From Pro Hockey to $300M in Real Estate: Zane Schartz on Building Freedom CRE - EP04

What do you get when a former pro hockey player walks away from a \$100,000 deposit just to protect his investors?

You get Zane Schartz — founder of Freedom CRE, a real estate platform managing over $300 million in single-tenant, triple-net assets across the country.

In this episode of The Wealth Clock, Zane sits down with Steven Weinstock to talk about:

* How he went from body checks to credit checks
* Walking away from deals that don’t feel right, even at personal cost
* Why he focuses 100% on investment-grade tenants like Starbucks and Verizon
* The truth about NNN lease structures (and why most people misunderstand them)
* His lean business model, rapid investor growth, and vision for tokenizing real-world real estate

Whether you're in multifamily, commercial, or just thinking about investing, this episode is packed with strategy, insight, and real talk from someone who’s doing it at scale.

📌 Chapters:
0:00 Intro
2:20 First Deal Under Freedom CRE
6:45 Walking Away from \$100K
12:00 Gaining Momentum in the Business
16:40 Why He Chooses NNN Over Multifamily
21:30 How Monthly Cash Flow Works
28:45 Investing Criteria and Buy Box
35:20 Lessons from Pro Hockey
41:10 Faith, Discipline, and Staying Grounded
45:30 What’s Next for Freedom CRE

✅ Subscribe for more episodes featuring top real estate operators, founders, and investors.

📲 Follow Zane Schartz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zaneschartz/
📩 Learn more about Freedom CRE:  http://www.freedomcre.net
📧 Connect with Steven Weinstock : http://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenweinstock1

🎙 About Steven Weinstock
Steven Weinstock is a real estate investor and founder of WeCapital and the Goethals Capital Fund. Since 2001, he has built a diverse portfolio of residential and multifamily assets while helping investors access passive income through strategic real estate opportunities. On this podcast, he shares real-world insights on investing, capital raising, and what it really takes to build and scale in today’s market.

📩 Want to invest or get in touch?
Visit: www.WeCapitalX.com

📱 Connect with Steven:
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/stevenweinstock1

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wecapitalx/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheWealthClockPodcast

Transcript

Steven M Weinstock: 0:01

Hi. Welcome back to the Wealth Clock with Steven Weinstock, where Top Operators deal makers share what actually works in business and in life. Today's guest is Zane Schartz, and his story checks a few unexpected boxes. He's the founder of Freedom, CRE a company focused on single tenant triple net. Retail assets with a portfolio that's grown to over $300 million across the country. But before real estate, Zane spent almost three years skating professionally as a hockey player. So yeah we're talking to someone who went from body checks to credit checks. This episode isn't just about investing, it's about reinvention, discipline, structure. And finding a lane, most people overlook, we're going to talk. About how Zane went from the rink to retail and how he built a Lean national platform and why he's bullish on assets. Most people ignore. Let's get into it. Zane, thank you very much for joining us.

Zane Schartz: 1:04

Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. I love those those alliterations retail and checks to body checks to re what was the other one? Credit checks. I love checks.

Steven M Weinstock: 1:14

Yeah. Yeah. I I try my best. I try my best. Let's let's talk about freedom, CRE. What was the very first deal you closed under that name and how did it come together?

Zane Schartz: 1:23

The very first deal we closed under that name was a Family Dollar. And we actually bought it from the former private equity company that I used to work at. So I worked at another private equity firm for six years and ran these funds very similarly. And I left over two years ago now and. The first property you bought was from that company and I was actually the one who acquired it for that old private equity group. So I knew it was a good property and I was already in negotiations for a lease extension and ended up buying it for my new freedom Commercial Real Estate. That was our first one. And then since then we've added new tenants and more tenants and just diversified into different asset classes. Not asset classes. Sorry. Tenants and industries. So now we do tenants like Starbucks. We do auto parts stores telecom stores where we own the property. And then these multi-billion dollar companies like Verizon, Starbucks, dollar General Auto Zone are paying our rents.

