In this week's episode, we interview Richard Ficca, owner of Florida Coastal Insurance.
Rich is a friend, referral partner, and mentor. Rich has built a multi-million dollar insurance company. He's been in the insurance industry for over 21 years, 15 of that as an instructor for other insurance agencies. Rich is also an insurance agency valuation expert.
Rich talks all about hurricane preparedness, but brings it into the 21st Century. You'll hear Rich's explanation of:
- How to document all of the stuff in your home.
- What apps you should have on your phone.
- Using a thumb-drive to store your personal information.
- Why you should buy a $5 power strip.
You can contact Rich at www.FloridaCoastalInsuranceAgency.com, or email him at Richard@FloridaCoastalInsuranceAgency.com, or call Rich at 727-569-6000 x 101.
What are some of your best Hurricane tips? Email me at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com
We recently had our neighborhood garage sale, and it occurred to me that I could use that opportunity to practice my negotiation skills with very little risk.
When negotiating, you need to have two things in mind:
1. What is your price (either as a buyer or as a seller)? Know your value and be confident about it. When dealing with a creditor, know your financial information, so you can be confident in the settlement offer to the creditor.
2. There is value in taking less or compromising - a value to "not put it back in the garage." When settling debt, there is a value to getting the creditor to go away, even if the creditor is asking for more than what you want to pay. What is the opportunity cost inherent in settlement? What is the emotional value to settle?
If you have questions regarding debt settlement, please contact me at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com.
In this week's episode, we interview Tom Wolf, a business coach, author and speaker here in the Tampa Bay area.
Tom's business excels at helping business owners to leverage themselves, so they can work on their business instead of in their business. Tom has an interesting and diverse background. He has owned an IT Staffing Company, 10 Great Clips Franchises. Tom has a lot of experience in building and selling companies.
Now Tom focuses on finding your purpose and has a 7-step program to answer the question, "who am I and why am I here?" Tom also has a work-book related to his coaching program.
To contact Tom or Pam Wolf, you can get ahold of them at:
You can contact me at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com
Another week, another listener question.
In this episode we answer a realtor question: "How does someone rent out a house in Foreclosure? Is this a scam? It is in the MLS"
Interestingly, this is not, necessarily, a legal question. It may be a moral question.
What do you think? Let me know if you think it should be proper to rent out your house while the house is in foreclosure.
In this week's episode, we answer a question from a listener in Colorado.
"I no where near the point of bankruptcy, but my husband and I have a lot of debt and are treading water trying to stay afloat most of the time. Any tips on consolidating debt or getting things paid off quickly for the self-employed."
First, the laws are different between Colorado and Florida.
Second, what type of debt are we dealing with - unsecured debt, secured debt, student loans, IRS, credit cards, hospital bills, etc.?
In this episode, we answer the listener questions with some tips on consolidating and ultimately crushing your debt.
Please share this episode on social media if you enjoy the content!
You can contact me at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com
Would you like to write a book in seven hours or less? Do you want a system to get a professionally-published book in seven hours or less?
This week's guest is Nick Raithel of The Seven Hour Book. Nick can put together content, create graphics, help with publishing, and anything else necessary to get a book completed that you write!
So how does this have to do with Crushing Debt? Writing a book will position you as a leader in your industry, thus generating direct revenue (from book sales) or indirect revenue (through search engine optimization, speaking engagements, etc.). In addition, providing material through a published book is a way to give back to the community by sharing information.
You can reach Nick by going to his website www.contentcorps.net.
If you have questions about becoming a published author in 7 hours or less, please contact Nick.
If you have questions that I can answer, please contact me at www.YesnerLaw.com. If you want more information about our upcoming book, Crushing Debt, please email me directly at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com with the subject line "Crushing Debt Book."
Episode 63 of the Crushing Debt Podcast is our interview with Juliet Kyes of ActionCOACH Tampa Bay.
One way to eliminate debt is to work with a business coach and ActionCOACH Tampa Bay is one of the best, not only in the Tampa Bay area, but also within the ActionCOACH Franchise.
Juliet and I discuss:
- The Five Ways, which is an ActionCOACH system designed to help increase results in business.
- The ActionCOACH library of materials.
- OMG! WTF? What's the Focus?: A Guide for Building an Actionable Business Plan by the ActionCOACH Tampa Bay team. You can find it here on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/OMG-WTF-Whats-Focus-Actionable/dp/0692443290/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1495052695&sr=8-1&keywords=juliet+kyes
And other great material!
You can reach Juliet by going to her website: www.ActionCOACHTampaBay.com
You can reach us at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com
In this week's episode, we explain the difference between an Eviction, and Ejectment and an Unlawful Detainer lawsuit.
Sometimes, landlords and even Courts and attorneys confuse the difference between the three types of cases.
