Latest / None of Your Business Podcast / The Man Behind ASK TOMER
Transcript
- 0:00And that night, I saw videos and I saw people walking around with
- 0:05tag, I'm a kidney donor. And another, another guy's
- 0:08walking around. I'm a recipient.
- 0:11I was like, wow. And I was 3030 years old at the
- 0:14time. And I told my wife, why don't I
- 0:17donate a kidney? I can't believe you really want
- 0:21to go through this. I'm like, yeah, you're like,
- 0:22you're not drunk. None of your business, Oshi.
- 0:28None of your business, Michael. It's the None of Your Business
- 0:31podcast hosted by Michael Anoshi.
- 0:36Welcome back everybody to another amazing episode of the
- 0:40None of Your Business podcast. Thank you for joining.
- 0:42I'm your host, Michael Greenfield.
- 0:44Joined with me is Ushi Schwartz. This episode is sponsored by the
- 0:49Serenity Healthcare Center, which we'll get into later
- 0:51during our commercial break and of course, the Prime Source
- 0:53production team. Thank you to all of our
- 0:56followers and listeners. We ask you to please subscribe,
- 0:59comment, get involved. We enjoy your feedback and we're
- 1:02growing together on our journey. Today we are joined by the
- 1:07person that told me my first dirty joke when I.
- 1:11Was a sleepaway camp. And I was nine years old.
- 1:14Tomer Naftali, welcome to the. Program, Thank you.
- 1:16Thank you for having me. You're one of the most spiritual
- 1:18people I know and right, so journey.
- 1:21So like, what was that like? It was definitely a beautiful I,
- 1:26I don't want to call it a roller coaster because it wasn't a
- 1:28roller coaster, but, but as soon as we moved to the States, I was
- 1:33sent to public school. Actually, I was sent to yeshiva.
- 1:35We went, I went to Hawk Heber Academy of West Queens.
- 1:39I was there for a year. I couldn't stand it.
- 1:41I hated it so much so that I took, you know, and in the
- 1:47bakery they would have or the pizza shops, they would wrap the
- 1:51pizza box with, with a white string.
- 1:54I would take those strings and put them here in the side.
- 1:57So it's it was Cetus because we had a very annoying teacher that
- 2:01would come in every day and check, are you right, Cetus?
- 2:05So we just checked the string. So that's what I had because I
- 2:07couldn't stand it. I could.
- 2:08I hated it. That's terrible.
- 2:10The teacher would actually check.
- 2:11Yeah, yeah, that. And she was a time for domining
- 2:15and it was so hated. I mean, as as a kid in second
- 2:18grade who has no connection whatsoever to, to going to
- 2:21yeshiva. And when I was, I remember being
- 2:25in in kindergarten and we had a, it'll be, I grew up in regional
- 2:32and we had a fence. It was a shared building and
- 2:36there was a fence. One side is the non religious
- 2:39and the other side was a religious.
- 2:41And they used to tell us that the religious people are smelly.
- 2:46So this, you know, and growing up, like why would I want to
- 2:49associate or be connected to a smelly kid?
- 2:52And some kids had dirt coming out of their ears.
- 2:54I mean, whatever. They were just not well
- 2:56maintained. That could very well be also
- 2:59with a regular guy. So growing up, I was like, I
- 3:03want to stay away from these guys.
- 3:05From religious people. From religious people.
- 3:07And then when we came here, all of a sudden you're like, they're
- 3:10not. There's nothing bad.
- 3:11And we were in a religious neighborhood in Queens, Kew
- 3:14Garden Hills. So I started having making
- 3:16friends. And then from there I actually
- 3:20started putting on kippa and Cetus in public school.
- 3:24No, I finished fifth grade. You left Hawk, and you went to.
- 3:26Public I left Hawk. I went to public school 3rd,
- 3:284th, 5th, and in the middle of 4th I put on a Kippa and Cetus
- 3:33and as a whole year and a half that I was, you know, already
- 3:37practicing religion. And then some holy soul, a Jew,
- 3:43I would actually mention his name because he's, he's an
- 3:45incredible guy. Robbie Newman from Queens.
- 3:48He put me into dark Hetora, put me into yeshiva.
- 3:51And you know, from there, it's, it's, you know, it's all
- 3:54history. So your parents weren't
- 3:56religious my. Parents weren't religious and
- 3:58they came in. Why did you decide in 4th, 5th
- 4:00grade that you want to suddenly put on a keeper like had?
- 4:03My, my siblings, my older siblings who went to Ezra
- 4:08Academy, if you heard of Ezra Academy, they're incredible.
- 4:11They, they really help people. They had one of the best verbame
- 4:14then was Rimosha Weinberger from Ace from, from Woodmere.
- 4:19And he got my sister on board to become religious.
- 4:23And then my sister, my sister started keeping Shabbos.
- 4:26My mother had the cost of the kitchen and we started have to
- 4:29make Chile. And then, you know, Friday night
- 4:31meals, it became more official. And then I told my sister, I
- 4:35really, I love this. I I want to keep Shabbos with
- 4:36you. I want to dent with you.
- 4:37I want, you know, and and that that got me into it.
- 4:41And from there, you know, it was big became Shiva.
- 4:44And then from yeshiva, we started rolling.
- 4:46You know we don't. Know this lifeless.
- 4:47You know the. Phenomenon and we just met
- 4:50someone recently who's the last 20s who was living at home and
- 4:53no one in his family is observant and he's doing it on
- 4:55his own. I think it's amazing that a
- 4:58family allows you, your parents allowed you to live the parent.
- 5:00My parents allowed it. Not only that, they put on, you
- 5:03know, now you're, you're going back and you're thinking about
- 5:05it. Wow.
- 5:07To put in a Shabbos clock so the lights could turn on and off.
- 5:10And I remember my brother, he would the dafka shut off the
- 5:15light in the bathroom and I and I went on, I got one of those
- 5:18Shabbos protectors and he would take it.
- 5:20He would try to, you know, sibling rivalry.
- 5:23Your brothers do. That's where it's.
- 5:24Normal. It's normal.
- 5:25But the fact that my parents got me the you know that that
- 5:27Shabbos, I remember this, but there was a push button and you
- 5:29turn it and you said it that you know.
- 5:31Those are always very yeah. Very little button.
- 5:33You still see them in Brooklyn and some old house over there.
- 5:36You know you'll you'll find. Is it off?
- 5:38You know, when I built my house, by the way, I created a Shabbos
- 5:41clock room that everything is controlled from one room.
- 5:44You have that. Not only do I not have that, I
- 5:47have never in my life used a Shabbos timer, Shabbos clock,
- 5:51ever on anything, even when I was growing up.
- 5:53Ever. I've never used one, never been
- 5:55one, never used 1A light that's on.
- 5:57It stays on. It's off.
- 5:59It stays off on. Goodbye.
- 6:00Have a nice. Day you remember the Shabbos.
- 6:01Clock pins, remember they had that little plastic pins and you
- 6:04have like. No, you had.
- 6:05They come, they came out and you have you lost it.
- 6:07You couldn't use the shopping stock ever.
- 6:08You're like running around right before shopping.
- 6:10I need a black pin to turn it back on.
- 6:11I hit the on the Why is he talking?
- 6:13Hit the sit there and had the, the ability to say or do
- 6:17whatever he wants. But that's, that's an amazing
- 6:20background. I, I, I can dive deep into that
- 6:23for hours and we could standing, but keep forwarding us up a
- 6:25little bit and telling us how you got to where you are today.
- 6:28All right, so then, you know, Muncie called.
- 6:32I was introduced to Muncie and I fell in love.
- 6:33I called it Muncie Iricoidis. This is what Muncie was like.
- 6:37Wow. I remember my sister and my
- 6:39brother-in-law, they, they brought me up on one and, and
- 6:41we're talking about Albert Drive.
- 6:44And I was like, wow, I was so fascinated.
- 6:47I mean, first of all, the space and the, the, the, the beauty
- 6:50was summer. It was really, really nice.
- 6:52And then I was like, OK, I want to go to yeshiva over here.
- 6:55And I got myself into yeshiva. I went to Bischeraga.
- 6:58Yeah. No, it's after Bischeraga.
- 7:01After me shrug, I went to Israel for a little bit came back, I
- 7:04learned graphic design and when did you got married?
- 7:08I married I was 21. I got married on my birthday on.
- 7:11Your birthday? Yeah. 21 nice I met my wife in
- 7:15Muncie. She actually pretty fascinating
- 7:18story how we met. I I came to Muncie to help an
- 7:23organization. I had a friend, Ron Krezel,
- 7:27maybe you know, I know him. OK, so his father had an
- 7:30organization that he worked for our team, our team.
- 7:32They they help people to, you know, Kiru and all that.
- 7:35And he said to me, Tomer, I know you.
- 7:38You're not shy, you're not embarrassed.
- 7:39You're a good fundraiser. I need you here on Perm in
- 7:42Muncie. I told him, listen, it's a
- 7:44Thursday. My parents are having their meal
- 7:46in Brooklyn. If you can make sure that I get
- 7:48a ride back on on Perm day. So I'll drive you fine, no
- 7:53problem. If you're going to drive me, I'm
- 7:54in. So I came to Muncie on Wednesday
- 7:57afternoon. We, we had the, you know,
- 8:00whatever it is, we went collecting me and him and, and
- 8:04whatever we did, we did, we did, we made, we did good.
- 8:08And then 3:00 in the afternoon, I think like skiers at 5:30
- 8:13roughly, we are ready driving towards Pascack Rd.
- 8:19Get on getting on from old Nike Turnpike onto the highway.
- 8:23As we're about to enter the highway, he says we have to turn
- 8:26around. I'm like what for that we forgot
- 8:28to say Frederick Emporium to my parents who are having a meal by
- 8:32the Luzon family. Are you kidding?
- 8:35Send them a beep beeper. You know, we have phones back
- 8:38then like. Stop by the.
- 8:40Get a pay phone and then I'm a beep Abby Burr so we because.
- 8:46Everybody needs to understand that that means gun and.
- 8:49We turned around, get all the way right near Orsamihangel
- 8:52Court. Opposite side of where you were,
- 8:54yeah. And we came there and that's
- 8:57where I met my wife. What happened where she was
- 8:59just. Sitting there, she had, she came
- 9:00from Montreal for Peru. She's there.
- 9:03She had, she dressed up like a bear.
- 9:05So she had the, you know, like polka dots on her face and
- 9:08whatever. I'd not say hello to her, but I
- 9:10asked the lady or the lady who I used to be been biased by that
- 9:13house, OK. And I'm like, who is that?
- 9:17She's like Tomali. She's great.
- 9:20That's she's your wife. She's your wife.
- 9:22That's it. Go.
- 9:24I was like, what are you talking about?
- 9:25She called my mom that night, told her get her on the phone.
- 9:29I went out with her on Sunday for the first time.
- 9:32This was perm night was Thursday night.
- 9:34We went out on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday Shabbat.
- 9:39We spent the whole Shabbat. I came to Monday.
- 9:40I proposed about the Shabbat. One week.
- 9:42One week. One week.
- 9:44One week I've ever heard of that That's.
- 9:46Edward, your wife for one week. One week.
- 9:49That's insane. And that was it.
