12:13):
business went out of business.
And who won?
the guys I bought all this stufffrom so the third time I said,
hey, you know, uh, and I didn'thave fun because I was doing it
like you're supposed to do andlike a robot kind of yeah right
(12:34):
and robotic about it, uh, nosoul in it.
And I said I'm not having funand I'm not succeeding.
So this is crazy.
Is life like not having fun andnot succeeding?
Then I said, well, you knowwhat?
I could have fun today andmaybe succeed or not.
Before I was not having fun andnot succeeding.
(12:56):
At least I'll have fun.
You get one out of two.
Yeah, I have fun.
When I started having fun.
That's when things changed.
Also, what changed is I started.
Okay, what's the most importantthing in a business?
It's not whether you're an LLCor I mean, it depends on the
business, of course, but most ofus that start, but it doesn't
matter you know, and you'reworried about the government
(13:18):
finding you, man, that theycan't deliver the mail on time.
It'd take them three years tofind you.
You know, if you didn'tregister or something like that,
you don't need to be an LLC.
Nobody calls me up hey, are youan LLC so I could buy your
product?
Nobody does that.
So I figured the only thingthat's important to your success
(13:39):
as a business is a customer.
everything else is croutons andthen the salad doesn't matter
yeah and if you don't have acustomer, you don't have a
business.
So to me it's also.
It's flipping around.
Now you have to get customersfirst.
What the hell's when people goout and spend all this money on
what they're going to do andwhat they're going to give and
(14:01):
everything, and then go lookcustomers, and customers don't
want to buy it you know, uh, andyou got to do that first, and
so much easier to do that nowthan ever before.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Uh, because before, at least when I grew up, not you
, if you remember, if you wantedto have a sell something, you
need a store yeah, well, youknow, let me ask you about that
because that's something I'vebeen just personally talking a
lot about lately, because it'sfunny for me.
So I got in, I started buyingreal estate when I was 19 and I
(14:31):
started in.
Well, yeah, it was a $300 lotin Denny, new Mexico, so it's
not that impressive.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
but Wow, hey, anything is impressive if you're
doing it.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
No, thank you.
Well, funny for me as somebodythat I used to be the young guy.
Now I see all these peopleyounger than me and the tech
industry.
I always looked at it as a hugeasset that, like you just said,
makes everything so much easier.
But I think it's getting sotech heavy, we're losing a
little bit of the human to humanAbsolutely.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Absolutely no, and it's that way with information.
Now it's so tech oriented.
People are just using thetechnology to find opportunities
and stuff like that, and that'swrong, because if you go to
Google, all you're going to findis ways to spend money.
Yeah, google wants to get moneyfrom you, and so there's no
(15:23):
opportunities there, andparticularly there's no
opportunity if you don't havemoney.
So what are you going to do inthis country if you don't have
money and you want to start areal estate business or
something like that?
Now, I mean real estate.
I mean I think there's a lot ofopportunities coming up in real
estate.
That's going to be at locallevel, okay, yeah, and if you're
(15:45):
in real estate, I'd start, nomatter who's in, who's you know
well, we know who won, but nomatter who won, we have to
concentrate on real estate.
We need more of that stuffBecause we don't have enough
housing.
It's too expensive and they'llcome through from the federal
government, but locally, likeright now I keep running into,
here's a Toledo.
(16:06):
Toledo just got a milliondollars for people to buy old
homes and that's grant money.
So you don't have to pay back,that's for investors like you,
and then $250,000 to renovatethe homes to make them sellable.
So you create housing.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
You're going to have to tell me about that one more,
yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:27):
Well, here's what it is.
It's different everywhere.
Everyone's going to bedifferent.
The thing is, you want to knowwhere those things are coming
from and where they are and it'sgovernment, so it's going to be
in your county.
You want to go to your countyand you could call 211, call 211
and ask for the countygovernment for your county, and
(16:51):
the key word is communitydevelopment.
That's where most of this stuffcomes from.
Ok, community development.
