So the big question is this how are real estate investors who don't have a ton of free time, don't have access to off-market deals and didn't start life on third base, how do we grow a real estate business conservatively to support our families, finally leave the corporate rat race and build a legacy? That is the question, and this podcast will give you the answers. I'm Ed Matthews and this is Real Estate Underground. This is the Real Estate Underground Podcast Show number 84. Greetings and salutations, real estate undergrouders.
Ed MathewsIt's Ed Matthews, again with the Real Estate Underground. I am really excited about this conversation, mainly because I'm a confessed real estate geek. My kids think I'm actually a dork, which is kind of the next level, but they might be right. But the gentleman that we're interviewing today, dorian Lamb he is the defender of the deal and someone that I have been following for quite some time and I thought that, given his experience and his view across the marketplace, it would be invaluable to our audience to have a conversation with Mr Lamb and learn at the foot of the title master. How are you, sir? Nice Welcome to the show.
Dorian LimI'm reacting to you. Call me master. Thank you for that. Thank you for the introduction. I'm looking forward to being part of something underground. Yes, Back in the days of being underground, that's something cool, Not to say that this isn't. But underground is different for us now and I'm happy to be part of some level of underground capacity.
Ed MathewsI like to think we're cool, although, like I referred to earlier, if you ask my teenager daughters, neither of them will tell you I'm cool. So to each their own. So, dorian, for those folks out there that don't necessarily do business in the New York Tri-State area and may not know who you are and what you do, why don't you step us through a cornerstone and how you got into this business and how we got to today, yeah, so my name is Dorian Lamb and I'm a born and raised in New Yorker.
Dorian LimI've been here all my life, and so I went to NYU and came out as a management consultant and did some consulting work for the big four at the time for Fortune 100 companies and my journey into real estate and even more specific title insurance was not planned at all. It was through acquisition. It allowed me to consult in the title insurance space and I had spent over a decade in the back office and had an opportunity later on in my career to learn the front office side of it and eventually become an owner of my own company, which is Cornerstone. So that's kind of how I ended up where I am. Because, it's funny, I often get the story of when I start by saying I was a management consultant. They always immediately say how did you end up in title insurance? Right?
Ed MathewsIt was completely unplanned.
Dorian LimBut as I guess we'll dig deeper into later in our conversation, I've been very fortunate to be where I am now and it's one of the things that drives me, because at this point in my career it really is about being as optimal as possible and trying to grow the business and grow our investment profile as well.
Ed MathewsYeah, excellent.
Ed MathewsAnd so the thing that's interesting about your operation and the way you approach it and the fact that fellow software and process consultant and sales guy and operations guy and all that the idea that you would go from helping Fortune 100 companies to smooth their operations to running your own business it's all about business systems and making sure that the value chain gets connected so that you can operate efficiently.
Ed MathewsSo as far as, but the thing about your operation and the thing that I personally respect so much is that, first off, you have a broad view into the marketplace. I was talking with a gentleman who's starting a job at one of the really high-end lenders and I said one of the things that you have that I don't have is a view into the entire market, which I value as an investor, Because that person and you see so many deals over the span of a day, week, month, quarter that I just don't see until they're already transacted at best. And so that's one of the things that really we were talking before we got on and it hadn't occurred to me that you were a genuine gold nugget resource in terms of picking up the phone and calling Dorian and saying, hey, man, what do you see in the market lately what's going on, Right?
Dorian LimYeah, I mean, you know what's interesting and we handle both residential closings and commercial closings, so we do have a nice reference as far as the type of deals that are closing. Where they're closing, yeah, who's involved with them? Institutional lenders are active, and lenders are not the types of lenders that are now becoming prolific at any given point in time when they private lenders, the regional banks or the institutional lenders, and we also get a profile of the asset class that is closing more frequently and even within that asset class. So if we talked about multifamily per se, same things like we see a lot of student housing, we see some senior housing, or we're seeing a lot of luxury condos, so on and so forth. So, yes, to what you said and, taking a step back and again, consult in mind what's the logic behind this was that you know, in a way we're a hub to real estate closings and what I mean by that is you know, we're one of the entities that or parties that has the ability to interact with everyone that's involved in a closing.
Dorian LimSo, whether it be the buyer, the seller, the lender, the lender council, the land use attorney, whoever it is that's involved in the transaction, we have a reason to at times reach out to them for clearance matters, curative matters, you know, for clarification on certain components. And when you take a step back and see it in that way, you know it wasn't obvious at the time, but it became obvious when we said you know we actually have a lot of touch points.