- 9:50I mean, you know, we, we have a lot of listeners by the way,
- 9:52they're not Jewish. I'm sure I'm going to get a lot
- 9:55of. But even by our standards, one
- 9:57week is very, very fair above. You know what we're going to
- 10:00hear back. Yeah, but then, then of course,
- 10:02you know, her parents were opposed because she's Ashkenaz
- 10:06and I'm Sephardic. She's from the neighbor Ox.
- 10:10The background, Paula. You know again what kind of
- 10:12Sephardic are. You about Syrian?
- 10:13You're Syrian Turkish now Syrian Turks.
- 10:16Usually marry into Syrians only or can you go to Persia?
- 10:20You could do whatever you want today.
- 10:22Today you could do whatever you're asking.
- 10:23In general, you're not. What's accepted is that you're,
- 10:26you really should not intermingle because, you know,
- 10:29the, the, the cultural differences could really, you
- 10:33know, become a challenge. This person who has a radio
- 11:00show, he has live Zoom conferences with hundreds of
- 11:04thousands of people tuning in every single week.
- 11:07The reason why they do is because he is amazing.
- 11:10I sat with him for over an hour and I got the most out of it.
- 11:14And let me tell you, I did a lot of talking, he did a lot of
- 11:17listening. And I learned that the Serenity
- 11:19Center is a clinic that provides a service for therapy that's led
- 11:23and supervised by Mordecai Weinberger.
- 11:26And I see why they're so successful.
- 11:29And it's just something that, you know, we need to mention
- 11:31more of. And I want the community of
- 11:33Rockland County and even beyond to know that if you need
- 11:36therapy, don't wait and push it off because it might be too
- 11:38expensive or you may not be aware of the perfect therapist.
- 11:43Go to Serenity center, try them out.
- 11:45Insurance will most likely cover most if not all the charges and
- 11:49you will get top level service. Sounds like a no brainer to me.
- 11:53See that was your first job was was marketing printing.
- 11:57A graphic design. Graphic design.
- 11:59Yep, and you were the actual graphic designer.
- 12:02I was a designer. You had a company, you had, you
- 12:04had people working for you. I would say that.
- 12:06You. I had people working for me.
- 12:07Yeah, back then. Back then, if any couple was
- 12:10getting married, they wanted to. Work on an invitation.
- 12:13He would sit there and curate the logo and figure out the
- 12:16words. And I did, I did everything for
- 12:18them. I mean, I would meet people in
- 12:19the store and I see a couple that were just in gate and like,
- 12:23here's my card. You're going to get, you're
- 12:24getting married, you need a wedding invitation.
- 12:26And and believe it or not, people called me from that.
- 12:29Of course, you said you were laid off, so that's before you
- 12:32had this business. Right.
- 12:34Yes, it's before I had the business, I was working for
- 12:36someone and I found that later on that he was actually
- 12:39borrowing from a Gamache for three months to cover my salary.
- 12:43Very, very nice, great guy and I felt bad and he at some .6
- 12:50months prior to that, he offered me either go off on your own or
- 12:57he said he was offered a job by some big marketing company and
- 13:01he's like, I'll go and you run my business.
- 13:03And that's where I got more involved and that's at least
- 13:05where I had a little bit of the experience to run a, a, a
- 13:07business. I don't know what do we need
- 13:09$20,000? Buy a Mac, buy a printer, you
- 13:13know, little inkjet and scanner and you know, and we'll, we'll
- 13:17get. Started your business by
- 13:18yourself? By yourself?
- 13:19How old were you at the time? 20.
- 13:21Two and you were just married and one kid.
- 13:23Is married and then three weeks later we had a kid and thank God
- 13:26who is spiraled Barack Hashem from there.
- 13:29You know, many clients later, actually one of my biggest
- 13:33clients was Mati Soushard from Gateways organization.
- 13:40I actually helped him four years prior to run a seminar, one of
- 13:46his first seminars that he ran here when he was still with our
- 13:49Rahim. And then we met one day in the
- 13:52cleaners, Mazal cleaners, you know, next to Mandarin and we
- 13:56met over there and he's like, Oh, Tom, how are you?
- 13:59I told him I do graphic like he's like, oh, I have an
- 14:00organization. I need brochures, I need stuff
- 14:02and from that. So he he was one of my biggest
- 14:05clients. He's no.
- 14:07He's the yeah, he's one of the first organizations like in
- 14:11Rockland County. Not just making an organization
- 14:14and Kirov and rabbis inspiration, but also one of the
- 14:18first hay sock programs. Yeah.
- 14:20What are the programs that there the organization into a program.
- 14:23Yeah. And then the program supported
- 14:25the organization and that they just evolved.
- 14:27Now they have buildings in in in Manhattan and Tel Aviv.
- 14:30Phenomenal. He does, he does incredible work
- 14:33and, and, you know, kick off your so he, I'll kick off my
- 14:35business and, and I'll tell you at some point, very, very
- 14:39interesting, you know, because some people, and this is, this
- 14:41is part of the spirituality. Yeah, I, I, you know, we have
- 14:45it, It's, it's ingrained in our, in our blood system history.
- 14:48But we also need to constantly work on beat the horn and then
- 14:51muna and so on. And whatever happens is for the
- 14:55best, always, even things that you think that are not good.
- 15:00OK, Why don't I give you an example from A, a a, a movie
- 15:04that I just recently saw? I don't know.
- 15:07I don't remember the name. That's where.
- 15:08You're going with this? Yeah.
- 15:10Well, you're about to be an inspiration.
- 15:12I'm then we're going to talk about Rabbi.
- 15:13Or some safe. And I'm telling you from a
- 15:15movie. From a movie.
- 15:16OK, OK. I like your style.
- 15:18Go ahead. 22 girls that are are, you know, renting and they live
- 15:23in a dump. I'll, I'll, I'll remember the
- 15:26name it's called. Doesn't matter.
- 15:28Yeah, it doesn't matter anyway. They live in a dump and the guy
- 15:32came to to evict them. Where's the rent money?
- 15:35I gave it to her. I gave it to him.
- 15:36Whatever. The guy ended up stealing,
- 15:38stealing the money and they had from from 10:00 in the morning,
- 15:42they had till 6:00 PM to come up with the money, $1500.
- 15:46They did whatever they could to try to come up with the money.
- 15:52They ended up finding shoes hanging on the street and they
- 15:55sold it and they got the money. They made 2500 and now they had
- 15:58the money. And then some other girl came
- 16:00and beat him up and took the money.
- 16:01The girlfriend of the boy, whatever.
- 16:03Anyway, they don't have the money.
- 16:06By 6:00 PM, they show up and the guy emptied out their house.
- 16:09They're like, what do you mean you told us?
- 16:11By 6:00 PM, he says, well, I know you're not going to come up
- 16:13with the money, so I already evicted.
- 16:15You put the mat on the street. And at that moment you're like
- 16:20thinking to yourself, like, how much worse can I get?
- 16:24But I was like thinking to myself, everything is for the
- 16:28best. And what happened?
- 16:31One of these one of the girls is is an artist, but she didn't
- 16:35succeed. She wasn't doing anything.
- 16:37But now her art was out outside on display.
- 16:40And some girl that one of the new tenants that came, she saw
- 16:43it. She's like, I'm, I love this
- 16:453500 boom. And also she was like, let's
- 16:48make a show. And they made an art gallery
- 16:51that night. They made tons of money.
- 16:53And I'm like, look at that. So from one thing that's bad and
- 16:58that was like being put out on the street, it's really for your
- 17:01best. Every situation like is, is like
- 17:04that in life. Things that sometimes seem.
- 17:05So where, where am I leading with this over here?
- 17:09We were renting for a few years in in Spring Valley and we get a
- 17:12call from the owner. I'm selling the house.
- 17:15So you guys have to leave and my wife where we're going to go.
- 17:19What are we going to do? I told her everything is for the
- 17:21best. We're going to find.
- 17:23We're going to go look for a house to buy.
- 17:25And we actually looked on Kenter Lane at six Kenter Lane, you
- 17:28know where, where ACOCA used to live and I don't know if you
- 17:32know them. And we looked at that one that
- 17:35wasn't good for us. And the, the next Sunday we saw
- 17:39the the house across the street, 5 Kenter Lane.
- 17:42My wife had some money put away from her childhood to her
- 17:45parents saved or whatever, but we needed so we had 20.
- 17:49And I'm like, OK, we'll get another 2010%.
- 17:51The house was 400,000 beautiful. You need 10%.
- 17:55My mortgage broker calls me and he says it's better if you get
- 18:0020% down. Where am I getting 20%?
- 18:03So here comes an unbelievable mahalo.
- 18:06I don't even know I could say that publicly, but you know
- 18:08what? It's OK.
- 18:09I called up a client and of an organization, not Sushart, but
- 18:14Sushart actually is the one that who introduced me to this client
- 18:19and they were like American friends.
- 18:21So they have an organization in Israel and they have an
- 18:23organization over here. And I called him up and I said,
- 18:25you know, I need 50K, would you loan it to me and I'll pay you
- 18:29back through printing services and and designs.
- 18:33He says, yeah, sure, come tomorrow, come pick up a check.
- 18:34And I was like, what? And to top it off, he tells me I
- 18:40don't want you to pay it back every invoice that you invoice
- 18:43because we were doing a lot of work for them.
- 18:45And he says I don't want you to pay it back all at one lump sum.
- 18:50Every invoice that you invoice us you will deduct 20% towards
- 18:55the loan and then the rest you could keep for yourself.
- 18:58Within two years, I paid off the whole loan.
- 19:00What a bench. What a bench.
- 19:02And then he got laid off. I mean, he was like 90,
- 19:04literally 90 years old. He got he got sent home.
- 19:06Now he was the emeritus of the of the company and they changed
- 19:11changed over and they stopped using US.
- 19:12And I told my wife, this is exactly what the Moldehai told
- 19:15us. Still in the head casualty got.
- 19:17This is the reason why you came to this position.
- 19:20I said the reason they were our clients was it that we could
- 19:22actually put down the money for the house, pay them back and be,
- 19:26you know, completely clean anyway.
- 19:28That that that, that I think was a very, very nice no.
- 19:31That's phenomenal. What a story.
- 19:33There's some good people in this world.
- 19:34You know, there are some people that really nice things for
- 19:37other people. And I mean, this guy is client
- 19:39of yours. Like he didn't have to do that.
- 19:41And it's also very risky business because if you're
- 19:43paying it back from what you're invoicing, you could start maybe
- 19:47inflating some of the prices. And I don't know how you know
- 19:51how honest it could be, but he trusted you.
- 19:54I imagine he trusted you. They trust me, you know, they
- 19:56scrutinized everything. They they knew everything that's
- 19:58going. On that's a really nice story.
- 20:00You mentioned your wife had some money saved up.
- 20:02What does that mean? She had my How did she have that
- 20:03money saved up? From her child, literally.
- 20:06I don't know. I don't. $20,000 from
- 20:08babysitting. That's from her.
- 20:09No way. From her grandparents.
- 20:10She was she was a child. Her pair her oh, like her own
- 20:13hair. Her grandparents open up a
- 20:14savings account. Usually that's what you do when
- 20:16you have a child that's born. So she had that, No?
- 20:19The savings account. Yeah, right.
- 20:20I don't know what you mean. My grandmother didn't leave me a
- 20:22savings account. Yeah.
- 20:23That's really. Nice.
- 20:24It was very, very nice. Do people do that?