Steven M Weinstock: 2:19

Got it. I saw on LinkedIn you once posted about walking away. From a hundred thousand dollars earnest money deposit to protect your investors. That's not something you see every day. It was your money on the line that you walked away from. What happened over there?

Zane Schartz: 2:33

Oh. My pockets were definitely a lot lighter after that one. So we got that one under contract and it was a really good property. This was actually, we were gonna buy an a plus class multifamily deal 2024 build property. This was actually last year. And, I always make sure that my investors are first. And I do that because I have a lot of friends and family who invest with me and myself personally. And yeah, we had a hundred K of earnest money and it went hard. And after it went hard, we kinda learned just stuff about the property that wasn't really disclosed and that we did not learn in our 45 day due diligence. So that could be our fault, that could be the sellers, but we found stuff that we were just like, Hey, this isn't gonna, this is gonna do it for us. This is probably gonna be more money than we. Had budget to fix. And because of that, I wasn't gonna fit a square peg in a round hole. And the seller wasn't super willing to work with us and they were pressuring us to do other things. So I was just like, Hey, I'd rather lose the a hundred K outta my own money than I. Continue to raise investors money and just get across the finish line.'cause in the end that a hundred thousand dollars might hurt today, but in the future it'd hurt more if I lost investors' capital. And for me, capital preservation for our investors is much more important than putting money in my own pocket. Like I'm not doing this to pad my pockets. I'm doing it to help other people get wealthy. And then a byproduct of that is obviously operators making money as well.

Steven M Weinstock: 3:52

Yeah, that's very smart and your investors should definitely be happy to hear that. Little tidbit. You have $300 million in assets under management. At what point did you realize, or did you feel that, wow, okay, freedom, CRE has momentum and, I'm ready to hit the pedal to the metal. Was it right away? I know you said you had a background working for a private equity group. As soon as you started, did you know that this is where you're gonna get to? Did you think it would be a few deals and maybe do something else? At what point did you realize this is the way to go or for you.

Zane Schartz: 4:25

So I've always had the long-term vision of being an entrepreneur and having my own company. So I knew even when I was at that old company that I would be doing this someday myself. And then honestly, my track record there, I worked there for six years. We had a lot of investors that followed me to my new company, so they knew that I was in control and running a lot of what was happening over there. And once I left, they said, okay, we're gonna. Follow you. So that was a huge blessing and allowed me the opportunity to start instead of starting from zero, I started a little bit further along than most. So had some investor capital ready to play with. And then as we've had success and as we've done well for them, obviously. Happy investors are repeat investors and happy investors are investors who send you referrals. We've done well and honestly, over the past six or seven months since I started using LinkedIn, I have had exponential growth and the growth has been very crazy. I probably have 15 or 20 new investor calls a week. It is absolutely insane the amount of just traction that we are getting and the amount of growth that we're having from. LinkedIn, and I think a lot of that is due in part to, I'm very transparent on LinkedIn. I'm very I don't hold any information close to my chest. I say why I like deals, what deals we're looking at, why we're looking at 'em. I'll even post deals and be like, Hey, we're thinking about making an offer on this one. So I'm sure other people see that and maybe you'll make an offer on it themselves. But I'm just not greedy with any of the information I have or any of the knowledge that I've obtained. I just want to help people. That's really why I do it.

Steven M Weinstock: 5:54

Yeah.. I I follow your LinkedIn and it's it's very well written and it's the content that you're providing is, very good. You'll talk about a deal where you bought it with this billionaire tenant and then this tenant left and how you're able to, rent it out to somebody else. Definitely a checkout. Zane Schartz's LinkedIn. Definitely. Thanks. Yeah. Most people that I come across are chasing, multifamily or industrial flex space. I'm in the multifamily space. I've dabbled in some retail and some office space. I personally like, multifamily or residential, because I guess it's what I know. Why and how did you zero in on single tenant triple net leases types of property?