Dorian LimAnd you know we're paying attention. It's not just about giving an insurance product and providing title insurance. If there's a way we can contribute to either market intelligence or in some way provide content around that, then you know we will. And from that you know open doors in a different way from us, where we not only just provide title insurance. Now some of our operators have become friends. You know they started off as prospects, became clients, they've become friends and now we either spitball on ideas, we get the opportunity to invest in their deals, we get the opportunity to talk to folks like you about finding passive investors and connecting the dots to their developers that are closing deals right, because that's what a title insurance company does it. You know they.
Dorian LimWe actually see the owner, operator, sponsor sitting there signing the document. Or you know now it happens in escrow but we know who it is and that it's actually them. There's a level of verification and validity that we can offer to the process where you know somebody called me and said, hey, is it really the one closing the deals. I can say, yeah, I see a signature right here. I know, I know what we've been doing for five, six, seven, eight years. Right, and he's returned money to investors all the time. Yes, good answer.
Ed MathewsYeah, thank you.
Ed MathewsAnd you know. It's interesting, though, because the you know the other part of it is you know. You know from an operator perspective, from a attorney, you know law office perspective, even lenders, you know who's easy to work with, who's a little more difficult, who's you know, and you know the ability to be able to go from customer client to friend and be able to trust an advisor is really valuable to me. To be able to pick up the phone, pick your brain, or remember your team's brain and say, you know, hey, I'm thinking about doing this. What do you think?
Dorian LimYeah, you know. You know this as well as anyone.
Ed MathewsThere is different you know, legal fees can can you know, accumulate pretty quickly, right. That's a big on attorneys here.
Dorian LimBut we have become a resource from that perspective as well, which is look, I have a transactional real estate attorney, but I'm about to go into a joint venture with a church, like I need a referral here and I don't want to pay whatever. X white you know dollar. They're not institutional. They want to use somebody that we know. That's an industry that is more efficient from the perspective of being able to advise and consult them, and that's on the commercial side of you know access agreements.
Dorian LimWe get asked a lot condo documents, which attorneys are good for a certain scenario. And it also resonates on the residential side, where any of our friends, our own family, will say I don't have a real estate attorney. I'm about to, you know, buy a piece of property. Do you have any referrals? And we've become a resource on that end too, because we were literally on an email chain or closing with other residential real estate attorneys that can speak to who's responsive, who's not, who doesn't cover a certain area, who does. The last thing you want to do is to use an attorney that says very effective in New Jersey and have them close.
Dorian LimYou know something in New York where the rules and the matters and the nuances can be different so that's where we can come help, where we we kind of are really an advisor, that and we're not charging and rising fees right, we're a company at the other day but that we can be a resource to, to you know that.
Ed MathewsYeah, so so tell me about from an operational perspective. You know I'm former management consultant, so you know obviously you're very systems oriented and I'm curious about the. You know not only the systems that you've put in place over over time to you know to be able to operate, but you know, when you look at an operator, somebody like me or you know in a you know a similar firm, you know what are some of the systems that that you see that make it a lot easier for us to be able to. You know someone like us to be able to close transactions working with. You know your firm and obviously the buyers or sellers.
Yeah, I don't know if there's a specific system that I can, you know, cite here, but I think it's more of a philosophy, right? Yeah, best practices, that's where we're. You know, one of the things that we are firm believers in is we hire by talent. What I mean by that is and I'll get into, I'll define that a little more but, yeah, great, what I mean by that is is, you know, for us, ghana, days of finding somebody that specifically fits perfectly into a certain role or mechanism or responsibility, right, and I become now talent. And what I mean talent, I, what I mean is is is problem solving, the ability to kind of not only present the problem but then actually go through the extra steps of saying, you know, but we could do it this way, right, and that's that's important for us, because, as a whole, now, this is, you know, this could speak a little bit to system.
Ed MathewsAnd I think of as a business owner is not to do everything.
Dorian LimIf I'm doing everything, then the program is wrong and I can't scale right, I can't grow. So the idea is to empower those with talent, with problem solving ability, to give them the liberty to understand what we're trying to accomplish. So here's the mission.
Dorian LimHere are the goals. I'm not going to pretend to know what the best. I know a way to do it, but I really want you here to figure out either is this the best way, is there a better way, or are there things that can complement? So you know, the old saying was if it ain't broke, don't fix it. I don't subscribe to that. What I subscribe to is that a process can always become better Absolutely, and times, technology, all of it changes.