- 20:25Is that normal? I mean, everyone has a little
- 20:28bit of a different flavor of how they do things, but people save
- 20:31money for their kids. I remember my dad, he actually
- 20:33gave me an option when I first got married and he said to me,
- 20:38I'll, I'll either give you $15,000 for a ring or whatever
- 20:44the amount was for the ring and the setting and so on.
- 20:47Or I'll give you 5 grand. You buy yourself a less
- 20:50expensive ring, but I'll give you 20,000 to buy your first
- 20:53house. What do you pick?
- 20:55And he had money saved up for me and at the time we decided
- 20:59together she got a 5 grand ring and they gave you 20 gram
- 21:02towards your because I made the decision that the house was more
- 21:05important together. Obviously I didn't do it alone,
- 21:08but everybody does something different.
- 21:09I think that especially if you have a friend that's a life
- 21:11insurance salesman, I'm sure he'll.
- 21:13Tell you to. Save up for your child or buy
- 21:16life insurance for your own 4 year old kid and save up over.
- 21:19That's really nice. You're very, very fortunate.
- 21:20Yeah, but it's interesting to me.
- 21:22By not everybody has that it's. Interesting to me that Tomar,
- 21:24you know, oh, she's asking you give me a moment that defines
- 21:29you and you're picking your business.
- 21:31There's not. Defines you the first moment
- 21:33that he made his mark. Yeah.
- 21:36First, like, what's his entrance way into the adult world like?
- 21:39That because you went into this business and then COVID came and
- 21:43then you pivoted and then you started this whole new business
- 21:46line and like you're saying, everything happens for a reason.
- 21:50I just, I would love to hear that process like you, you
- 21:52definitely have a great marketing head.
- 21:53You're a salesman. You're, you're not a connector.
- 21:56You see a person in a in a store and then you find out they're
- 21:59engaged and you know, do you go to dating spots and is that
- 22:03something that you did? Also, you know, I don't know
- 22:05what you're talking about. I'm gonna say I know you know
- 22:07his story already, but I have no idea about anything that you
- 22:10just said. That's what I'm saying.
- 22:11So you had this printing business, then what happened?
- 22:13That's my point. I'm saying you should take us
- 22:15forward and. Yeah, all right.
- 22:16Were you so? Very successful in the printing
- 22:18business. And did you make in the biggest
- 22:21year when you were doing what was like the biggest year you
- 22:24had? I'm just trying to say like what
- 22:26kind of revenue you were talking about?
- 22:28I mean let's just say until I was doing printing, it was only
- 22:32designed and I was bringing in about less than 100 KA year.
- 22:37As soon as I opened up the printing business that was in
- 22:402006, the the sales almost quadrupled from year to year,
- 22:47meaning the first year doing like 4400 between 4 and 500.
- 22:52The next year I was already at 1.2 and that just it kept on
- 22:57going up and up and then at some point I think it was like 1.5
- 23:03roughly it's and then and then from there it started to
- 23:05decline. You know, there's everybody goes
- 23:07through roller coasters in life. Did you like it?
- 23:09Did you love what you did? I loved what I did love.
- 23:11I love that I because you get to actually see a product that you
- 23:15created. It's your brainchild.
- 23:18I created something and then that that thing was.
- 23:20Something would you be shocked to know that you did the
- 23:22invitations for my wedding? I would not be shocked.
- 23:25Yeah, you did. You did invitations from my.
- 23:27Wedding I did invitations and you know what I tell people I
- 23:29go, I go to their children who are now getting married.
- 23:32I'm like, you know, you're alive because of me.
- 23:35There I. Don't know about that.
- 23:37I don't know about that, but no. Invitations.
- 23:39No wedding, no child. All right, all right, everybody
- 23:42settle down. I they're not curing cancer over
- 23:45here, but that's pretty, that's pretty cool.
- 23:47So how long did you do this thing for and what happened?
- 23:50So we did the invitation. We were in the invitation
- 23:53industry till 2020 till COVID. Is there even industry now like
- 23:59I know when? People believe it or not, there
- 24:00is. People went back, people went
- 24:02back. It's like via WhatsApp.
- 24:04WhatsApp a lot of that are hard copy invitations believe.
- 24:07It or not our mailboxes are that's what people do.
- 24:09They want to go to our mailboxes are full because they realize
- 24:11that doing that that you know, the wedding registry barely
- 24:14works the WhatsApp. Is that right?
- 24:16Am I right though in saying that that really want to send
- 24:18physical invitation? Because they want to go to
- 24:20check. I never send the check with the
- 24:21return card. Some people do.
- 24:23If I want to show up to the wedding, I'll bring the check
- 24:25with me. Some people do believe it or
- 24:26not, there there's a nice amount of of of money that comes and
- 24:30it's for the kids, by the way. How much money did you?
- 24:32Make at your wedding. At our wedding we made 10K10.
- 24:35Nice, actually I made 6. I made three, Yeah.
- 24:39So apparently I suck or I have very stingy, stingy friends and
- 24:42family members, but I made three grand.
- 24:44That's it. People make Oh and I and I spent
- 24:46it in like the first 3 weeks. Yeah, I don't remember.
- 24:49I'm just living. I didn't have a lot of money
- 24:51when I got. I read those like, you know, I'm
- 24:53I. Who had money?
- 24:54Who had money? You know, like the most your
- 24:55most expensive bill was Verizon. Your life was so much simpler
- 24:59then it was. I had so much less. 50 contacts
- 25:02on your phone. That's it.
- 25:03You can't have any more. Yep, extra out of 50.
- 25:06I had more, you know that I still remember phone numbers
- 25:09from back then because you had to.
- 25:10You had to memorize numbers. I remember numbers of, of, of
- 25:13vendors, of of of the, you know, family members.
- 25:16I remember my old phone number. Go ask me today what my
- 25:18daughter's number. Hold on.
- 25:19Let me know what her numbers do. You want her something very, you
- 25:21know your. Daughter's number.
- 25:22We're talking about like bar mitzvah wedding money, bar
- 25:25mitzvah money, right? The kids we turn 13 usually they
- 25:28get I don't know how much they get like on average 3004
- 25:31thousand something like that. Some of my friends told me they
- 25:34got like fifteen $20,000 out there bar mitzvah, which is wild
- 25:37to me that to get that much money.
- 25:38But I only discovered years later that it was very normal
- 25:43for people, for bar mitzvah boys that they kept the money, that
- 25:45the money was for them and they got to use it or they parents
- 25:49made them put it away and they used it.
- 25:50You know, later on when they got married, I didn't keep my money.
- 25:53My my parents actually took the money from me the night of the
- 25:57bar mitzvah. I didn't even get to like.
- 25:59You know. See the account, how much money
- 26:01it was. They took the money from me and
- 26:04when I was like talking about my friends later on, I'd be like,
- 26:06really like you, you didn't keep the money.
- 26:08And then no. And I thought it was normal.
- 26:10I always started feeling bad about myself much, much late.
- 26:12At the time, I didn't think it was such a big deal, you know.
- 26:15But apparently in Hasidic world, it's very common.
- 26:19They take the bar mitzvah money from the kid and they use that
- 26:23to pay some of the bills from the bar mitzvah thing.
- 26:25And in the non basitas world, it's not common.
- 26:28It's actually considered like a little, it's an insult.
- 26:31Like, yeah, it's the kids money. Like, you know, even if the
- 26:33parents don't have money, even if they have to borrow money to
- 26:35make a bar Mitzo, they will not take the kids money, which I
- 26:38don't know how I feel about it. I don't know, like does the
- 26:41parents have the right to take the money?
- 26:43Should they not take the money? Like Mike, what's your feeling
- 26:46on that? You know that if a kid wins
- 26:49money in a lawsuit, the parents have the right to use the money
- 26:53to help the kid live, right? So you can use, let's say a kid,
- 26:56you know something happens to him and they there's a lawsuit
- 26:58and there's a earnings of $100,000 off a lawsuit.
- 27:00So what do you do? Do you give the kid the money?
- 27:03Or do you you you put it away for the care?
- 27:05You or do you or if you and if you can't live and you need that
- 27:08money, what do you do? So you're, that's the, that's
- 27:10the question that comes up interested in these discussions
- 27:13that I've had before. But legally you're allowed to
- 27:15use. Sometimes the parents are
- 27:16desperate, sometimes they, they don't have them, they don't have
- 27:19money. And if they got access to it in
- 27:21this way and they, they feel like justified and, and using
- 27:24it, I guess. But doesn't mean it's right.
- 27:26It doesn't mean it's right. And it's a it's a little bit of
- 27:29a controversial topic. You know, parents feel like
- 27:32sometimes entitled to, you know, their kids, whatever, until
- 27:35they're like, you know, married on their own, Like everything
- 27:37you do is mine, right? You're under living under my
- 27:39house. But I think that's an old school
- 27:41mentality. Like I wouldn't do that for my
- 27:44kids. I mean, I should never need to.
- 27:45I should never know of it, right?
- 27:47I, I feel like I would feel very dirty, like taking my kids by
- 27:51miss for money. I feel like I feel dirty doing
- 27:53that. I guess it depends how much they
- 27:55made. Hey, you know what, I, I think
- 27:59every family has their own, you know, situation and how they
- 28:02handle it and how they, they decide.
- 28:03You know, I, I, I heard of one family, you know, since I met
- 28:06people with invitations. So they, they would say, we
- 28:09don't allow you to open the gift until you sit down and write a
- 28:12thank you note. Of course, it's all.
- 28:14Yeah, you have to have gratitude.
- 28:15Sounds horrible. Yeah, that's that's very nice.
- 28:17Don't you know you cannot cash the check until you?
- 28:20Teach appreciation. Yeah, have have gratitude.
- 28:23And you know what? I just saw something right?
- 28:25Now I hope my parents did. I hope everybody, but I
- 28:28definitely the. Ratitude.
- 28:30It's called an avodah. The avodah it's a it's a work.
- 28:32It's it's it's it's something you have to work on because not
- 28:38everybody has it naturally. To be grateful, you have to
- 28:43constantly work on being. Grateful, Tomer, I I'm very
- 28:46grateful that you're in my life. And one of the things that I
- 28:51know about you that, oh, she doesn't.
- 28:53And if it's OK with you, I want to talk about the idea of being
- 28:57grateful. You want, you know, you call me
- 28:58up a lot for different, you know, organizations to support
- 29:03and to be a part of them. And we'll get back to that in a
- 29:05minute because I have a problem with that.
- 29:06And we'll talk about that in a minute.
- 29:08But besides that, though, you called me once and you said,
- 29:10yeah, come, we're we're having a party for somebody who almost
- 29:13didn't live and they survived. And then I came to the party and
- 29:16we're eating all this delicious Syrian food and so on.
- 29:21I turned to the guy and I said, so what's your deal?
- 29:22He goes, what are you doing? What's my deal?
- 29:24Tomer gave me his kidney. Wow.
- 29:27And I'm like, what? What are you talking about?
- 29:28What? How much did he get paid for it?
- 29:31What? What do you say?
- 29:32What? How do you know?
- 29:33Is he your brother? What?
- 29:36Total stranger. Total stranger.
- 29:38Help me through that. I've never actually asked you
- 29:40this story and I don't know it. And since that moment I was
- 29:43like, whoa, new found respect for you.
- 29:45Like OK, it's interesting to know, but I was always scared to
- 29:48tell it to ask the story and go through this with you.
- 29:50But here we are. So I'd love to hear it.