Zane Schartz: 6:36

Yeah. So at that old private equity firm I worked at, I also was in charge. I was the chief investment officer there. So I did mostly acquisitions and I was in charge of all the multifamily acquisitions. So I knew how to underwrite a deal and then saw them come to fruition or not. And a lot of things that I. Didn't like about multifamily were the variables that are out of your control in terms of expenses that cost of goods, cost of labor insurance going up. There's just a lot of variables that you can't control. Obviously there's a lot of variables that are good that you can control and you can create in why and create value. So the levers are more so for me. That higher, more lever, more levers equals more risk, but also more risk equals potential for more return. So when I left, I wanted to create something that was very low risk, very stable, very consistent, very just. Cut and dry aiming for singles and doubles over and over again for investors and not really swinging for the fences on any deal. And for me the most stable, consistent way to do it was buy properties where the people paying your rent are multi-billion dollar companies backing your lease. And for us, we're fully reimbursed on taxes and insurance and common area maintenance. So we don't have a ton of operational risk in terms of variances on our returns. That was really the reason why is I wanted to buy things that cash flowed from day one and were very low risk and that's why we were looking at a plus class new build Multifamily is 'cause those are typically mid nineties occupied and should have not a lot of operational risk. And if they're ran well. It should be pretty low risk. That didn't work and that's okay. And maybe that was a blessing in disguise and maybe that was God pointing me to just stay in the triple net single tenant retail space. Which I think is what we're probably gonna do. And like you said earlier, I. Of, hey, multifamily, so you're sticking multifamily. I know triple net and retail better than I know anything else. So I think that just might be my niche moving forward. And sticking to that and being one of the, one of the main faces of that is something that I would love to be.

Steven M Weinstock: 8:40

What do most people get wrong when they look at a triple net deal or tenant credit?

Zane Schartz: 8:46

I think most people assume that just because it's a name brand, that it's an investment grade tenant. So everything we buy is investment grade means meaning it has a triple B or higher credit rating from Moody's or Standard and poors. So in order to have that, you have to check a lot of different boxes. We exclusively and only by investment grade, but people will say, oh, we have a. A Subway or a Dunkin Donuts or a Pizza Hut, those are all great name brands and national name brands, but they're not investment grade because all those are backed by franchisees. Most people will think, oh we buy high credit tenants and we buy corporate backed leases. A corporation can technically be. One property dunking Donuts, and that is not a credit rated tenant that we would buy. We only buy companies that are backed by the corporations that are publicly traded companies. So that's a big one. And then secondly, it's like some of these deals are double net and triple net. We're not afraid of double net leases. We have the team in place to operate 'em. So people might think that these deals are a hundred percent hands off. We don't touch 'em, and money just comes in the door. That's not the case. We are responsible for stuff. Sometimes we have to pay the taxes, pay the insurance, and get reimbursed by the tenant. Sometimes we're responsible for roofing structure. If it's a double net lease. Every lease is very different. There are properties out there that you can do absolute, triple net leases where you just collect rent. Those are very nice. We have some of those. The cap rates are lower, so the yield is lower. But overall I'd say the space is pretty clear so most people understand. I. Kind of what we're doing, how we do it, and why we do it. It's the nuances of what is investment grade, kinda what are your operational risks, et cetera.

Steven M Weinstock: 10:25

So are you saying that you would , stay away from. Franchisees and only deal with let's say Starbucks. From what I understand, let's say Starbucks is not a franchise business. It's usually corporate owned. I believe they, they might have some franchises, like a Disney World or in some hotels. But from what I understand, they're all owned by the franchisor the corporate. So does that mean you stay away from franchisees?

Zane Schartz: 10:49

Correct. We don't buy any franchisees. That's our niche is only. Leases backed by the multi-billion dollar tenants, starbucks is a hundred percent corporate owned. Every property they own is man managed and ran by Starbucks corporate all over the world.

Steven M Weinstock: 11:05

Got it. So let me ask you this question. I'll put you on the spot. If Shaquille O'Neal calls you, and from what I understand, he owns, I dunno a whole bunch of Papa John's or some other rent. So let's say he owns a hundred locations. So if he calls you and says, Hey Zane we're both athletes I'd like to rent this property. I'll even give you a shout out on Twitter, et cetera. But I am a franchisee. So you're telling me you would tell him to fly a kite? Is that what you're telling me?