Ed MathewsSo if it works for us today perfectly.
Dorian LimWho's to say that in a year it can't work better? So that's the type of, that's the way that we hire and that's the way we go about growing a company or growing anything that we're involved in. It's finding the talent, knowing that somebody is going to take the responsibility and that has the desire to solve a problem and then align it with the goals and the mission of what their primary objective is.
Ed MathewsSo, again. I don't pretend to know it the best.
Dorian LimI know a way to do it.
Ed MathewsI want to put people there to tell me the best way to do it. Yeah, I'm very open with our team and I've said this more than once on the air that if I walk into a conference room or onto a Zoom call or something and I'm the smartest person in that meeting, we're in a lot of trouble. Right, it's a problem.
Dorian LimRight, I've said the same thing yet, so learn the same page with that. You do not want me to be the smartest guy in the room?
Ed MathewsIf you're looking for me to figure everything out, we're going to have problems.
Ed MathewsSo, yeah, the same thing, right, as we are looking for people who understand our vision in terms of what we're trying to accomplish for our investors, our residents and everybody in between.
Ed MathewsAnd so somebody gave me some advice a while ago, and what they said was you want to hire, so every talent is really important, right, you want to hire passion players, not paycheck players. Right? You want to hire people that buy into the vision of the business and will execute and help the business grow, evolve, change, because, like you said, it's a dynamic environment. I mean, there's new best practices and technology and ways of doing things that go on, retweet on Twitter and see all the guys out, all the people out there throwing around ideas. It's mind-boggling how people operate, and I look at a situation like that and I'm always looking to pluck that little gold nugget and go, wow, we can apply that to our business. Right, and I want to, like you, I want to empower our team to do the same thing, right? Yeah, doesn't have to be my way. Just ask that we have to find the best way.
Dorian LimRight, exactly, and if your task is so mundane and non-dynamic that it's the same every single time, then we were kind of kicking back before we hit the court on this. That technology is there and chat GBT is there to take it, if it literally is the same ending all the time, right? So you have to evolve with that as a company. That applies as well.
Ed MathewsYeah, I mean we don't necessarily use chat GBT to create content, for instance, but two weekends ago, watching the Celtics game on yeah, it was the Celtics game I created I updated all of our job descriptions, all of the checklists for the various processes, because I've been trying to revamp our employee manual so that we bring everybody on the same page. And on Monday morning during our team meeting, I'm passing them all out and saying, ok, tell me what I got right, fix what I got wrong and if you have a better idea, incorporate it and let's talk right. And so they all scattered and they've been working on their various things Because I want to empower them and get their buy-in in terms of how they operate. But the other part of it is I'd like to take vacation every once in a while.
Dorian LimAnd so right, right.
Ed MathewsEven leave early on a Friday afternoon would be OK Every once in a while. And the fact is that if you don't show up to work as the principal or the founder, and everything stops. You don't have a business.
Dorian LimRight. So the idea here is not to control everything. The idea here is to get it to a point where you could set up and forget it and trust those that you've put in place to do what they need to do.
Ed MathewsAnd hire people that are better at those jobs than I am Right, Right, yeah, absolutely. So. You know, given your experience today, as well as you know, frankly, your management consulting experience, I'm sure you've had many mentors along the way and so I'm curious, you know, in terms of advice that you've received over the years, you know what is the best advice you've ever gotten and you know, I'm curious, who gave it to you?
Yeah, Not to be corny here, but the best advice is to recognize that you do. You need mentors and coaches, right? Right, you're spot on with regards to the fact that my journey still has mentors and has had mentors. So you know, it was kind of phrased in a way where it's think of any high performing person that you know in any capacity, and most people will name an athlete.
Dorian LimBut even if it were not, even if it's a famous celebrity on TV, the response to that is do you realize how many coaches and advisors they have? Because the majority of them will have, on average, probably 10. Right, and the question comes back to me how many do you have? And it's zero. So you know, think of it from that lens, but I'm not going to use that as a cop out to your question. The one thing that I would say, that is, has been extremely important and vital insight of through my years now as a real estate investor, you know outside of the company, but as a real estate investor and as somebody who contributes to capital raising and you know helping people look at deals or find deals is this is it's about the people, right, and it's you reach a point where it's not always about the deal, right.