- 29:53Wedding invitations. That's where it started with a
- 29:55wedding invitation for Mandy and Daniella Sabo. 8 years later,
- 30:01she sends me an e-mail. She says I'm doing a party event
- 30:05for renewal and I'd like you to print the Flyers and the
- 30:10postcards and the tickets. I read the e-mail and I said,
- 30:14wow, it sounds like a very worthy organization you're
- 30:17talking about. They're going back to 2011 and
- 30:21it was in the summer in August. And I said to her, I replied
- 30:25back, I said, you know what sounds like a very good
- 30:27organization. I'm going to donate all the
- 30:29printing, the Flyers and whatever it is.
- 30:31She says, wow, thank you. I'm giving you 2 tickets to come
- 30:35to the to the event. So to make a Long story short,
- 30:40we came to the event. It was wine tasting and food.
- 30:42It was in Piermont. It was so beautiful.
- 30:44I fell in love with Piermont. Piermont to me is like you just
- 30:47go and chill, watch the bridge and the water.
- 30:51It's very relaxing and calming. And that night I saw videos and
- 30:59I saw people walking around with tag, I'm a kidney donor and
- 31:03another another guy's walking around.
- 31:04I'm a recipient. I was like, wow.
- 31:08And I was 3030 years old at the time.
- 31:10And I told my wife, why don't I donate a kidney?
- 31:16You know, like we're saving, saving lives.
- 31:18This is sound like a really, really nice thing.
- 31:20I took Manacom Friedman's number.
- 31:22He's one of the directors of renewal.
- 31:25And and I told I at first I gave him my card and I said, we
- 31:29cannot call you. You got to call us the next day.
- 31:32It was Friday morning. I called him.
- 31:35He's like Tomer, I'm never in my office on a Friday.
- 31:38And I said I he's like, I can't believe you really want to go
- 31:41through this. I'm like, yeah.
- 31:42He's like, you're not drunk anymore.
- 31:43I'm like, I'm not. They sent me the forms.
- 31:47I then had to do blood work. So I went to Doctor Friedman,
- 31:51Benjamin Friedman. He was a right across the free
- 31:53from us. He did my blood work.
- 31:55I overnighted it and within a week we got back the results and
- 32:00they said that I match a guy who's been 17 years on dialysis.
- 32:06He has 33 antibodies and you have 30 and you're the closest
- 32:14match possible. The guy, 17 years has been
- 32:18waiting And I said I told my wife, I'm like, are you kidding?
- 32:20I'm sorry, I don't know what that means for antibodies.
- 32:23OK, let's just say you have prongs like over here you have
- 32:27on all these, you know, the back of the computer you have you
- 32:29have the the prong and then and it goes in OK, antibodies are in
- 32:35in your immune system. They protect you from certain
- 32:40sicknesses. Most people will have 8:10,
- 32:4312/15 whatever this guy Ronen, he received when he was 17 years
- 32:51old, he received a kidney from a cadaver.
- 32:54That's a dead person who just passed or had a car accident,
- 32:58which is not the best form of of kidney receiving a kidney
- 33:02because it's already it's it's it's the body went through a
- 33:04shock. He had it for three years.
- 33:07That kidney raised his antibody levels in his body to 33 from
- 33:13whatever number he had prior. I don't know.
- 33:15It doesn't make a difference. So, so basically, if if you're
- 33:19putting in a foreign object in, in somebody's body, those are
- 33:24going to reject it, 33 antibodies.
- 33:28And if you put another guy who has 15, it's not going to the
- 33:31prong won't won't fit. Won't connect.
- 33:34Yeah, it won't connect. So it's going to be a reject.
- 33:36The doctor said we're going to be able to handle the three by
- 33:40giving an anti reject injection. And and very, very quickly we
- 33:48went through with it. I called up the rabbis.
- 33:50I introduced myself to Rabbi Mansour at that time for the
- 33:53first time. It was that time when I was, you
- 33:56met Rabbi. That's well, I met, I met him a
- 33:58little bit before, but then I called him.
- 34:00I told him, listen, I'm your, you know, I'm your student.
- 34:02I'm your and, and it spiraled from there.
- 34:05And Balkhasram, we have a very good connection today, you know,
- 34:09driving in on Fridays and going in, keeping a steady connection
- 34:12with the, with the Rabbi, which was very important to me because
- 34:16in Muncie we didn't really have, you don't have anybody to really
- 34:19connect with at the time, you know, going to going back to
- 34:222011 and Balkhasram, we saved the guy's life.
- 34:28Let's get this time. So you thought of the first time
- 34:31you even were I? Didn't even know what a kidney
- 34:33was. Right, like the concept of
- 34:35donating a kidney was just born a couple of weeks before that,
- 34:39right when you went to the renewal event, Correct.
- 34:41Right. They called you to do the
- 34:42graphic designs. Oh, sounds like a nice
- 34:44organization. I'll do it for free.
- 34:45They invited you. You show up there, you get
- 34:47inspired by all these other people.
- 34:49I also want to do it. I want to give a kidney and then
- 34:51like the next few days you give blood work and your.
- 34:54Blood work and you're tested and then you and then then they.
- 34:56Find a match within a week or two, they find a match for
- 34:59another person and also a very rare match right, right exactly
- 35:03They realize that wow this person's been waiting for a long
- 35:04time. We didn't think we'd be able to
- 35:05find someone. Now we're finding you and then
- 35:09then you start going into the. Columbia, you got, you got to go
- 35:12to Columbia Hospital. You you have to meet with with
- 35:15the social worker. You have to meet with
- 35:17psychiatrist colleges. They.
- 35:18Got to make sure you're clean. Why are you doing this?
- 35:21How are you doing? How is anybody paying you?
- 35:24And of course, you like, no one's paying me.
- 35:27I'm doing this altruistically. I really want to help this guy.
- 35:30And I feel like I'm saving a life.
- 35:32And I know my, my children are going to learn from this over
- 35:34here. And it's a lesson that they'll
- 35:36never forget. By the way, My, my, my, my, my
- 35:39boys and my daughters who were who were around.
- 35:41I had four kids at the time. They will never forget that we
- 35:46all together and obviously I had my wife back back and stuff.
- 35:50If your wife is not on board, forget about it.
- 35:52Sure, you know, you could have your mother saying yeah, don't
- 35:54do it. You know, but and my mother just
- 35:57teach my mother. Lesson to your 4 kids.
- 35:59I really teach you a lesson right now.
- 36:00To me and Michael both sitting here and to anybody that's
- 36:02listening, I'm like super inspired right now.
- 36:05I think that you might not be so human after all.
- 36:09Like there's something wrong with you.
- 36:10You know so because. Us humans, like we are hardwired
- 36:14to care about ourselves 1st and especially in a dangerous
- 36:17situation, right, is where our natural reflex is the first just
- 36:20take care of ourselves. So if we're like hanging on on a
- 36:23Cliff or somebody next is hanging on a Cliff, like I'm
- 36:25going to try to figure out how I survive, right?
- 36:28My first instinct is in how do I help the next person survive,
- 36:31right? If I'm in a dangerous situation
- 36:32as well, that's how. And the plane tell you first put
- 36:36on your mask and then yeah. Exactly, First for safety
- 36:38reasons that makes sense to do it that way.
- 36:40But when I think of donating a kidney I'm thinking 1st and wait
- 36:43a second. Like what kind of harm is that
- 36:44causing me if I'm going to be down one kidney?
- 36:48Like I know that they say that, you know, you don't need 2
- 36:50kidneys, you need just one. And if one fails, they both
- 36:53fail. So it's not going to help you,
- 36:55right? But but still fact is that it's
- 36:58a. Do it under it's.
- 36:59Difficult to do and they're opening you up.
- 37:01Once they're cut, you open, all bets are off, all bets are off.
- 37:04So it's a risk. It's still a.
- 37:05Risk. It's definitely a risk.
- 37:06And by the way, I went in life at risk thinking I'm not going
- 37:09to wake up. By the way I didn't know I was
- 37:10going to. I was like, forget it.
- 37:12They're putting me out and I might not even wake up.
- 37:14You told me I want to take it up a notch.
- 37:16May I I want to up the ante a little go ahead.
- 37:19I could understand and I could relate to you a little bit
- 37:21better if it was for somebody you know and for somebody you
- 37:24love that you're willing to take more risk.
- 37:26Total stranger. But for a stranger, somebody
- 37:29that you never met, to even take 1% risk for your own life is
- 37:34wild. It's totally totally crazy.
- 37:36So I'm like shocked right now. I'm all inspired by how you and
- 37:42so quickly in a couple of weeks, this is all happening rapidly.
- 37:45It's happening so quick, so fast.
- 37:47Like who are you? What what kind of doesn't make
- 37:50sense to me. I'm like, it doesn't make sense.
- 37:52Where is this coming from? I just.
- 37:53Want to add to that and I appreciate everything you're
- 37:56saying. Was she he?
- 37:57He keeps using the word we donated.
- 38:00Who's the we? Who's the we?
- 38:02Without the wife, you can't do it.
- 38:03Without the wife, you can't do it.
- 38:04That it's like it's, it's an effort of it's.
- 38:06It's a it's a group effort. Yeah.
- 38:08Yeah. And also I have involved and by
- 38:10the way, my employees at the time who were working for me, if
- 38:14they wouldn't be on board, being able to, to handle the business,
- 38:18the printing that was going on at the time and the designs, you
- 38:23know, I'm the boss, I'm running the show and I'm, I'm out.
- 38:26I was out for five weeks. Wow.
- 38:29You have to read. Yeah, recovery.
- 38:31They say it's harder for the person giving the kidney, the
- 38:34person receiving the kidney, it's a quicker recovery, pretty
- 38:37quick, they say, right, So what? So you don't know this person
- 38:40and you decide to go through with it.
- 38:42Were you? Able to meet this person.
- 38:43Before they are. They had the right before the
- 38:46show, yeah. You're allowed to is that is
- 38:49that. Yeah, you're.
- 38:50No, I wanted to. I wanted to see him.
- 38:51I give him a blessing and he. Gets to see you also how does
- 38:54that if you don't mind yes to that process.
- 38:56So interesting you said also that they make you call them.
- 38:59They say we're not going to call you right because they you they
- 39:01can't listen convincing. People, even if they give
- 39:03kidneys, have to run after Yes, people have to have to
- 39:06voluntarily on their own, yeah, call up and say.
- 39:09And you say I want to know who the person is.
- 39:11They don't tell you until the. Day they don't tell you, they
- 39:13just told me a first name and I didn't know.
- 39:15Did you know how old he was? Until he was 39.
- 39:18You knew that, That they tell me, yeah.
- 39:19They told me he was 39. Tell me if it's a man, they tell
- 39:21you how old he is. They give you very basic.
- 39:23Very basic details and they give you the option.
- 39:25To meet him or are you? No, you cannot you usually they
- 39:27they don't want you to meet because they don't want you to
- 39:29have any regrets. You might you might have a
- 39:31regret. I don't want you to meet and you
- 39:32know what I did? I went on, I went on on Google
- 39:36and I and I said, you know what Ronan kidney need kidney Thai
- 39:42blood O and also I found the video that he posted years prior
- 39:48from another organization in Israel very sneaky and I was
- 39:52very I was petrified because there must have been something
- 39:55wrong with the video and his head in the video.
