Latest / Small Biz Florida / Ep 432 | Beyond Traditional Banking: Small Business Financing with Brent LeBlanc

Transcript

Ep 432 | Beyond Traditional Banking: Small Business Financing with Brent LeBlanc · Small Biz Florida

• 0:02
  Brent: Welcome to Small Biz Florida, your go-to podcast for all things small business in the Sunshine
• 0:07
  Brent: State. This podcast is sponsored by Florida First Capital, your trusted partner for financing and
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  Brent: support. Here, you'll discover the latest news, trends, and invaluable resources to help you grow
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  Brent: and succeed. From startup strategies to scaling your business, we've got you covered. Join us as
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  Brent: we explore the vibrant Florida small business ecosystem and connect you with the experts who
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  Brent: can make a real difference. And now, please welcome your host, Tom Kindred, Regional Director of the
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  Brent: Small Business Development Center at Indian River State College. This is Small Biz Florida, the
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  Brent: podcast and broadcast that's all things business across the state of Florida. I'm Tom Kindred,
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  Brent: your host. And if you've been tuning in lately, you know Small Biz Florida is on the road again.
• 0:51
  Brent: We are at the 2026 annual Flagle Conference, one of my favorite conferences to attend and bring the
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  Brent: podcast because it is so important that small business owners get access to capital as they look
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  Brent: to grow, scale, and take advantage of what really is truly a fast-growing market in the state of
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  Brent: Florida. And we have with us right now someone to talk about alternatives to that capital access.
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  Brent: We've got our good friend Brent LeBlanc, who serves as Executive Vice President of Business Development
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  Brent: for Peachtree Group. Brent, welcome to Small Biz Florida. Yeah, Tom, thanks for the opportunity.
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  Brent: Absolutely. So Brent, I'm very interested in this conversation. You are truly what we might refer
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  Brent: to as that alternative lender to that traditional bank financing. That is exactly what we are. I love
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  Brent: it. All right. So, but before we get there, I want to start as we always do, just a little bit of your
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  Brent: background, a pathway to your current role with Peachtree Group. Yeah, Tom, thanks. I've been with
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  Brent: Peachtree almost 16 years, almost since the beginning of our private equity journey with Peachtree. But
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  Brent: previous to Peachtree, I've spent my entire life in real estate and specifically the hospitality
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  Brent: business. Wow. I've worked for some of and led development for some of the biggest brands in the
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  Brent: country. Nice. Most recently before Peachtree Starwood Hotels and Resorts. Okay. I have heard
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  Brent: that name. Yes. Yeah. It was acquired by Marriott several years back. So the name doesn't exist
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  Brent: anymore as Starwood Hotels, but Marriott bought the brands. So you've actually used the term
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  Brent: private equity. Explain to us a little bit about when you say private equity and Peachtree Group,
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  Brent: basically you're getting your funding from the private sector. That's correct. They're providing
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  Brent: funding and you are in turn lending that money out. Give me just a little high level. How does all that
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  Brent: kind of work in the world of lending? So Peachtree is private equity, true private equity. We're
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  Brent: located in Atlanta, Georgia. Started back in 2008. We started raising private equity in that 2010-2011
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  Brent: era. And we raised money all the way from the broker-dealer channels up through the institutional
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  Brent: channels. That includes high net worth individuals. That includes broker-dealers. That includes
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  Brent: registered investment advisors, RAAs, and family offices. Wow. And I find the timing interesting.
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  Brent: 2010, did this start because during the sort of recession, banks just stopped loaning money?
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  Brent: That's exactly right. We saw an opportunity to create a private credit shop where when banks
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  Brent: were disappearing from the market, there was really an opportunity that opened up to finance
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  Brent: hospitality. We started as a hospitality lender. Now, since we've diversified outside of hospitality
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  Brent: and we do all real estate asset classes, including multifamily, student housing, office, retail,
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  Brent: and really all asset classes. But we really started as a hotel lender. And when we came
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  Brent: through the great financial crisis, banks disappeared. We saw an opportunity to step in
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  Brent: and finance a lot of these hotels that there was no banks to finance.