Dorian LimBecause when I first started out, it was what had the highest returns, what to me, was the greatest opportunity, and of course that's important. But you get to a point, and then you know this, which is you're going to come to a point where you have five deals that are all great, right, and it's. I reached a point where it was like it's about the people. What I mean by that is you're about to invest in them, you're about to partner with them, you're about to do something together and real estate, as we all know, is not something that takes day, it takes years, right and you're about to get into a partnership, ie marriage relationship with you know, said people. So there's something to be said about spending the time to understand, get to know and build relationships. Yeah, so if I were to summarize that it's you know, and you've heard this, I'm pretty sure, but people will take a good deal with great partners over a great deal with bad partners 100% of the time, you know.
Dorian LimI see it all the time in title, which is receive deals that are being sold because the partnership just reached the point where they needed out. They wanted out or there was some, you know, separation or something that they just could not agree on and they needed to sell the site or move on or find an equity injection or find some way to dissolve the partnerships.
Dorian LimSo that's one of the lessons I've learned because, at the end of the day, you representing many investors and in some cases you, you know, being the investor. You want to know that, because real estate another thing that we know that's a given is that it's not always going to go according to plan, Right. And when it doesn't go according to plan, is that individual going to really have your best interests in mind? Or they really kind of set on some lavish lifestyle that they're trying to, you know, maintain Right? And you know, famously, one of the questions that I heard someone ask when they were seeking out partnership was what kind of cars do you drive Right? And and you know, look not not to hate on people with exotic cars because that's great.
Ed MathewsHey, you know, I think exotic cars are great, but if you have 10 Lamborghinis in your garage.
Dorian LimJust there could be some misalignment depending on the type of investor. In person, of course that you are, but it's just an example of just getting to know people, to know that you're aligned, to know that, when things go wrong, that that person is going to be accountable for you with these.
Ed MathewsYeah, so for the record, I drive a Ford 2019 Ford expedition with about 92,000 miles on it. There you go, I love it. So. So I hear you. You know it's. It's interesting, the. You know you use the marriage metaphor and and I I 100% agree, right, you know anyone that that I'm looking to do business with. We're going to date first, right, we're going to date first, right. Every property, every project has a curveball, every single one of them, without a doubt, right? And you learn a lot. My grandfather always used to say you learn a lot about people in two very specific situations One, when there's a pile of money on the table, and the second one is when the stuff hits the fan. Right, everybody reverts back to who they are, and so, if you have that understanding of the person or the group sitting in front of me, we operate from the same value system. We're gonna do the right thing, even if no one's paying attention. You gotta know that before you go to the altar and trade your boughs, right?
Dorian LimAnd my examples were kind of on the equity side. It trickles down to your lender as well on the debt right, because there you're partner in it. If you think about it, they're depending on leverage. They're your biggest investor, so they're gonna work with you if things don't go exactly according to plan or they're gonna give you a very hard time right, so those are important matters, so the insight do mentors and advisors, and experience has been that it really is about the people right, especially the time when everybody's trying to either work from home or create this element where you have a trusted up, your blockchain and so on and so forth.
Dorian LimThere's roles for that, but in general, real estate is still a people driven business. Right, it's a game sport, it's a relationship business. It still is. And even no matter how perfect the platform is, you still wanna be able to be on the other side of that individual that you're about to give your hard-earned money to, or that a bank's about to give other people's money to, right. So you have to be able to feel the energy you have to feel the get an idea of the type of person that they are.
Ed MathewsSo true, I agree. So one of the theories that I have and I try to test it with every person that I meet here on the show is that leaders are readers, and so you, being the principal at your firm, me at mine, I know most of the principles that I've met over the years are voracious readers, and these days it doesn't necessarily mean picking up a book. Right, it doesn't have to be a tangible book, but it does, because it can be conferences, it can be YouTube videos, it can be podcasts that you listen to, it can be audio books or real books. So I'm curious about two things. One is what are you paying attention to these days in terms of topics and types of information you're pulling in? And then, specifically, who's the author or the creator behind it? Who are you paying attention to?
Dorian LimYeah, so I am a subscriber of all the mediums that you just described right, so I am old school in the sense that I do like to have physical copies, and for me I guess it means I'm exercising my eyes and still maintaining my literacy.