All three types of lawsuits accomplish the same goal - getting someone or something off or out of the owner's property. However, how we get there is different for each type of lawsuit.
We hope you enjoy this week's episode. Please let us know if you have any questions - shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com
In this week's episode of the Crushing Debt Podcast, we interview Andrew Gordon with Reliable Claims Adjusting. Andrew is a Public Adjuster - meaning he works for the insured (the homeowner) versus the insurance company.
Andrew is the insured's advocate against the insurance company to maximize recovery when there is a loss that is covered by insurance.
In this week's episode, we discuss some things people can do to protect themselves either before or after a loss has occurred. Andrew also discovers a few of his success stories.
If you've suffered a loss to your home, or what to know what to do in the event you suffer a loss at your house, contract Andrew at 813-786-5771 or http://www.reliableclaimsadjusting.com/
To contact Yesner Law, please email Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com.
I polled a group of about 100 FL Realtors on which residential real estate contract is better for Buyers or Sellers, the "As-Is" Contract or the Repair Limit contract. The answers are in this week's Crushing Debt Podcast!
I regularly speak at BABA (Become A Better Agent) for Insured Title Company. The last time I spoke, we debated the pros and cons of the two versions of the Florida Real Estate Contract in use by most FL Realtors.
The "As-Is" contract gives the buyer the right to cancel the contract after doing inspections, if the Buyer finds that the property is not acceptable.
The "Repair Limit" contract allows the seller to fix the property up to a certain repair limit. If the repairs exceed that limit, either party can cancel the contract, or the Buyer can agree to make repairs in excess of the dollar repair limit.
Which do you think is better for Sellers? Which do you think is better for Buyers?
Email me at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com
Episode 59 of the Crushing Debt Podcast is a great interview with Jason Crawford. Jason's company is called Fierce, Inc., and they help clients with visual marketing.
Fierce, Inc. takes your message, your vision and mission, and describes those things visually, to create more engagement with your customers, clients, referral sources, and the general public.
We talk about social media, Facebook Live, content creation, and other engagement topics.
To contact Jason, visit his website at www.wearefierce.net or JCrawford@wedarefierce.net, or his phone number is 813-789-5773.
To contact us, please email Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com.
In Episode 58 of The Crushing Debt podcast, we discuss a case called In Re: Failla. This case impacts both bankruptcy and foreclosure cases in Florida, and was a win for lenders, against homeowners and borrowers.
Mr. and Mrs. Failla bought a house in Boca Raton, Florida. Eventually circumstances caused them to fall behind on their mortgage and the bank filed a foreclosure. The Faillas then decided to eliminate their debts in bankruptcy, including stating their intent to "surrender" their house to the mortgage company.
However, when the bank proceeded to foreclose, based on the Failla's intent to surrender the house, the Faillas fought the foreclosure case. The bank objected to the Failla's actions. The case found its way to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, GA (which governs bankruptcy and Federal Court cases in Florida, Georgia and Alabama). The decision is from October 2016 and now, unfortunately, means that when someone in bankruptcy indicates an intent to "surrender" the house, they're no longer allowed to later defend the foreclosure case.
Do you agree with the Court's decision?
Please let us know at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com.
Regular listeners to the Crushing Debt Podcast know that we are HUGE fans of AFLAC.
In this week's episode, we interview Brian Morris, We talk about a very personal story about why Brian became an AFLAC Agent.
AFLAC helps people with short term disability for accidents, cancer, and other situations. AFLAC pays money to bridge the gap between the promise of health insurance, and the protection of health insurance.
Not only is Brian responsible for helping business owners and individuals obtain AFLAC, he is also responsible for growing his AFLAC team here in the Tampa area.
If you are interested in AFLAC, either to purchase a policy or become part of Brian's team, please contact him at 727-492-9960 or David_Morris@us.AFLAC.com (Brian's first name is actually David).
To contact us, please reach out at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com.
In Florida, there is a committee made up of 10 Realtors and 10 attorneys that get together every few years to review the standard form contract in use by most residential real estate agents in Florida. The contract is called the FAR/BAR (Florida Association of Realtors / Florida Bar). The intent of the contract is to provide a fill-in-the-blank form for Realtors to use to avoid an allegation of the unlicensed practice of law.
In this week's episode, we discuss some of the major changes that just went into effect on April 4, 2017, including:
This is not an exhaustive list of all the changes. If you have questions about interpretation of the revised FAR/BAR, or any real estate contract, commercial or residential, please reach out to us at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com.
In Episode 55 of the Podcast, we interview Marielis Rivera, a personal injury attorney with the firm of Pipas Law Group.
Like me, Marielis started on the "other side" representing insurance companies being sued by injured parties. Now, however, Marielis represents only injured parties.