- 40:00The video was choppy. So he was like saying, and I was
- 40:07like, I'm giving a do it kidney to wacko called the guy.
- 40:12I remember it was a shot on a bike called the Guy, I said.
- 40:16This guy's not know. He's like, don't worry, I
- 40:17promise you he's a normal guy like the video must have been.
- 40:20There was a glitch in the video. The reason why they don't want
- 40:23you? Exactly, this is the reason they
- 40:25don't want a chance of something happening that they they get lit
- 40:283rd and they change their mind. And by the way, my mother was,
- 40:32she was totally scared. Naturally, my father was like,
- 40:36yeah, go do it here, my father. Went against it.
- 40:40No, no one was against it. I mean, they were afraid.
- 40:43Renewal paid for my brother to come from Israel.
- 40:47They paid his ticket to come support the beat, of course,
- 40:50honest sense, which is very, very nice.
- 40:52So he came. He was here for a week.
- 40:54So the day of is the when you get to meet this Ronan.
- 40:57The day of, right. And then, you know, as, as, as
- 40:59things would have, would be, would be at that time for three
- 41:03days before the surgery, we had a, a, a storm and all power.
- 41:10We had no, no electricity. We had to actually move to a
- 41:13hotel. I don't know if you remember
- 41:14that in 2011, it was November, October, October.
- 41:18Yeah, it was October 29th and it snowed and there were still
- 41:25leaves on the tree, on the trees all over Muncie.
- 41:28Trees started falling everywhere and power lines were down.
- 41:31It was the most crazy time. And now you, where are you
- 41:36going? My wife is like, if we're not
- 41:37getting electricity, you're not doing it.
- 41:39It's like, where are we going to be in a hotel and you're in, in
- 41:42surgery, what am I doing with the kids and so on.
- 41:43And so you know, it, it was difficult, but I thank God that
- 41:46it came back on. But that was Shabbat.
- 41:48And the thing was on Thursday, November 3rd.
- 41:52You're in the hospital the first time you.
- 41:55Met. What was that meeting like when
- 41:56you met? Him.
- 41:57The meeting was very emotional. The meeting was very emotional.
- 41:59We met, they brought him into the room.
- 42:01We were ready in our robes. And I have pictures.
- 42:04I don't have it here. I actually have it on my phone.
- 42:05I'll find it. Yeah, That's OK with you.
- 42:08Yeah. And I met him.
- 42:10We hugged and we cried and I gave him a Blaha belkhat
- 42:14kohanim. And we just shared a few moments
- 42:18and I wished him luck. I said let's him, you know, it
- 42:21should go well. Were you nervous?
- 42:23Were you scared? I don't think I was nervous, all
- 42:25right. Like I said, you know, I was
- 42:26walking in thinking that I'm going to not wake up from this
- 42:30thing. I've never been put out before,
- 42:31so I had no idea what to expect. I thought, you know, I was like,
- 42:35goodbye. So you didn't like do a lot of
- 42:37research as to what the risks are?
- 42:40I did. You actually did Thinking of
- 42:42soul searching. No, I knew that I'm doing the
- 42:45right thing. I knew that I had two.
- 42:47Weeks to decide to actually do it and then until you did it.
- 42:50It was like a week. No, you're not going to from
- 42:51August till till November 3rd, 2011.
- 42:54November 3rd was was the. Was the actual procedure.
- 42:57Yeah, exactly. And I had time to think about
- 42:59it, of course. Yeah, but it took you very
- 43:01little time to say I want to do it.
- 43:03Right. And there's like, I met my wife.
- 43:05How long did it take for me to decide to marry home?
- 43:07That was the right thing to do and this was the right thing to
- 43:10do. I know I'm saving a guy's life
- 43:12and I'm like, it's not for that. By the way, I don't know how
- 43:14many people actually could live for 17 years on dialysis.
- 43:18You look at the people, maybe 10 years. 12.
- 43:23Years tops. This guy did dialysis.
- 43:25A different type of dialysis. Which?
- 43:26Was he was very young, this guy his.
- 43:29Whole life since he's 14 years old, by the way, he's been
- 43:31suffering from kidney disease. Wow, he really didn't have a
- 43:35life. Was he married at the time of
- 43:36this guy? He was single and he got married
- 43:39a few years afterwards and and he had a child, only one child
- 43:44and she's four years old now. Cutest thing?
- 43:48Do you have a relationship with him now?
- 43:49Till today? Yeah.
- 43:50Yeah. Like you guys are close.
- 43:51You stay. Close we we can visit each other
- 43:53once. I mean, you have a piece of
- 43:54yourself inside of him. Yeah, yeah.
- 43:56I feel I feel like you know, his he's married, but for his wife
- 44:00is is is is is is, you know, incredible for wanting to marry
- 44:05a guy who has a time bomb. You know there's a limit and
- 44:10where. His He can't have a regular,
- 44:12healthy, long life. He has a regular, healthy life.
- 44:15Thank God. He's great and but at some point
- 44:19it might it might stop. You don't know.
- 44:22How long can this kidney last for I?
- 44:24Don't What usually happens when somebody gets a kidney?
- 44:26That's it. By the way, he would not be able
- 44:27to get to get another transplant after that because he has he has
- 44:31two of his own failed, then he has the cadaver and then he has
- 44:33wife. He has four kidneys 3 three are
- 44:35like 3 little things that are not functioning in his.
- 44:38Body The average person that gets a kidney does it do they
- 44:41have do they end up having normal lives?
- 44:43They, oh, they, they definitely has a normal life.
- 44:45Not normal. Life say they can live long.
- 44:46They can like they can. Live.
- 44:47I don't know how long it lasts. You know, Michael, you know, you
- 44:50and I, by the way, should both just leave this room.
- 44:52We're parable people. We're really bad people.
- 44:56First training order. Yes, Sir.
- 44:58You have a restraining order. OK.
- 45:00I. Went to help somebody.
- 45:02Yeah, Toma, it's just this is wild.
- 45:05This is like, I hope you can appreciate that a lot of people
- 45:08listening are going to feel bad about themselves as well,
- 45:11because I don't know if I have it in me.
- 45:12I don't know how many people have it in them.
- 45:14I don't know. I don't.
- 45:14Know if I had it in me? Somebody showed me something.
- 45:17My name is Toma and it's the same.
- 45:20If you boggle the letters, it's to him.
- 45:22Donor. That was very, you know.
- 45:27Always a nice one of those. Do you feel any different at
- 45:31all? I was going to say no 00.
- 45:35Like you have the same strength, the same energy.
- 45:37Strength, same energy, more energy.
- 45:40I'm, you know, always positive forward thinking so.
- 45:43Are you at risk for anything in the future because the fact that
- 45:46you only have one kidney now or you have the same like your
- 45:49status quo was if it was bad? Quo if nothing really changed.
- 45:52I mean, they only told me maintain your health, you lose
- 45:56weight, you know, keep keep fit. So we're doing that.
- 45:59Thank God. OK.
- 45:59And you look great. Thank you very much.
- 46:02And. Wow, what?
- 46:04Save one life, save the world, right?
- 46:07Isn't that what they say? Save one life, save the world.
- 46:09You did that. You literally did that.
- 46:13A guy like this has one place to go.
- 46:15Only heaven, I hope. I mean you hope you're better.
- 46:19Otherwise we're all out of luck here.
- 46:21Get your. Pace, I'm grabbing onto his.
- 46:24Oh my God, that's that's intense.
- 46:27Anyway, so Fast forward, Fast forward, you know, so we got, we
- 46:30got the COVID. There was nothing.
- 46:34No, we're. Going back to your life.
- 46:35Story Yeah, yeah, we're going back still.
- 46:37We're going back, we'll go back. I'm back, I'm back.
- 46:39Throw them. Back he's like yeah, OK, let's
- 46:40move on. OK so that was my so I did
- 46:42yesterday. Let me tell you about.
- 46:43Let me talk about tomorrow. Go ahead.
- 46:46Yeah. Came COVID and there there was
- 46:49literally no work, nothing to do.
- 46:53We were like 3 weeks before Pesach and.
- 46:56No events. There's everything, there's no
- 46:58events. Everybody, you know, all night,
- 47:01my client that were doing their events.
- 47:03Pesach, usually Pesach is, is, is a busy time because you're
- 47:05doing, you know, printing for the, the, the programs and so on
- 47:10and so forth. And everybody shut down and I
- 47:14was there's what the, what the Shabbat, I lit a candle.
- 47:19It was 12/30 at night. I lit a candle for Eliao Navi 1
- 47:23candle. I never did that before.
- 47:26And I just sat there and I said, God, please give me something.
- 47:31We need, we need to do something.
- 47:34I, you know, Pesach is coming and I just have no means.
- 47:40And then I said, OK, well, after you pray, you need to do some
- 47:44form of, he said, look, you need to do some form of, of, of, you
- 47:48know, taking a step forward towards an act, an act.
- 47:52So I looked online at some gadgets that could be
- 47:56appropriate for COVID. I saw a a, a pouch that would be
- 48:01appropriate for nursing homes or be appropriate for landlords to
- 48:07give out to their tenants, to give out to the to the people.
- 48:12What what from the pouch? The pouch would have your logos
- 48:15put on it. And inside the pouch was a glove
- 48:17with the kit. A kit.
- 48:19OK, well I'm saying they call it.
- 48:21Glove a mask. Yeah, had had a few things in
- 48:23there, you know, sanitizer, COVID.
- 48:26Kit beautiful and have your logo on it and it could have your.
- 48:28Logo on it, so that's great. Fine, perfect.
- 48:30I posted that first time in my life that I posted anything on
- 48:34the status at 1:00 AM, I receive a response from there from a
- 48:42friend in Lakewood. And he says to me, Tomer, can
- 48:46you get me masks? I said, what kind of masks?
- 48:50He's like, you know, the, the blue, the blue masks.
- 48:53I said, first of all, I said, yes, of course I can because
- 48:55it's not going to be a no, I could get you masks.
- 48:58And it's actually fascinating. So he told me that his wife is
- 49:01the purchasing director for 30 nursing homes and they're
- 49:06desperately looking for masks. How much do they need 350,000
- 49:11masks? And I'm like, OK, so let me find
- 49:13out. I'll get back to you in a few
- 49:14minutes. Luckily they're ready for for
- 49:18over a year. I've had a relationship with a
- 49:22with some lady and I've never met her, but her name is Skye
- 49:25Chen in in China. And I was buying promotional
- 49:30items from her. So we had a relationship.
- 49:32So I texted her right through WeChat and she said, yeah, I
- 49:35could get you masks. She sent me a picture, send me
- 49:38the price. I sent it to them.
- 49:40By the time the morning came, they put the order through and
- 49:45I'm like, OK, you know what, maybe I should buy a little
- 49:47more. So I bought a half a million
- 49:48masks and then a few other people bought for me at that
- 49:53time. And the biggest challenge was
- 49:57how are you paying for this? Because I didn't have any money
- 49:59to pay for it. I needed almost 200 K to fork it
- 50:03that that company said they're going to put the money in escrow
- 50:08by Madison title. And a very good friend stepped
- 50:13up to the plate and he said, Tomer, I really want to help
- 50:16you. I'm don't want to make any money
- 50:19on this. And I'm going to lend you this
- 50:22money. I'm going to pay for the order.
- 50:26And the good thing is that in his line of business, he knows
- 50:30Madison title and he knows who they are.
- 50:33And everybody just knew each other.