You want to make an appointmentwith the bureaucrat that
community development money withthe bureaucrat in charge of
that community development money.
You don't have to be.
They have to talk to you asmuch as they do to Donald Trump.
You know, yeah, and they'reavailable to you, and if they
(17:16):
ever have a meeting for peopleto apply for something, show up
at that meeting, yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Well, let me ask cause it's a unique niche, right
, and I would have to admit well, and actually, do you know the
number of, uh, roughly how manygrants you've helped people get
in the last 40 years?
Here?
It's got to be billions, rightoh, absolutely no.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
I I've sold four or five million books you know, uh,
you know, and what's nice nowwhat I have is a service for
twenty dollars, and I get morepersonal satisfaction that
because we have a service nowfor twenty dollars, other people
help you.
Besides me, we have membershelping members.
(17:58):
We got about 15 000 people nowand they help each other get
grants.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
So and that's the lescoehelpcom.
I think I saw it.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
Yeah, right, and they're better than I am because
I've been doing this 50 years,so you're just starting.
It's hard to me to relate tosomebody just starting how to
spell grant.
Speaker 1 (18:18):
Yeah, sure, sure.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
And so someone who's so excited they just found out
the first time themselves.
Speaker 1 (18:24):
Yeah, Well, it's kind of hard to believe, right like
when you first hear it.
For you it's old hat at thispoint because you've been doing
it and you've seen it besuccessful.
But I remember watching yourstuff then and I was like man,
like can I really get 1200 forxyz, you know, and is that the
biggest if?
Speaker 3 (18:40):
you if you call mary gallagher, just a deal.
That's better than me, you know, because I'm selling you
something and that's what isimportant and that's what I
think stops.
And people and people go togoogle to look yeah, and you'll
never find anything there anyway.
It's a fire hose of informationand that's why it's people you
(19:02):
have to talk to people.
Here's another thing, I thinkfor business, everybody should
know that we have the governmenthires mentors for any kind of
business for free for you tohelp you find money.
Help you find money, legal help, any kind of help you need for
free, and the SBA runs a website.
(19:22):
You got to write this down, soit's sbagov, and then slash
local dash assistance.
Local dash assistance is allsmall letters.
Speaker 1 (19:38):
And for everybody watching this on YouTube, I'll
put this in the description link, all the links that we're
talking about.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
I'll put this in the description link, all the links
that we're talking about, andyou put in your zip code.
And you put in your zip codeand they'll show you local
organizations that getgovernment funding.
These are experts in startingand expanding any businesses and
knowing the resources for youto help, and all the free
resources not Google will helpyou with 2 million resources, or
(20:06):
2 billion.
I'm telling you the truth.
That will all cost you money.
These people know thegovernment and nonprofit
organizations that give money,and that's where you get and
their services for free, andthat's where you want to make
appointments with them, say yourbusiness, real estate or
(20:33):
whatever and and understand howthey could help you.
You don't ask them for money.
You ask them for help, andthat's the important thing,
because they point you tosources, uh, and then, if you
ask them for money, they say, no, we don't have money, so you go
away.
No, what they have, though, isvery important, more important
than money, and so you, you'regonna get get.
You know you're going to loseout that way, so it's so
important to do that, and it'sall free and I'm sure, as a real
(20:57):
estate, yeah, I mean, that'sthe best place, and actually,
for community development officeis the other porthole for doing
that to try to find localprograms.
Now there will be dozens more.
There's probably about 70 or 80local programs in every city
(21:18):
that are government-related.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
And this is all over the country.
This isn't just like LA and NewYork, oh, absolutely.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
Every city, county, whatever, definitely, and it's
all free country.
This isn't just like la and newyork.
Absolutely every city, county,whatever, uh, definitely, um,
and it's all free.
And I mean trump.
His whole family business isbuilt on government programs.
There has been so good at it.
He was investigated all thetime yeah, that's a story for
another.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
Yeah, I mean what?
What percentage?