Many times, injured parties are unable to work because of their injuries and, when income drops, there is a ton of stress in addition to their injuries. Marielis does a great job of informing her clients of their options and helps her clients to manage their debts until the lawsuit is over.
You can contact Marielis on her cell phone at 813-509-6606, or on Facebook.
You can contact us at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or www.yesnerlaw.com. We would appreciate if you would leave a positive review of the Crushing Debt Podcast if you enjoy the content, and ask a friend to subscribe and listen to our weekly episodes!
In this episode of the podcast, we talk about a former client and an aggressive strategy we used to eliminate a potential mortgage deficiency.
The client was divorced and her ex-husband kept the property. The problem for our client was that she was still on the Promissory Note and Mortgage. The divorce did not (and can not) eliminate her liability to the lender under the promissory note and mortgage.
Years later, the husband passed away and the bank, in this case a credit union, pursued the ex-wife for foreclosure. Credit Unions never (in our experience) waive deficiency, so our client was still financially responsible to pay any deficiency to the Credit Union.
The client did not qualify for Chapter 7, so we filed a Chapter 13 reorganization (or payment plan) bankruptcy, with the hope that the Credit Union failed to file a claim in the bankruptcy case (meaning the Credit Union would not get paid).
It is an aggressive strategy because if the Credit Union had filed a claim in the bankruptcy case, they would have been entitled to payment and the payments to the bankruptcy court would have been unaffordable.
We hope you enjoy this week's episode. If you have questions about how we were able to help her and why it is an aggressive strategy, please listen to the episode, or send us an email - shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com.
Welcome to Year 2 of the podcast. As you have seen from previous episodes, we have re-branded the podcast and it is now The Crushing Debt Podcast, where our goal is to help you eliminate the financial bullies in your life.
This week's episode is a review of the different laws that expired at the end of 2016, and some new case law that impacts foreclosure defense in 2017 and going forward, unless or until the Supreme Court makes a conflicting decision.
What did we lose? HAMP which helped with modifications, HARP which helped with refinances, HAFA which helped with short sales, and the Mortgage Debt Relief Act, which made mortgage and foreclosure deficiencies non-taxable.
In addition, we discuss the Bartram case, which has a huge impact on foreclosure law here in Florida.
We hope you enjoy the content, and we ask that you share this post and episode if you think the content has value!
You can reach me at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com
Welcome to the last episode of the first year of the podcast!
In this week's episode, we have a repeat guest, Jason Avery of Avery Construction and Constructing Debt. However, in this episode of the podcast, we talk to Jason about Room Full of Referrals provided by Jason through the company, Asentiv.
In Room Full of Referrals, we learn that people are faster paced or slower paced, people oriented or task oriented. The seminar is highly useful in determining your own style, learning the behavioral style of other people, and how to use that information to better connect, and generate better referrals.
Jason was my jury consultant a while back and used his behavioral style analysis to help me pick the right jury and win my case! I also utilize tactic learned in Room Full of Referrals to better connect with potential clients and customers. In Room Full of Referrals we learn the Platinum Rule. Everyone knows the Golden Rule - treat others the way you want to be treated. The Platinum Rule is to treat others how they want to be treated.
To reach me, please email Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com. As this is Episode 52, we want to continue to provide value to you, our listeners. Please let us know what you like about the podcast, what we can improve about the podcast, and what you want us to keep the same about the podcast.
In this week's episode, we interview attorney Kelly Petry. Kelly and I discuss issues with Student Loans.
Kelly and I discuss whether student loans are dischargeable in bankruptcy court, how student loans are treated in bankruptcy court, and some things that we can do in bankruptcy court to address the debtor's student loans.
In certain circumstances, student loans are dischargeable. In Tampa, we utilize the Brunner Test to determine whether a student loan can be eliminated by the bankruptcy court. However, there is a very high standard to discharge a student loan in bankruptcy court.
The Brunner factors are: (1) debtor cannot maintain a minimal standard of living if forced to repay the loans, (2) there are additional circumstances that show the debtor's financial condition is going to persist for the foreseeable future, and (3) that the debtor has tried to repay the student loan.
While the standard is high, there have been some inroads and Congress is currently trying to determine if they can provide additional assistance to people trying to repay their student loans.
To contact Kelly, please call her at 813-873-0713.
If you have questions, please email me at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com, or www.yesnerlaw.com. Please also share this podcast episode if you found it valuable!
Student loan debt is becoming unduly burdensome. Student loan debt is quickly becoming the biggest area of debt for borrowers who are having trouble making their monthly obligations.
Christie and her firm can help people eliminate or negotiate student loan debt that was taken out by a parent or co-borrower for the student, or for schools that have closed. In addition, outside of bankruptcy court, there are other options to help students eliminate, reduce or negotiate their student loans. Of course, if the borrower can prove "undue hardship" those cases may be dischargeable in bankruptcy court, but that is a high standard and rare.