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  Brent: Wow. All right. So here's the question everybody's going to want me to ask you.
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  Brent: Is it less difficult, less rigorous to deal with an organization like yours in terms of capital access
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  Brent: versus a traditional bank?
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  Brent: Yeah, we have the ability to control our own destiny. We have the ability to pivot and move
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  Brent: with the market. When some banks have a typical box that they have to sit in, private equity and
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  Brent: private credit can move around that box and actually get outside that box occasionally when
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  Brent: needed to structure a deal that makes sense for all parties.
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  Brent: Okay. And you talked about hospitality. I've worked with a number of clients through the years that
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  Brent: they, well, speaking of hospitality, I worked with a client who was trying to acquire a hotel. It was
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  Brent: a chain hotel. And you do run in sometimes to some pushback in traditional financing because
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  Brent: banks just don't understand that market. They don't understand that space. So they say, well,
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  Brent: we don't, you know, we don't, we don't do hotels. So, but that's where an organization like Peachtree
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  Brent: could come to the table. That's correct. Why banks traditionally go or negative on hotels is
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  Brent: the operating model. It's very labor intensive. You have, you have a ton of staff, you have rates
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  Brent: changing nightly. So your revenue management is nightly. In a typical multifamily, it might be
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  Brent: yearly. A retail, a retail deal is, you know, you rent that space for six years and you come back
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  Brent: and renew that. But the operating model for a hotel is so, so, so dynamic. People don't understand it.
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  Brent: And they've made a lot of mistakes in that space. So they, they just seem to not want to go back into
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  Brent: it. And I don't want people to think that you only do hotels. Just as an example, though, you can be
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  Brent: more flexible. You can, you can look outside as you put it. You're not box checkers. You're, you can
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  Brent: look at a deal on face value and, and, and attempt to make something work where maybe some traditional
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  Brent: folks say, this is not our space, right? We know the space. We love the space. We know how to
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  Brent: underwrite the space. Our typical, and we, we really hadn't got into SBA 7A lending, but the shop that
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  Brent: we acquired out of Dallas, First Western back in January, their entire portfolio when we bought them
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  Brent: was hotels. So we're looked at as, as, as a lender, as hotel experts. Right. And, and so let's, let's,
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  Brent: let's segue into your 7A. So, so we talked a little bit before we pushed the record button here.
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  Brent: Back in the beginning days of Peachtree, you did very large deals. But that's changed a little bit
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  Brent: with your now offering 7As. Kind of go through that with us. Yeah. Our private credit shop has
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  Brent: historically, you know, last year we did 3 billion in lending and that was all first mortgage bridge
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  Brent: loans, private credit to all real estate asset classes. I think we were close to about 2 billion
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  Brent: in hotel lending and the remainder was multifamily, student housing, office, retail, and the like.
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  Brent: We took the opportunity to buy an SBLC, a non-bank lender license. The company was called First
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  Brent: Western. We bought them in late January. So that was the beginning and the genesis of our SBA 7A shop.
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  Brent: Their portfolio was majority hotels, I think 98, 99% hotels. We have made an effort as we're going
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  Brent: to grow that portfolio. We are diversifying outside of hotels. So now we're doing business
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  Brent: acquisitions, startups, turnarounds, and really diversifying outside of the hospitality.
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  Brent: Well, and you mentioned business acquisitions. Of course, I don't need to tell you there's the whole
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  Brent: silver tsunami thing going on. We got 19 million small business owners out there that are 65 years
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  Brent: and older. So you could do acquisitions. Absolutely. We think it's the right time.
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  Brent: We think it's going to be an explosion as we go through this next season as these,
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  Brent: as these businesses are being sold. And we think it's a huge opportunity.
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  Brent: Okay. What does engagement with Peachtree Group look like? How does someone start a conversation
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  Brent: with you about a potential loan? I think it's a phone call. The phone call or an email.
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  Brent: And we take a more common sense approach. You're going to talk to somebody. You're going to meet
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  Brent: somebody at Peachtree. A lot of lenders, a lot of owners or borrowers will never meet the lender.