Because I know there's justthousands and thousands of these
grants out there.
What percentage go unclaimed?
Do a lot of them just sit there?
Speaker 3 (21:53):
A lot.
Yes, it really depends, buteven the more common ones.
Speaker 1 (21:58):
I mean.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
I got listings that you know anywhere from 20 to 30
percent of the people that areeligible don't apply.
That's the more thing.
How much of the people eligibledon't apply?
And, by the way, another littletip is good.
You're a real estate developerand you go to the county and
you're not getting theinformation you need.
(22:20):
Yankee around, you call thisnumber 202-224-3121.
202-224-3121.
Now that's the Capitol Hillswitchboard.
Ok, you want to call them andask for your elected official?
(22:42):
You have two senators and onecongressman.
You could ask for all three orjust go down the list.
You call.
I would start at the senatorsbecause they have bigger staffs
and say, hey, this county ismessing me over.
Speaker 1 (22:58):
See, they have that Not to cut you off.
We're doing a development inBend Oregon right now and it's
been a huge pain, so I'll takeall the help I can get.
So yeah, Absolutely no.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
You, you, you and you go right down the lever.
Here's how to find out all yourelected officials you go to
commoncauseorg, Okay, and youput in your zip code and you'll
see, you know not only thefederal, but the county
officials, the state officials,and you just bug every one of
(23:31):
them but it's true, because, ok,that's a program and they want
to help you do something good.
So they, so everybody involvedwith your program lives there,
will vote for them.
Yeah that's what it's all aboutRight, exactly, program lives
there will vote for them.
Yeah, that's what it's allabout.
Right, exactly so.
And then what's so neat?
When they do you a favor likeyou're gonna vote for that son
of a bitch, no matter what?
Speaker 1 (23:52):
oh, you sure would.
Yeah, I don't care what sideyou're on.
Yeah, you give me free money.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
Yeah, this is how they get re-elected.
I mean, I I'm looking at aletter here I just got from a
congressman's office.
Congress Congressman Dan Ryandelivers on a promise of
government that works for allsectors, secures $30 million
owed to constituents by federalgovernment.
Here, congressman Ryan, histeam of expert caseworkers
(24:21):
secured $30 million owed topeople in his constituency and
he also got money for businesses, for nonprofits, for everybody.
Oh yeah, here For businesses,organizations, communities he
got another $21 million for them.
(24:41):
See, that's the system.
This is why Elon Musk ishanging around Donald Trump.
The biggest pot of money is inthe government.
Speaker 1 (24:55):
Even the guy who's worth $250 billion or whatever
it is.
Yeah, that's interesting,because that's one of the things
we're passionate about on thereal estate investing and just
investing in general, is thatthere's a small percentage of
people that have access to theknowledge that most of us don't
get, and so is it true with thegrants, too, then, that some of
(25:15):
the people at the top are theones utilizing these the most Is
that?
Speaker 3 (25:19):
No, I mean yes because they're asking for it.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Yeah yeah, because they know.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yeah, you didn't ask for it.
You went to Google and thinkyou could find a place to ask
for it, and you can't.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Yeah, does it help you at all that you're in DC?
That's just a coincidence.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Well, it is a coincidence.
You don't have to be, but itdoes in a way, because it's so
organically, I learn more abouthow the government works.
I mean, I run into people atparties who work for some agency
, so there's some osmosis that Ijust get comfortable with the
(25:59):
bureaucracy by living here.
People outside have this visionknow some dragon or whatever.
yeah, that stops them, I mean mymembers.
They're just afraid to evencall the government.
You know and you don't.
I mean, these are people thatyou and me doing it and you know
(26:20):
, I just know so many of them.
It's just simple for me, uh.
But if you haven't, you have,you know, a mental thing
stopping you.
And once you get over that andsay, holy shit, this works, then
you're not going to stop.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Let me ask you I'm sure this is probably one of the
questions you get asked themost, but for everybody that
gets to listen to this or watchthis in my network are there
again.