As you will hear there are many other avenues available to help people negotiate or eliminate their student loan debts, under various federal programs.
We appreciate Christie being on the podcast. We have referred her clients who have been very happy with her services.
Christie offers free consultations and phone consultations. To reach her, please call 813-258-2808 or www.ChristieArkovich.com, www.TampaBankruptcyLawyer.com. Check out her student loan survival package on her website!
If you have questions for me, or other topics that you would like to hear on the podcast, please contact me at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com or www.YesnerLaw.com.
In Episode 49 of the Podcast, I discuss the case Bartram v. US Bank National Association, which was decided by the Florida Supreme Court in November 2016.
Bartram is a significant decision in Florida because the FL Supreme Court holds that the bank can file a second foreclosure case, after dismissing its first foreclosure case, even if the date that the borrowers stopped making payments is beyond Florida's five-year statute of limitations.
For whatever reason, some banks decide to dismiss foreclosure cases when those cases have a technical deficiency (ownership of the promissory note for example). If it took the bank too long to fix that issue, so that the date of default became more than five years old, some courts in Florida held that the bank could not foreclose again (because the default date was more than 5 years old). Bartram reversed that line of thinking and, because it was decided by the Supreme Court of the State of Florida, that is now the "law of the land" in Florida.
The Court did say that any payments that were past due more than 5 years are uncollectible as being beyond the 5-year statute of limitations, but the foreclosure itself could proceed as long as the bank alleged a default date that was within the five years - meaning the bank would simply waive any late payments that are more than five years past due and continue their foreclosure. Already we've seen a slight increase in foreclosure filed under these circumstances.
To learn more, please visit our website at www.yesnerlaw.com. Or if you have questions, please email me directly at Shawn@Yesnerlaw.com.
Also note we are changing the name and branding of the Podcast to Crushing Debt. You'll hear the name change in Episodes 53 and beyond. We've updated the logo with this episode and would appreciate any feedback!
In this Episode of the podcast, we have our friend Tiffanie Kellog back for an interview. Tiffanie has a new book out, Knock the Socks off your Audience, to go along with her first book 4 1/2 Networking Mistakes and its accompanying workbook, Networking for Results.
In this episode of the podcast, Tiffanie turns the tables and interviews me on what makes a good referral for Yesner Law, using some of the techniques she writes about in her books.
You can find and order Tiffanie's books on Amazon.
If you want to contact me, you can email me at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or visit the website at www.yesnerlaw.com.
Please leave a review or comment if you enjoy the content.
In this week's episode of the Podcast, we again interview our friend Loren Pincus. In addition to being a personal injury and criminal law attorney, Loren is also a sports agent for Minor League Baseball.
Loren has a few clients who may get called up to the big leagues, moving Loren to the big leagues as an agent himself. While Loren is a fantastic attorney, you can hear in his voice that being a baseball agent is his true passion.
This was one of my most interesting interviews and one I enjoyed the most. Loren talks about what it takes to be a sports agent, particularly in Minor and Major League Baseball.
You can learn more about Loren at www.GreenLineSportsManagement.com, or follow him on twitter @Greenlinesm.
If you have any questions, you can email me at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com or visit our website at www.YesnerLaw.com.
When a small business owner files bankruptcy, their company becomes an asset of the bankruptcy case. Therefore, the business owner needs to evaluate the value of the business.
Some business owners want to say that their small business is worth nothing because if they don't work, the company doesn't make money and is worth nothing. However, the bankruptcy judges and trustees in Tampa will not accept that argument, because the business has value. What would a competitor pay to buy the business? What is the value of the assets of the business? What are its receivables? What are its revenues? Its profits?
In this episode of the podcast, we review all of these different valuation techniques in connection with business owners who want to file personal bankruptcy.
If you have questions that you think would make a great future episode, please let me know at Shawn@YesnerLaw.com. You can also visit our website at www.yesnerlaw.com.
In this week's episode, I have a conversation with Tyler Sheff of The Cash Flow Guys. Tyler is a real estate investor, coach, consultant, podcast host, and most importantly a friend and mentor to me personally.
Tyler is one of the real estate investors that does it right. He always looks for a win-win scenario and coaches his students in the right way to buy and invest in real estate (i.e. without taking advantage of anyone).
Tyler refers customers, clients and investors to Yesner Law and we very much appreciate the referral relationship we've created with The Cash Flow Guys.
We recently acquired equipment that allows us to conduct podcast interviews by skype and Tyler was kind enough to be a guinea pig. This episode is the result. We hope you enjoy the content, and visit Tyler's website for more information.
I can always be reached at shawn@yesnerlaw.com and www.yesnerlaw.com.