- 50:35So there was a trust factor over here and he made sure that the
- 50:39mask was approved and everything was good.
- 50:42And luckily he he, he took every step.
- 50:46He was so involved in every step.
- 50:49Even with the shipping. Now, how are you going to ship
- 50:52stuff over here? I don't even know how to ship
- 50:54anything. Two months before COVID started,
- 50:57I got a phone call from some Italian lady and she said, yeah,
- 51:02we do shipping from China. I'm like, I don't do shipping
- 51:04for you. I'm like this liaison in China,
- 51:06the sky lady, She does all the shipping for me.
- 51:08Like I'll just meet with you. I said, you know, OK, meet me on
- 51:12the way. When are you going to be in
- 51:13Muncie? She's like on Friday.
- 51:14I'm going to be in Muncie. And I was just on the way back
- 51:16from Brooklyn at 12 O 5. She called me.
- 51:18She's like, I'm in your in your driver.
- 51:19I'm like, I'm I'll be there. We met for a minute.
- 51:22She gave me a business card and a pen and that was it.
- 51:25And then that's who I used to actually bring all the goods in.
- 51:29And it was like unbelievable that Shannon already set
- 51:31everything up months before we had it all.
- 51:34It was moving pieces on the top. Moving the pieces and and
- 51:38because of our friends involvement in knowing
- 51:40everything every step of the every detail to the tea.
- 51:45And then my father passed away a few days before this shipment
- 51:49was supposed to come and arrive, and he handled everything from
- 51:52there and I got a paycheck. I made like 100K from that
- 51:56order. Wow it.
- 51:57Was ridiculous. And then and I'll tell you, I'll
- 52:01tell you another thing that happened.
- 52:03So you did a lot of these types of deals.
- 52:05We did. We did so then then I started
- 52:07the whole COVID PPE stuff. I didn't even.
- 52:10Evolve During that time I was. Yeah, I got very involved and
- 52:13and Michael, you started buying stuff for me.
- 52:15I sold you a bunch of things. And I don't know if you know the
- 52:19story, but you, you had a guy Yankee.
- 52:21I don't even know his last name. I haven't.
- 52:23I haven't saved Yankee masks. Maybe you have 100 people on my
- 52:27phone. Anki mask, slammy mask, Ellie
- 52:29masks. Oh God.
- 52:31Anyway, at along with this shipment, I decided to order
- 52:3615,000 gallons and they were very cheap quality like 25
- 52:42grams. There was nothing, it was a joke
- 52:44and you're you're a Yankee guy. I mentioned it to him or you
- 52:48mentioned it to him and and you said you're going to sell it to
- 52:50him for. I was going to sell it to him
- 52:52for 350 each. OK, He's like, I'll take them
- 52:56all. We need it great.
- 52:58And I'm happy. And then you're going to be
- 53:03you're going to be wowed by the story because you don't even
- 53:05know. And I just got up from from
- 53:09Shiva and a good friend of mine from Lakewood, he says to me,
- 53:13Tomer, I heard you have gowns coming in.
- 53:16Can I buy them or I'm like, no, they're already sold.
- 53:18He's like, what are you selling them for like 350?
- 53:19He's like, I'll give you 650. I'm like, OK, Yankee, I've just
- 53:27got offered a whole lot more for these things.
- 53:29He says to me, don't worry, don't do this to me.
- 53:30He's like, I already have it. However, you guys were set up
- 53:33already to sell it to another, another nursing home that needed
- 53:37them. He's like, you gave me your
- 53:39word. I don't you can give me a
- 53:40deposit. So we hung up.
- 53:44He was a little upset. And then I sat there and I
- 53:47thought, I'm like, I literally just got up from Shiva.
- 53:50What would my father do? And I thought deep down, I went
- 53:55deep down to my soul and I said my father would not beg.
- 53:58He would not renege on his word. And I called Yankee and I told
- 54:01Yankee, it's yours. Well, I'm, I'm, I'm forgiving
- 54:05for going. It was it was a tremendous
- 54:07amount. Double the money and.
- 54:08I needed it so, and you know what happened a week later you
- 54:12ordered for me and I made more than I would have made or had I
- 54:15sold you the the had I sold the guns to the to the to the, I
- 54:18mean. The additional orders.
- 54:19Exactly because you you ordered money.
- 54:20You didn't. Burn a bridge and a PayPal for
- 54:22you. Exactly, and it didn't take a
- 54:24long time to see that COVID. NPB.
- 54:27Was crazy. That was a madness, Michael.
- 54:29That was madness that time and everybody was selling or buying
- 54:32at that point. People get tested.
- 54:34Yeah, that's crazy. To me, for me, it was a tense,
- 54:37Yeah, No, no, no, I'm not saying this, this, this.
- 54:41This, this particular incident, Yeah, of course.
- 54:43How much volume did he do through PP?
- 54:44It was like crazy amount a lot. I like I did a. 200,000 I mean,
- 54:49I imagine it was a little crazy. By the way, it didn't evade me
- 54:53that the purchase was 200 K. He made 100K.
- 54:56He say. That sounds like a 50% margin to
- 54:58me. That's amazing.
- 55:00So you did this thing during COVID, which probably a lot of
- 55:03people did, and thank God. I think it's amazing that the
- 55:05private sector got involved because the government totally
- 55:09dropped the ball on this. Nobody had anything.
- 55:12It was wild. People have to step up, give.
- 55:15Her a mess for the the the three M that was ridiculous.
- 55:18But anyway. People has to have supplies,
- 55:20yeah. So what happens next?
- 55:23So, So what? Happened over and printing.
- 55:28I I just kept doing for select clients.
- 55:31I was doing the, you know, servicing them because they
- 55:33were, you know, they're like, we don't I don't know where to go.
- 55:35We don't know what to do. OK, fine.
- 55:37I'll do it for you today. Keep, keep myself a little busy.
- 55:40And then this was a little over two years ago.
- 55:43And we're sitting, it was Sunday morning.
- 55:45I'm in shul, and a guy turns around one of the spy women in
- 55:51the Spartak shul, and he says, you know, I've been looking for
- 55:53an apartment in Tavaria for over three years.
- 55:57I just can't make up my mind. I can't buy anything.
- 55:59He's like, I don't know why I can't seem to find anything.
- 56:01I don't what's the big deal? I'll find you an an apartment
- 56:04are. We getting to the real estate
- 56:06stuff now we are Hallelujah, we get it, Hallelujah.
- 56:09I was waiting for that. Are you wanting to do this real
- 56:11estate ask Tomer business start? I'm waiting for this point and
- 56:15we're up to this point we made. It took us in the two hours to
- 56:17get here, but here we are, OK. Honey, by the way, are we?
- 56:20Zoom in on Do you zoom in on this over here?
- 56:22Could you do this? Over Well, there it is.
- 56:24Asked Homer. Asked Homer.
- 56:24It's. Just funny, like, you know
- 56:25everything through his life, you know?
- 56:27Oh, you need a kidney? I got.
- 56:28You. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 56:30I. Unbelievable.
- 56:33He's a yes man, yes man. He's a yes man.
- 56:35Lesson learned, by the way, literally teachable moment.
- 56:38You know how we used to do these teachable moments?
- 56:39Teachable not be the. Yes, be the yes guy, you're
- 56:42missing out on life. Otherwise the fake you're
- 56:44missing out on things 100%. Oh.
- 56:46You know, don't be negative, be positive.
- 56:48Be positive, always positive. You're like I got.
- 56:50You. Yeah.
- 56:52So I said I I I'll, I'll find you an apartment.
- 56:54It was a big deal. I made a phone call.
- 56:56He's a friend, and he connected me with a broker over there and
- 56:59he showed me an apartment. That guy literally fell in love
- 57:03with it. I was like, OK, what do we do
- 57:06next? I got a call that same day.
- 57:09It was Sunday afternoon. I got a call from a friend.
- 57:13He tells me, listen, there's an attorney from Israel over here
- 57:16and he wants to meet with you because you're always making
- 57:18parties, always making events. He wants you to do like a host a
- 57:21home gathering and meet up with him.
- 57:24So I said, OK, give me his number.
- 57:26I'm like, this is great. We met on Monday morning in my
- 57:31house and I was very, I was like, OK, by the way, I have a
- 57:34guy who's on the fence over here to, you know, he wants to see I
- 57:38I found an apartment. We're going to need an attorney.
- 57:40He's like, great. OK, I know I want to learn more
- 57:42about this. Where where can I?
- 57:43He's like, well, we're doing a we have an event that an Israel
- 57:47Expo in Great Neck. I can I come, you know, Yeah,
- 57:51it's free. Come, I went there, I drove in,
- 57:53I thought, you know what? I think we should, I think I
- 57:55should go, I think I should go. I went there and I met the
- 57:57mortgage broker and I met the guy who could do the power of
- 57:59attorney and I met so many developers and over there, it's
- 58:02like a little mini conference guys in two weeks.
- 58:05This guy was under contract and I was like, hold on, this was
- 58:09very easy. And why don't I create a, a, a
- 58:14platform to help Americans buy apartments in Israel?
- 58:18And then I started advertising it and started telling, you
- 58:23know, instead of hounding guys and you know, one person, I'm
- 58:25like, I'm thinking that this guy is going to be the one and he's
- 58:27going to buy and buy, you know, and, and they just spiraled,
- 58:32spiraled and the asked Homer brand came into existence.
- 58:37Now I used to just write, ask and then Tomer.
- 58:40If you want to know something, ask Tomer.
- 58:42Black ink, no inspiration, no nothing.
- 58:46I was just putting out like tips on how to buy and I was suturing
- 58:49on the Internet and so on and so forth.
- 58:50And thank God we closed with that.
- 58:52It was that and I set him up with Airbnb so that he can make
- 58:56money on his very a purchase for $550,000 whatever it was.
- 59:01And he, he was making money. He was so happy and he's still
- 59:05happy and he bought another apartment.
- 59:06By the way, I have a few guys that are repeat clients.
- 59:10For themselves, they're buying, yeah.
- 59:13Just to have. Just to have because.
- 59:15And they rent it out. They'll rent it out.
- 59:17Real estate in Israel is always profitable, is always a
- 59:21blessing, and you can never go wrong.
- 59:24When you're buying an apartment in Israel or a house or a villa
- 59:27or whatever it is, you could never go wrong.
- 59:29In the whole country. In the whole country.
- 59:31There's no bad parts. There's no, but no, there's no
- 59:33bad parts. Because there's all going out.
- 59:34It's. Always going up.
- 59:35Go look in the history. Go Google, Stefan, Google.
- 59:38Did Israel's real estate ever go down?
- 59:40No. To stabilize at some point, yes.
- 59:43Is it going to continue going up?
- 59:45Yes, do. You know how he knows?
- 59:46He asked Tomer. So.
- 59:48This is what you're doing now, full SO.
- 59:50Now we're doing that full time. I have to tell you, you took
- 59:52your energy of, Asked Tomer. And he took his marketing
- 59:56background, his printing knowledge, and he went crazy.
- 1:00:01Crazy. Let me tell you how crazy he
- 1:00:03went. First of all.
- 1:00:04Show us the sign that you have behind you the Asked tomer.com.
- 1:00:07He made this into a sticker. OK, this sticker that you see
- 1:00:10your asked tomer.com. I'm not, I'm not kidding, Ring,
- 1:00:13I want you to know. OK, all right, that's enough.