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  Brent: You're going to meet Peachtree. We are very hands-on. We are very sponsor-owner,
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  Brent: borrower-driven. We think this is a common sense business. We think the business is the business,
• 9:19
  Brent: and it either makes sense or it doesn't. But we're really underwriting the borrower here.
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  Brent: And with the SBA guarantee, the SBA guarantee is incentivizing us to get outside of our typical
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  Brent: credit box to go lend to someone that we typically might not lend to. So what that turns into is,
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  Brent: can that borrower run this business? Can that borrower get up every morning and make this a go?
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  Brent: Does he have the resolve? Does he have the grit to really make this business work? And I think that's
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  Brent: such an important part of SBA financing that we've seen change over the last 10 to 15 years where it's
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  Brent: gotten transactional and we're bringing more of a transformational approach back to the business.
• 10:07
  Brent: Yeah, no, I think you just nailed it. It has become so transactional. And I think, I love to hear you
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  Brent: talk about the owner, the grit, the commitment, the experience, because those are entrepreneurial
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  Brent: terms. That's exactly right. Right. So you are really in a position to support an entrepreneur.
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  Brent: That's right. And Tom, I'm in charge of growth for our SBA shop. And so I'm in charge to go out and
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  Brent: hire a team to help me grow this, this portfolio or grow this shop, our SBA division. And I talk to
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  Brent: BDOs, salespeople every day. And one question I ask is how many of your clients have you spoken to?
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  Brent: How many clients have you met? And some are very proud and saying, I don't really talk to my clients.
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  Brent: I don't really go meet my clients. I'm too busy doing deals. Well, those are the guys I don't hire
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  Brent: because we're trying to bring a different approach. Let's say a loan goes bad or starts to go bad
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  Brent: and nobody has a relationship with that borrower. It's going to go bad and you're never going to
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  Brent: know it's going to go bad. But if you have a relationship with that borrower, you can do
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  Brent: things on the forefront. You're going to know about it much sooner, earlier, and be able to help them
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  Brent: through the tough times. I like it. It is Brent LeBlanc, who serves as the Executive Vice
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  Brent: President of Business Development for a very innovative group, Peachtree Group, private equity
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  Brent: lenders. Brent, again, how does someone find Peachtree Group? I think they send me an email
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  Brent: or they call me and I usually pick up the phone. And if I don't pick up the phone, I'm going to call
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  Brent: you back within a couple hours. Give us that number. 832-444-6844. And you're the website?
• 11:57
  Brent: You're always going to talk to somebody. Okay. You're always going to talk to somebody. So you
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  Brent: can go to www.peachtreegroup.com and you can see our whole suite of lending products. Okay.
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  Brent: Brent, thank you for your support at the Flagle Conference this year. Thank you for being an
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  Brent: exhibitor here. Thank you for your time here on Small Biz Florida. And thank you for all you do for
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  Brent: small businesses. Tom, it's been a pleasure. Thank you. Absolutely. This is Small Biz Florida. I am
• 12:27
  Brent: Tom Kinner, your host. It is all about capital access for small business owners and operators here
• 12:32
  Brent: at the 2026 Flagle Conference, all taking place at the beautiful JW Marriott in Orlando. Stay tuned.
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  Brent: More to come. This is Small Biz Florida. That's all for this episode of Small Biz Florida.
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  Brent: We hope you found valuable insights and inspiration to fuel your entrepreneurial journey.
• 12:51
  Brent: Don't forget to subscribe to Small Biz Florida on your favorite podcast platform to never miss an
• 12:56
  Brent: episode. We're also active on Instagram. You can find us at Small Biz Florida. So follow us for
• 13:02
  Brent: exclusive content and connect with fellow Florida small business owners. And for even more resources
• 13:08
  Brent: and support, visit our website at floridasbdc.org forward slash podcast. That's floridasbdc.org
• 13:16
  Brent: forward slash podcast. Until then keep innovating and keep growing. Thanks for listening.