Dorian LimBut, I also do during drives or walks or whatever it is. I'll e-book, I'll listen to podcasts or so on and so forth. So this is a loaded question. I feel like you could probably have a whole separate topic on this. Sure, yeah, I'm gonna just go with what I'm consuming now in general, and one of the things that I'm very passionate about is wellness. Right, and I use the word wellness in our fitness because most of the time when I say fitness, people just associate it with physical fitness.
Dorian LimThat's a component of it but wellness also embodies mental fitness and a happy life a happy family happy company, happy employees.
Dorian LimSo I focus a lot on or now at least my content is in that area. So I'm a firm believer that if we're going to be good husbands, fathers, owners, investors, anything that you have to be well in general. So anything that helps me figure out understanding sleep better, understanding relationships better, understanding spirituality better is what I'm consuming now, so I'll throw some names out there. I'll have a podcast from. Andrew Huberman is huge in the brain and the neurological space. Andy Galpin is a guy that's very physically oriented in terms of movement and biomechanics and what works and what doesn't, from a physical fitness standpoint.
Dorian LimBut that's a part of my life. The other is obviously with regards to the mindset and the habits that help me maintain a level of productivity that I need to have in order to grow a business and grow investments and grow a family. But let's see what comes to mind. Habits is a book written by James Clear Atomic Habits. Atomic Habits yeah, that's great because it does break down things. It's not even bite size, but kind of nano size, nanosize type of things to start programming in and not think of it, as I need to be able to read 100 words per minute tomorrow.
Dorian LimThere's always a starting point there, recognizing that it's about the repetition. But other authors that I follow from the business front are Dale Carnegie is a famous one in terms of how to influence people. That may be Robert Kaldini, I'm sorry. Dale Carnegie did how to Win Friends.
Ed MathewsAnd Influence People. That's right. Influence was the other book you were referring to.
Dorian LimRobert Kaldini is Influence, so he's another. So I'm into the psychology of businesses as well. Seth Goldene is somebody I follow but, like I said, I'm a bit scared of being on this because I feel like we can be and talk about this on end. But you're right, I've been encouraged to read. I try my best to read as much as possible, but I wish I could read more. One of the things that somebody said to me is the answers are out there.
Ed MathewsYou just got to read it Right and yeah, that's exactly right. But the other part of it is that you alluded to it earlier. Is that the life balance? So I'm curious when you're not investing in real estate or running your title company, what do you like to do in your private time? How do you spend your time away from the industry?
Dorian LimSo if it's not family. I did use the word wellness intentionally, but I am into physical fitness, so I'm usually there's some event that I'm getting ready for, whether it be a triathlon or a CrossFit event or some of the other fitness things that are out there. It just keeps me very focused and it helps with decision making with regards to where I'm spending my time.
Dorian LimSo if I feel like there may not be value in something that's being proposed to me. Quite honestly, I would say I'm just going to sleep, because sleep is the one thing for us in order to take on the next day. So that's what I do, if it's not family. But I have two young kids, so our weekends and our off time are pretty filled.
Ed MathewsYeah, I can only imagine I have about teenagers. And my uncle asked me once what are your hobbies? And I said your nieces, those are my hobbies. I do what they need me to do.
Dorian LimIt's mentoring them.
Right, exactly, or ride to the swim meet or softball game or soccer game or dance practice or whatever Uber yeah, exactly, I'm a professional Uber, although I don't get paid for it. So, dorian, I've really enjoyed this conversation and I appreciate your insights. Thank you very much. If people want to learn more about you or your company, what's the best way for them to reach out and get in touch?
Dorian LimYeah, the easiest way is over the internet. My company, cornerstone, is cornerstonelandabstractcom. It's my personal brand. I'm known as the defender of the deal, so if you type in defenderofthedealcom, you'll see all the information about me and that will lead you to all the Instagram, linkedin and the blog newsletter that we have on both fronts.
Ed MathewsYou also have an excellent white paper on your site. I went out for this conversation. We should probably mention that that was outstanding.
Dorian LimThat's right. Thanks for bringing that up and thanks for the kind words on that, but yeah, you can go to defenderofthedealcom and pull my white paper down on there, specifically on how to use title insurance as a tool in your belt, whether you're an investor or whether you're going to purchase your own property.
Ed MathewsRight on. Well, Dorian, thank you so much for your time today and all your experience and wisdom. I'm grateful and it's good to see you, my friend.
Dorian LimThank you, Ed, for bringing back the underground.
Ed MathewsYeah, no problem, all right, One show at a time. Until next time, happy investing.