- 1:00:15That's enough. Yeah, yeah.
- 1:00:16Put it away, Put it away. I want you to know that I was
- 1:00:21davening at the Kotel and my son looks at me and he goes, asked
- 1:00:25albert.com sticker on the Kotel. I'm like, what?
- 1:00:29Are you kidding? It's all over the place.
- 1:00:30I was in a bathroom in hebronaskedalbert.com Your name
- 1:00:36is all over the place and it's just amazing what you've been
- 1:00:39doing and how. You How many apartments have you
- 1:00:41brokered in the last couple of years?
- 1:00:44Over 20. Wow.
- 1:00:45Yeah, that's amazing. That's pretty good.
- 1:00:48Incredible. Yeah, Yeah, very good.
- 1:00:50How does it work? If I want to get an apartment
- 1:00:53tomorrow, buy a house in Israel, is it similar to how it works
- 1:00:56over here as far as very different the mortgage as far as
- 1:00:58the percent you have to put that like is is it easy to get a loan
- 1:01:03over there? Like how does it work?
- 1:01:04OK, so first thing, first thing is identify the property.
- 1:01:08Are you going into a development where you would help me with
- 1:01:11that of? Course, I say, look, I want to
- 1:01:12buy a home in Israel. I want to, you know, have a
- 1:01:16vacation home there. I don't know what to do.
- 1:01:19I don't know where to get started.
- 1:01:20I call you. What's the first thing you do
- 1:01:21for me? First thing, first thing is I'll
- 1:01:23ask you, do you know where you want to go?
- 1:01:26No. OK.
- 1:01:26You don't know most people and or not know where they want to
- 1:01:30go. No, OK unless they know, unless
- 1:01:32the guy is like I want to go to Bechamage or I want to go to
- 1:01:34Jerusalem. I know very little at.
- 1:01:35All it's very good. I've been there 2-3 times in my
- 1:01:37life. Second question in our land I'd.
- 1:01:38Love to get a house there one day.
- 1:01:40Well, if I'm interested, well, what do you?
- 1:01:41Second question I'll ask you is what is your budget?
- 1:01:44Is it half $1,000,000? Is it $2,000,000?
- 1:01:46Is it 5? OK, you'll have guys that I had
- 1:01:49a guy I just met now on vacation and he says to me his father
- 1:01:51wants to buy a nine bedroom apartment.
- 1:01:55Now, if you if you know what that means, you're looking,
- 1:01:58you're looking at $10 million by no.
- 1:01:59No, that's. If I could afford it.
- 1:02:01Let's say my budget's good 100,000.
- 1:02:02OK, so if you have 500,000 so then I'll I'll tell you by the
- 1:02:05way, Jerusalem is a nice. Apartment in Gaza, yeah.
- 1:02:10You could you could start Subway either if you want Jerusalem for
- 1:02:14a half $1,000,000. I told you could donate it to
- 1:02:16the mirror and they'll put a plaque over the bathroom.
- 1:02:17No, no, no, I donate it. I want Jerusalem.
- 1:02:20I want an Israel somewhere. Yeah, you tell me about SO.
- 1:02:24I will tell you, I think I'm sorry, one of the questions that
- 1:02:26you need to ask is why? Because I want to be able to go
- 1:02:30to Israel and have my own place. So you want it to be anywhere?
- 1:02:35I don't know exactly. So the first you want to be
- 1:02:37Trump? You want Why do you want to buy
- 1:02:39an apartment? Is it an emotional buy which it
- 1:02:4299% is in my opinion, get to that, you know, because although
- 1:02:46the property value 100%, I agree with you, Tomer does go up in
- 1:02:50value. I've done the study and invested
- 1:02:52in Israel. It goes up in value equity wise,
- 1:02:55but you're not profiting on a yearly basis, so it's not a
- 1:02:59great investment. As far as a return on your
- 1:03:02investment in every single property you buy in Israel.
- 1:03:04There are plenty of investments that you could buy in Israel,
- 1:03:06don't get me wrong, but not everywhere.
- 1:03:08You have to say I want to buy an apartment in Israel.
- 1:03:09Let me just buy something, I'll make money.
- 1:03:11So why do you want to buy an apartment in Israel?
- 1:03:13I love? Israel, I think it's a beautiful
- 1:03:15country and I want to be able to go a little bit more, you know,
- 1:03:19now that I'm getting older and I want to have a place where where
- 1:03:21I can go. You know, around Jerusalem.
- 1:03:23Then sure, it doesn't have to be.
- 1:03:25In or around? Within an hour drive to
- 1:03:27Jerusalem. Within a 5 minute drive to
- 1:03:29Jerusalem. I have a setting of where to.
- 1:03:30Go. Now we have a setting.
- 1:03:31Yeah, exactly. An American area.
- 1:03:33I'd love to have something a little bit more modernized,
- 1:03:35something more Western like. Right, right.
- 1:03:38Right, so. Is there?
- 1:03:39Projects, they're definitely, definitely project with
- 1:03:42American. I mean, I wouldn't tell you.
- 1:03:43I wouldn't send you to bet your machine anymore.
- 1:03:45I would tell you. The beautiful things go further
- 1:03:47out put down a down payment. There's a very popular
- 1:03:50development strategy that someone who's buying an
- 1:03:53apartment in Israel. Sorry, you can ask Michael also.
- 1:03:55I have some answers. We'll get back to that.
- 1:03:58Thing is that, you know, you could put 10% down and then over
- 1:04:02the course of the next two years or sometimes 3 as it's being
- 1:04:05developed, you give up to 30% more and then you get a mortgage
- 1:04:08of 50%. That's a common.
- 1:04:10But but let's assume that I find a place and I guess you're going
- 1:04:13to start showing me pictures, right?
- 1:04:14You're going to start, I'm not going to actually have to go
- 1:04:16down there and I find a place and I like it and I say tell him
- 1:04:19I want to buy this. OK, it's in my budgets,
- 1:04:22$500,000. That's a great location.
- 1:04:25House seems great. I want to buy it.
- 1:04:26What? What happens next?
- 1:04:28Registration form deposit. Registration.
- 1:04:31Form. There's a registration form
- 1:04:33again we're. Talking.
- 1:04:35Yeah, you know, you're not a citizen, so you're you're not
- 1:04:36going through the process of a, a, an existing home or we're
- 1:04:41talking about a development. So developments, you have a
- 1:04:43developer and they they need you to do it.
- 1:04:46Tofis al Shamma. That's the registration form.
- 1:04:48You'll fill it out. Give us your passport, give me
- 1:04:50your license, and then I get the I get the ball rolling.
- 1:04:54When is the clarity you're talking about a?
- 1:04:56Development that takes a little years.
- 1:04:57That's right. Under construction, under right?
- 1:04:58Not a purchase. Or let's.
- 1:05:00Talk about a house immediate purchase.
- 1:05:01There, yes, immediate. OK, Yeah, yeah, whatever,
- 1:05:04whatever it is. But let's say if it's an
- 1:05:06immediate purchase, immediate. What I do is, is send your
- 1:05:10passport. I will provide you with the
- 1:05:13attorney. I'll provide you with the power
- 1:05:15of attorney and the mortgage broker should you need a
- 1:05:17mortgage. I need a mortgage, yes.
- 1:05:20You're gonna need a mortgage. There how do I get a mortgage?
- 1:05:21I have no credit in Israel. They don't know.
- 1:05:23I'll tell you about that. It's very easy.
- 1:05:26Once, once you sign a, an, an agreement, we get you the, the
- 1:05:31power of attorney, the documents, basically you're
- 1:05:33allowing the attorney to sign on your behalf because you're not
- 1:05:37going there. It does great.
- 1:05:38We have that they schedule a signing of the contract and you
- 1:05:41need to get a mortgage. What, what does it entail?
- 1:05:44Well, you need 2 years of tax returns, American tax, American
- 1:05:49tax returns. The banks look at your income
- 1:05:52only. They don't look at your expenses
- 1:05:55as they do over here, so. They just look at my income.
- 1:05:58They just look at your income. They don't care about how much
- 1:06:00expenses I have. They don't care.
- 1:06:02Because I can be in the red, I could be spending more than I'm
- 1:06:05earning. They don't, they don't, they
- 1:06:06don't care. They want, they need three
- 1:06:08months of bank statements. They want to see your credit
- 1:06:09score really just to see that you're a man, so.
- 1:06:11Our credit score here matters there.
- 1:06:12Are they? Yeah, they're just looking to
- 1:06:14see that you have above 650. OK.
- 1:06:16They don't have their own credit scoring system over there.
- 1:06:18They. Don't know in Israel no really.
- 1:06:20And and once you provide that that documentation, I know it
- 1:06:23sounds funny. You're like, OK, but it's easy
- 1:06:25to get a loan and I was very answered here in America are
- 1:06:28much greater than the the Israelis.
- 1:06:31So there's Israelis are struggling to get a mortgage.
- 1:06:33What? What type of percent is the bank
- 1:06:35offering? Bank gives you by default 50%.
- 1:06:37It's easy, you'll get 50%. They give me 50%. 50% mortgage
- 1:06:41so you have to put down 50 if you that means you're putting
- 1:06:44down OK, yeah, yeah, yeah, OK. And you gotta, you gotta.
- 1:06:47Understand why the banks are a little more legal amount that
- 1:06:49I'm putting down exactly the reason why they're a little more
- 1:06:51lenient is a few reasons why I think they're a little more
- 1:06:53lenient and. 1020%, right. Well, it's 50% you put down.
- 1:06:57You'll tell me what you think about this thought process,
- 1:07:00because I thought about this a lot.
- 1:07:01The reason why they're more lenient about approving you for
- 1:07:04a loan is because a, they're only giving you 50%.
- 1:07:07There are ways, yeah, there are ways to get an extra 10 or an
- 1:07:10extra 20 as a secondary mortgage.
- 1:07:13That's number one. Number two is they know the
- 1:07:15value in Israel keeps going up, so they know the equity of the.
- 1:07:19Leverage on the property. They need to take it back.
- 1:07:21They also don't have American rules where if you don't pay
- 1:07:23your mortgage, you're at. It's not New York City, you get
- 1:07:25a tenant out in like 19 years. Exactly.
- 1:07:28And the lastly is interestingly enough, everyone has to take a
- 1:07:31life insurance policy and mortgage insurance.
- 1:07:34Mortgage insurance? That means the guy croaks.
- 1:07:37And the bank is like, OK, well, we, we're, we're going to.
- 1:07:40They don't have problems with trusts and challenges with, you
- 1:07:43know, family. Fight what?
- 1:07:44Kind of interest rates is going on over there in Israel. 5
- 1:07:47percent, 6% depending on the time.
- 1:07:48Over here, similar, yeah, a little bit lower actually here
- 1:07:52now. Yeah.
- 1:07:53And, and you, you get approved in like 3-4 days.
- 1:07:56It's like that, you're done, you get the approval, we got the
- 1:08:00process going. We give the power of attorney to
- 1:08:02the to the mortgage guy. We give the power of attorney to
- 1:08:05the attorney. He signs on your thing and
- 1:08:07obviously we have to transfer funds to Israel.
- 1:08:09So we use the Forex system to transfer the funds and we
- 1:08:16simplified. Nice.
- 1:08:17The whole let's not have. This place right now in Israel,
- 1:08:20where are the young people going?