Zane Schartz: 11:33

I'd say Shaq, you can go pound sand. No, I'd say, there's different levels to investment. There's different levels to franchisees. And there's this thing that some public REITs look at. It's called investment grade qualities. And if the corporation generates over $1 billion in gross revenue, then they call them investment quality, but not investment grade. So they're making their own scale of like investment grade, Moody's s and p kind of on scale. We wouldn't buy it, so we would not buy it if it was Shaq. Some people might look at it and be like, Hey, Shaq is worth.$300 million and all of his companies make over a billion dollars. I don't know how much they make, but we wouldn't do it. We would say, Hey, we'll go find a property that isn't, but I will say there's value in franchise backed leases. There is value if you have somebody who owns 50 Dunking Donuts and most Dunking Donuts are absolute triple net leases where the tenant does take care of everything. I'm not saying that the way we do it is the only way to do it. I'm saying that our niche is, we only buy investment grade tenants. So a lot of people will buy retail centers or strip centers where maybe it's a five unit strip center and it might be, investment grade anchored by a Starbucks and then have four mom and pop nail salons, pizza joints, D donut stores. There's money to be made on that because if one of those tenants leaves. Then you can bring in potentially a new tenant or a higher credit tenant. There's just, there's more variables and that's why we don't do it. So we would rather have the security of a multimillion dollar company paying our rent than the potential upside of higher risk. So that's why we do it.

Steven M Weinstock: 13:10

You've mentioned on some of your posts that monthly distributions to your investors is a game changer. What makes your model more predictable for investors?

Zane Schartz: 13:21

Easy answer. We have fixed rental income and we have fixed debt on every deal. So those are the two biggest variables in your bottom line is what is your income, what are your expenses and what's your debt service? So our expenses are pretty much fixed. Our income is definitely fixed for X amount of years, however long the lease is. And then debt service. We only do fixed rate interest. So because of the consistency and stability of what we do, we can send monthly distributions every single month like clockwork to our investors. And our, the way we structure our deals is we run 'em as funds. So it's not single 10 single property offerings. Everything we buy is a fund where there's 10 to 20 different assets in the fund. And investors have ownership across every property in the fund. So they're diversified. Across different industries, geographic locations, tenants, lease terms. And with that, every property in the fund flows to the fund, LLC, which then flows out to the investors. So it's a, it is a simple distribution model, just making sure that, I guess you have budget for CapEx, not CapEx, but capital reserves for rainy day fund. But outside of that we distribute everything.

Steven M Weinstock: 14:30

Is your fund call, is this considered a closed-end fund or an open-ended fund?

Zane Schartz: 14:35

So it's closing at the end of 2025.

Steven M Weinstock: 14:38

Got it. And I guess for your fund specifically, I. Do, I guess you outline a specific criteria of what you'll buy and then really they, they just leave it up to you, am I correct?

Zane Schartz: 14:50

Correct. Yeah. It's applying pool raise and it's a certain box criteria that we say, Hey, we're looking for single tenant and at lease properties backed by multi-billion dollar companies multi-billion dollar investment grade companies, and we're looking to buy them in these geographic locations. Not limited to, but we're focused on the Sunbelt. And we're gonna build a portfolio with these projected returns. Seven, 8% cash on cash, looking for 20% annual returns when we exit. And then here's the exit strategy is roll up and sell it to a private equity group or a pension fund, or a reit. And that's like the overall model. But yeah, they gotta trust the professionals to go find the best properties on the market because we don't know what properties are gonna be on the market in three months. And we don't know what properties are gonna be on the market in six months.

Steven M Weinstock: 15:32

As far as your investors, are you targeting everybody? Do you have any mom and pop investors? Are you only looking for funds?

Zane Schartz: 15:40

Yeah, so

Steven M Weinstock: 15:40

big, big minimum checks. If I could call you after the Zoom and say, I have $5,000, could I get in? Just, tell the audience who you're targeting, who you're talking to.