I know it's tailored to yourspecific situation to some
extent, and I know that there'sthousands of these all the time,
but are there any grants rightnow that just pretty much
anybody could get if they wantedto, or any that you're really
(27:00):
excited about that you want tohighlight?
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Well, I think the most exciting thing for the
average person out there issomething called findhelporg.
Okay, are you online now?
Yes, sir, okay, go tofindhelporg.
Okay, put in your zip code okay, okay, say you, you, you own a
(27:31):
lot of property, okay, uh, so,and you people can't pay your
rent yeah okay, put in rent uh,let's see, I got housing goods,
health money open the uh.
Up the left hand corner there'sa little search thing.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
You see that uh, yeah , I did.
I did that.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
It said there's 2379 programs in my okay okay, now
after look up in that left-handcorner again, okay, and put in
the keyword rent okay, oh, homerenters yep home and renters
insurance how many do you havethere now?
Speaker 1 (28:12):
let's see 32 programs .
Speaker 3 (28:16):
Okay.
So there's 32 programs in yourzip code to help people pay
their rent.
So if you have a renter thatcan't pay their rent, you say
start calling these.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Gosh.
Well, you're going to make mepopular with my tenants.
Yeah, Exactly.
Speaker 3 (28:33):
Yeah, they don't know and they're hiding or whatever,
and that's too bad.
Yeah, here I saw one, a newprogram I forget where it is a
new program, I forget where itis that a lot of landlords don't
want to take vouchers.
(28:54):
Section 8 vouchers yeah, yeah,so what they're doing is giving
the landlords $2,000 so theytake the vouchers.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Oh well, hey, okay, good, yeah see.
Speaker 3 (29:05):
I mean, it's that kind of stuff that's happening
all the time.
It's underneath the radar.
It's amazing the opportunitiesthat are out there and you just
got to stay away from Google.
Speaker 1 (29:21):
Well, yeah, you're going to a place that's designed
to extract money from you, notgive money, like you said.
One more question, backing up alittle bit how did you
personally get into the grants?
Was there, did you get oneyourself, or what was it that?
I mean, I got a bunch.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
I don't need them anymore.
Actually, a recent one I gotwas uh, uh, a covid from the sba
gave me twenty20,000.
Okay.
Yeah, so you're still gettingthem yourself Wow, okay, yeah,
and I didn't need it.
Yeah.
And so, instead of sending itback, I said I'm going to use
(29:58):
this to give grants to mymembers.
See, my members need money.
Yeah, that's why I only charge$20, and they're all looking for
it.
So what I started as a grantprogram, give me one sentence
what you would use with $1,000and we'll give out the $20,000.
And that went over so well now,and the business is profitable.
(30:20):
I never thought it would becharging only $20.
And so now we give $70,000 outjust to members every month.
Speaker 1 (30:27):
Oh wow, yeah, I mean wow yeah.
I mean that's amazing.
And all they have to do is justsay here's what I'll do if you
give it to me.
Speaker 3 (30:33):
Yeah, one sentence, that's great, and I thought you
had to be Bezos or somebody todo something like this.
But yeah, I mean just a littleschmuck like me giving out
grants.
It just amazes me.
My people need it.
(30:56):
I mean, we have.
I don't know if it means muchat all, but half this country
cannot afford a $500 bill.
If the bill came in theirmailbox, you know that they owe
$500, they don't have that money.
That's half the country and wehave a lot of poor people.
We are, of all the countriesthat are developed, the
(31:17):
developed countries, that'sabout 30.
We are number two in ourpoverty rate.
That means the percentage ofpeople that are in poverty.
That means the percentage ofpeople that are in poverty we're
the second largest.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
The largest is Costa Rica.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
I was just going to ask you the largest, and I said
God, we're only number two, wegot to get out there and become
number one.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
No well, it's amazing too.
There really is a great dividein in our country with
information, I think, more thananything else right, which is
key thing.