- 1:08:23What's it this Gaza business, Mike?
- 1:08:24It's awesome. You and Trump, you're trying to
- 1:08:27you're trying to get Gaza. Going over there, yeah, but
- 1:08:28it's. Going to take some time but
- 1:08:30before then you've got the young couples are going to first of
- 1:08:34all hottest place usual I'm Tel Aviv.
- 1:08:37For the the non religious you have Tel Aviv, the religions you
- 1:08:40have. Well, Tel Aviv is one of the
- 1:08:41most expensive real estates in the world, by the way.
- 1:08:43Top ten. Yeah, yeah.
- 1:08:45OK, so not everybody's going to Tel.
- 1:08:46Aviv, Yeah, We're not going to Tel Aviv.
- 1:08:47Service like the practical places.
- 1:08:49Practical places would the affordable places would be in
- 1:08:53Mitch Hamish. That would be your first choice
- 1:08:55to go after ritual I'm. How far is that from Jerusalem?
- 1:08:5925 minutes roughly, OK, OK. And then there's surrounding
- 1:09:02neighborhoods and areas that even 20 minutes from from
- 1:09:07Bachemis, you have a place called Carmay got for four 55106
- 1:09:12hundred. You can get a beautiful
- 1:09:13apartment and an all Anglo area you know, or you go a little up
- 1:09:19north. Yeah, definitely. 20 minutes to
- 1:09:2230 minutes away from Jerusalem, the prices go down.
- 1:09:25I think if you want to educate the listeners, it'll be a fun
- 1:09:29fact of how it works per square meter.
- 1:09:31So you have the pricing per square meter.
- 1:09:34Generally an apartment which is 100 square meters, think of it
- 1:09:36as 1000 square feet as an apartment, right?
- 1:09:38So it's a 2 bedroom apartment, 100 square meters, right, right.
- 1:09:41So the price per square meter in Jerusalem is 45 to 75,000.
- 1:09:50Go up a little, Yeah, Go up to 90.
- 1:09:52Well, maybe on new developments, you mean?
- 1:09:54Yeah, on new stuff. That's scary, by the way.
- 1:09:56It is so high, but it's it's very expensive.
- 1:09:59And when you go 20-30 minutes out, it's half that.
- 1:10:01So you, you know, there's a tremendous advantage of going 20
- 1:10:04minutes out if you're OK with that.
- 1:10:06I personally. If I'm the average, you know,
- 1:10:09middle-aged American, kind of comfortable here, but.
- 1:10:12You are there. Those both those things are
- 1:10:15true. Do you recommend that we start
- 1:10:19looking seriously into buying as like what's the benefit?
- 1:10:22Like sell me on it? What what do you tell the
- 1:10:25typical person like you got to buy a house or an apartment
- 1:10:27Israel. Here's why.
- 1:10:28So one thing is I, I, I never go with the tactic of, Oh my gosh,
- 1:10:31America is going to blow up and you have to have a place to run.
- 1:10:34Please don't know because you lose me if you do they.
- 1:10:36Exactly. You're buying because you have a
- 1:10:39lot of the land and you're buying because there's also a
- 1:10:42mitzvah to buy. And I know you might say, oh,
- 1:10:45there's other mitzvahs I haven't done yet.
- 1:10:46OK, fine. Is that?
- 1:10:47True, it's a mitzvah to buy property in Israel.
- 1:10:49In Israel, it's one of. The 613 commandments.
- 1:10:52Israel, Yeah. I don't know if it's one of the
- 1:10:55613. No, it's.
- 1:10:56No, it's. When there's maybe when there's
- 1:10:57the best time, it does, yeah. Well, there's the mitzvahs are
- 1:10:59taking steps in Israel even. I mean, so that in itself is a,
- 1:11:02yeah. Right.
- 1:11:04I want to take 613, but then fact of issue of has and you're
- 1:11:09going to you're going to want to have a part and a piece of the
- 1:11:12land. Then you have the skeptics and
- 1:11:14they'll tell you, well, you know they're going to be giving away
- 1:11:16all the land when Mushiya comes and I'll wait for Mashiac to
- 1:11:20come. I'll much.
- 1:11:20You have to stop paying your mortgage #1 and in my humble
- 1:11:23opinion, when what have. To come Mashiac comes real
- 1:11:25estate people triple. Exactly the people that are.
- 1:11:28Waiting for Mashiac to come. I'll wait for that.
- 1:11:31Yeah, that doesn't make sense. Because like if Mashiac is just
- 1:11:34giving away properties, like what about the people that
- 1:11:36already own over there? Like they lose their houses.
- 1:11:38Exactly. They lose their house.
- 1:11:39That doesn't add up. And then and then what about and
- 1:11:42then you have those guys. And then I had a, he tells me,
- 1:11:48you know, remember, you want to start a Mashiac fund.
- 1:11:51When, when Mashiac comes, where are you going to have money to
- 1:11:53pay for all the people that are getting up?
- 1:11:55They're going to need clothing or they need food.
- 1:11:57OK, So I had one guy, he says to me, you know what, What's going
- 1:12:01to happen with Riv Steinman when he gets up?
- 1:12:03And, and Riv Heimkaneski, they got up.
- 1:12:05They're going to need a they're going to need a house because
- 1:12:06they sold their house already. It's not existing.
- 1:12:08So I own 5. Apartments.
- 1:12:10They're going to tell me, Oh well, Sir, Sir, you're going to
- 1:12:12have to give one apartment to the rabbi, and I'm not going to
- 1:12:13give the rabbi, so I'm going to lose like a moron.
- 1:12:17Give the rabbi. You say we get, you know, I
- 1:12:22don't know. I don't know.
- 1:12:23I don't know if I'm giving away my apartment to a rabbi.
- 1:12:25I'm struggling with life here in real time.
- 1:12:28I'm not worried about what's going to happen after the fact.
- 1:12:30I think I said it earlier, it's a very emotional buy in general.
- 1:12:33You're connected to the country, the Holy Land and believe in the
- 1:12:35process of of the mitzvah and and waiting for Mashiach.
- 1:12:39Why wait? You know, you know.
- 1:12:41And I met a guy on a plane and I said then would you want to
- 1:12:45consider, you know, would you consider buying an apartment?
- 1:12:47He's like, I'm about to sign this contract already.
- 1:12:49Well I have 4 apartments and I'm buying.
- 1:12:51These do it as investments. That they do I.
- 1:12:53Think the message I would like to say is that you have to be
- 1:12:56able to afford it obviously and you have to be able to afford to
- 1:12:59not make money on that apartment.
- 1:13:01It's not something that like you.
- 1:13:02Know because the rental I can. Say is, ask Tomer.
- 1:13:06Come ask tomer.com. Tomer, we're.
- 1:13:08We're going to wrap it. We're going to wrap it.
- 1:13:10We've. Got to wrap up.
- 1:13:10Yeah, in. In, in just a second, you know,
- 1:13:15we, we have a tradition of going through a lightning round.
- 1:13:18But I, I will tell you that I think that this entire podcast
- 1:13:21was a lightning round and everything you said and so much
- 1:13:24we learnt and it was so beautiful.
- 1:13:25So I'm just going to end with asking you honestly, who would
- 1:13:28you recommend as a good guest on the podcast?
- 1:13:31And I have to ask you, Rabbi Mansour, I mean you mentioned
- 1:13:35his name a few times and. He he, he is.
- 1:13:37He is our family rabbi. He is my rabbi.
- 1:13:40He is my role model. Am I allowed to offer someone up
- 1:13:44for you? Is that something that's normal?
- 1:13:46I mean, like, I don't know actually, can I do that?
- 1:13:47I don't know if that's in the rules of the None of Your
- 1:13:49Business podcast. The rules are what?
- 1:13:51We make them to be. I want you to get rubbed by
- 1:13:53Monsieur. That's the.
- 1:13:54Rules. I think it would be fantastic.
- 1:13:56I. I We're the dictators of this
- 1:13:58show. But I, I could bring another
- 1:14:00student of his on here and I'd love to call him.
- 1:14:06Who's that? His name is Meyer Safdie.
- 1:14:08And he has an organization called care, Care for special
- 1:14:11children, autistic children And his he opened up the
- 1:14:16organization, him and his wife, they have two autistic children
- 1:14:19and they struggled with them for years, not knowing which schools
- 1:14:23to put them through and what benefits they could get from the
- 1:14:25government. And he opened up that
- 1:14:30organization to help other. Enough said.
- 1:14:33Get him on the phone. Get him on the phone.
- 1:14:35I love it. Well, Meyer, how are you?
- 1:14:36It's nice to meet you. We asked Homer after the after
- 1:14:39the podcast, like we asked all of our guests who's someone that
- 1:14:42you would recommend that would benefit and that we can grow
- 1:14:44with and can share their story And he mentioned you.
- 1:14:47So it's nice to meet you. First of all, I understand that
- 1:14:49you're on vacation. Yes, we're on vacation.
- 1:14:52The first thing that I love that you said, you said you asked
- 1:14:55Tomer. Ask Tomer, you started.
- 1:14:59Off with the right words, you asked Tomer.
- 1:15:01So you're one for one off the back Second of all, I actually
- 1:15:05I've I've met several times with I guess it's your brother David.
- 1:15:08Yes, we've met several times, bro.
- 1:15:11Hashem is a great guy. He's a very gifted man.
- 1:15:13And I'm, you know, grateful to to know him.
- 1:15:16So, yeah. And Thomas, a good friend, and
- 1:15:18he recommended that we speak. So yeah, we're, we're on board
- 1:15:22And and I appreciate the call. Wow, that's amazing.
- 1:15:25OK, so we're going to schedule it when you get back.
- 1:15:27And we're sorry to bother you on vacation, but it's really nice
- 1:15:29to speak with you. Not a worry.
- 1:15:31I appreciate it. Thank you so much and continue
- 1:15:33your great work. I appreciate it.
- 1:15:34Thank you. All the best.
- 1:15:36Wow. What a guy all.
- 1:15:38Right, everybody don't forget to like, subscribe, comment, get
- 1:15:41involved. We are sponsored by the Serenity
- 1:15:44Center in Rockland County. Therapy is a real thing and it's
- 1:15:48recommended to everyone, especially if you don't have to
- 1:15:51pay for it and insurance covers it.
- 1:15:53That's amazing. And thank you again, of course,
- 1:15:55to the Prime Source production team for doing such a fantastic
- 1:15:57job. Stephen, Will, Kim, Skyler,
- 1:15:59everybody on the team, you guys are amazing.
- 1:16:02That's a wrap. Have a great day, everybody.
- 1:16:03Michael, bye, bye. Wait, wait, wait, wait, don't.
- 1:16:05What happened? What happened?
- 1:16:06Michael, you are a people's person.
- 1:16:08You asked me to find you a guy to come to your podcast.
- 1:16:12I'm asking you to call someone now and tell him I want you to
- 1:16:15buy an apartment. You are going to make the best
- 1:16:17decision of your life. Look at this.
- 1:16:20I love it. I love it.
- 1:16:21I love it. That's what you need.
- 1:16:23That is 100% what? You need great, I'd love.
- 1:16:25To buy an apartment. All right, fantastic.
- 1:16:28I have a guy for you Pushy I'd. Like that to be taken off
- 1:16:33please. OK, but not at the moment, but
- 1:16:37in the very near future. I think I've done with this
- 1:16:41exactly, Have a nice day. All right.