Zane Schartz: 15:50

Yeah, so our minimum is a hundred K. We only work with accredited investors and our target investors are doctors, attorneys, engineers, pro athletes, executives any high net worth individual who is an accredited investor really and wants monthly cash flow is who we work with. And we have 400 plus investors right now. And. Probably growing, 10 20% a year in terms of growth, maybe more. But yeah we're growing, so always looking for new investors and looking to help people get that monthly cash flow. We're very different, like I said, than multifamily or development or whatever. I always tell investors like. First off, I tell 'em that real estate is the best place to be in. But I always tell 'em, you need to diversify across different asset classes in real estate. And if you want to maybe have an appreciation play on a value add multi-family deal, put some money there if you wanna kind of aim for the fences on a potential development deal. Ground up. Go there, your returns could be higher if you hit and if you want the low risk singles and doubles in getting on base, like that's what we're providing. I'm not trying to be the highest return in an investor's portfolio. I'm trying to be the most stable and consistent that they say, Hey, I get my money back every single month. I get distributions every single month. And then when we roll this up and sell it to a publicly traded REIT or a institutional buyer, like that's where the pop will come. Very different. Across the board and not saying one is any better than any others, it's just kinda what do investors want? And we're trying to provide a piece of their puzzle.

Steven M Weinstock: 17:16

Got it. I have some investors who reach out to me. They're, some of them are really focused on, I. Saving money on taxes. They asking me about cost aggregation depreciation, stuff like that. On a previous episode, I had a cost seg expert. He was mentioning the different types of properties. Some, depreciate garden style apartments, depreciate better than warehouses because there's more, toilets and more kitchen cabinets, et cetera. I guess I'm asking for triple net. Since you're not the fixing the toilet is not your department. Do you guys, is there such a thing as cost segregation on your properties? Do investors get that tax benefit? I'm curious.

Zane Schartz: 17:58

Yeah. Yeah. We do cost eggs on every property.'Cause we do own the building, so the building appreciates, and then the things inside of it also depreciate as well. Yeah, we do cost. Say I think if Trump brings back the a hundred percent bonus depreciation, we're anticipating 50 to 60% on investors dollars this year. And when you think of some of the stuff they, there are fixtures in the building that we do own. So for a Starbucks example, like there's a lot of. Stuff in there that we own and in the property. And in the end we do own the building and you can depreciate the value of the building. So we're closing on a Starbucks actually next week. And we're putting down 800 K to close on it. And we already have a cost egg study for 680 5K. So it's gonna be, and that's with the a hundred percent coming back, the a hundred percent bonus depreciation. So that's a. That's 85% loss on our dollar, which will be great for investors.

Steven M Weinstock: 18:47

What's your buy box as far as price? Are you buying a minimum to maximum? Are we talking 500,000 to 1.2? Are we talking 6 million to 12 million? Yeah. Where are you focused right now?

Zane Schartz: 18:59

We don't really have a minimum or maximum. I guess if I had to put a number, I'd say like we'd go as small as half a million and up to 10 million. It really just depends on the deal and how much the deal cash flows, what the cap rate we get it at, what the story behind it is, the likelihood of renewal. I. What the underlying value of the real estate is. You know who the tenant is. So we try to own three things. One, credit worthiness of tenant, two, the yield, and three, the the likelihood of the tenant renewing. So those are three things that we look for on a deal. And if we can blend that across the 10 to 20 assets in the fund then we're good.

Steven M Weinstock: 19:38

Got it. Okay. Zane you're an athlete. You played on multiple teams across multiple leagues. You wanna tell us a little about that? Tell us some memories or lessons you learned that sticks with you now as a business owner?