Speaker 3 (31:56):
That's what keeps me going, because, like this,
people have funny money problemand they go to google and you
just got a worse money problemand that's what we're trained to
do.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
Right, it's all by design.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Yeah, absolutely so.
It gives me something to do for10, 12 years.
Yes, sir.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
Well, hopefully longer than that, but I mean no,
but that's why people like youare so important.
And, like I said, that was me.
I mean I moved 33 times beforeI was 18 and we never owned
anything.
And then I see people likeyourself on television.
I go gosh, wow.
So you're telling me it'spossible to do X, y, z, and just
that knowledge that it'spossible is a big deal.
(32:35):
It's helpful, exactly.
I have two more questions foryou and then I'll leave you
alone.
That's okay.
You mentioned the lescohelpcom,which I think that sounds
incredible.
So, if I'm hearing you right?
Speaker 3 (32:47):
Oh yeah, Make sure we send you a free link to get
into it so you can look around.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, that'd be great .
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
And basically, if I'm hearing you right, how that
works, there's a lot ofeducational content there.
There's probably some links toresources, but then really, yes,
and more than that.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
That's where you apply to our grants.
That's where, but they're forpaying members, but also it's
one-on-one help.
I'm on there answeringquestions and every day we have
probably two, three, four hoursof members who help other
members with questions.
(33:23):
That's great, and we're alwaysloading it up with new programs.
Speaker 1 (33:28):
Sounds really effective, because then it can
be tailored to whoever'sspecific situation Exactly.
Speaker 3 (33:34):
That's what I think.
Tell me what you need, We'llnarrow it down.
Now what we're trying to do isget people to get on the phone.
People have this fear oftalking, particularly the
government bureaucrat yeah, Allthese people and ask them for
help.
People want to help becauseit's human nature and you have
(33:55):
to give them an opportunity.
And then also see, calling agovernment agency for help is
different than calling somebodya salesman.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
Yeah, it is.
Speaker 3 (34:06):
You're not going to get hung up on when you're
asking Exactly Because asalesman wants to get hung up on
when you're asking, exactlybecause a salesman you know
wants to get money from you, sothey're going to kiss your ass
right.
Uh, the government officialgets paid no matter what, so you
don't control anything on them.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Well like you said it can be a benefit to them
because if they help you thenyou're another vote that's going
to be in there, exactly.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Now, that's the elected officials, but the
people down really writing thechecks are different, and that's
why they had to be extra niceto them, okay.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Well, and then, aside from the let's go helpcom there
, do you work with people on aone-on-one coaching basis?
Speaker 3 (34:45):
What are the others That'seHelpcom is one-on-one.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Basically it is, I guess.
Yeah, it's just on a wide scale.
So that's the program at thispoint.
Speaker 3 (34:54):
People don't want to join.
You can learn a lot what I doon YouTube, so it's YouTubecom.
Matthew Lescoe, one word, and Iput links in there like we're
talking now and everything.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Yeah, links in there like we're talking now and
everything, yeah, and you've gotabout 280,000 subscribers on
there.
It's a pretty massive following.
Well, perfect, my friend.
Is there anything else that Ihaven't asked you that you'd
want to share with my audience?
Speaker 3 (35:18):
Well, remember this is your government.
You should use it.
You pay for it.
The rich people are using thehell out of it and it's there
for everybody and there's nomagic to it.
It's just maybe a pain in theass.
So you may have to take a halfa dozen phone calls to get the
right, but that's life.
You're going to have to do thatcall in Comcast too.
Speaker 1 (35:39):
Yeah, and Comcast doesn't give you two grand at
the end of it, exactly, comcastis only going to take your money
and still pay any ass work then.
Well hey, thank you very muchfor doing this, matthew.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
It's my pleasure.
Yeah, nice to meet you.
Well, have fun real estate.
I guess you will.
You've been at it a long time,since 19.
Good for you.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Hopefully I'll be doing it for another 40, 50
years here, I hope.
I think it'll still beimportant.
All right, well, thank you,mike, thank you.
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