Zane Schartz: 19:51

Yeah I had the opportunity to play at some pretty high levels. I played professionally, got paid to play a game, which was pretty fun. Never made it to NHL, but I got close, played with a lot of guys who did play in the NHL and were on their way to the NHL. So I like to say they wouldn't have made it to the NHL without being able to dance around me. I love hockey. It's a huge part of my life and a huge part of kind of just who I am. But yeah, played at Liberty University and then. Played professionally after that and played in North America and Europe, played in Germany, Finland, and Hungary. And I always tell people like business and hockey have so many overlaps and I think the biggest thing that. I take from sports and high level sports to the business world is the ability to learn how to lose and move forward. I always tell people that one of my favorite quotes is success is moving from failure to failure without lack of enthusiasm. I. And to me that, that was just my whole hockey career is just, that's everybody's sports career is you have to learn to lose and you gotta keep 'em going. So that's rolled over into real estate. And in real estate you make offers on deals that you don't get. You might think a deal might do this, but it does that. And just like taking, rolling with the punches and moving forward and using 'em as learning tools. And then on top of that too, it's just like playing at high levels. Most high level athletes just have a deep. Down desire drive to be the best and to excel. So I've taken that same drive as an athlete and rolled it into real estate and said, Hey, I want to build the best real estate investment for my investors and be competitive against all the other operators who are trying to raise money. So how can I make my. Offering better for Bob and Sue who are investing with me as opposed to investing with somebody else. And, it's competitive to say, find the best deals, find the best deals at cash flow, get the best debt, find the best properties, make the most competitive offer. There's, it's very competitive and I love it. I love what I do. It's not work to me. It's definitely fun. It's a puzzle and moving the puzzle in a way that. Can create returns for investors is what I love to do most and just help people along the way and have fun doing it. So that's how the transition from hockey to business has been. It's been great and I've actually had the opportunity to buy some ownership into a minor league pro hockey team in the league that I used to play in. So that's been a cool transition and I still play weekly and still get on the ice and. Rip around out there. So still love it.

Steven M Weinstock: 22:19

Yeah. Most people don't realize how structured professional sports are and for you to carry that discipline over to the business life is pretty remarkable. I. I've seen you mentioned that you've traveled to, is it, what is it, 20 countries?

Zane Schartz: 22:34

Yeah.

Steven M Weinstock: 22:35

And is this, while you were playing, is this, while you're running this business?

Zane Schartz: 22:38

It's a little bit of playing and just for pleasure. Like I love to travel. I, when I played over in Europe, I'd never been to Europe before I went. I played in Hungary. And I lived right by the Budapest airport so I could fly. I don't know if you've been to Europe, but you can fly anywhere for 50 bucks using Ryan Air or Whiz Air. You might not make it alive. Easy jet. Yeah, easy jet. Exactly. That kind of gave me a love for travel and I would pop over to Berlin for a day for literally a hundred dollars, or Italy for a few days, for a couple hundred bucks. So that's kinda where my love for travel happened. And then. I went back over there to play in Germany and Finland and I just, I love different cultures. I love different foods and seeing the world is really cool and I love Europe and been to Asia and stuff too, so love to travel. It's definitely part of what I love to do.

Steven M Weinstock: 23:24

Yeah, so owning triple net assets, gives you a lot of free time that allows you to travel. You're not dealing with maintenance requests. You're not dealing with tenant showings for the most part. You're really just you could really run this business almost by yourself. You could really have a lean team. Am I correct?

Zane Schartz: 23:43

I. It could be very lean. We have 70 plus properties we have a team in place. We have a team of five or six, and we know we have property managers who do handle the tenant relationships and some of the day-to-day task. We have two accountants that do bookkeeping and kind of CFO level accountant accounting. We have a marketing team and then I have an admin and then there's me who wears a bunch of different hats as an entrepreneur. But I think. You could just set it and forget it, if you bought the absolute triple net deals. But some of our deals have operational overhead, but also we like to get ahead of the leases. We wanna make sure that hey, if a deal's expire, if the lease is coming up for renewal in two to three years, we want to make sure that the property is doing well and make sure that the tenant wants to stay and we have a good understanding of if they're gonna stay and if we can work with them on staying and what the, what the likelihood of that is. We like to be a hands-on, as hands-on as you can be in this, but yeah, generally speaking, these deals cash flow like like clockwork and they're pretty hands off. But when you have 70 of 'em growing to a hundred, 200 of 'em, there's stuff you gotta do on a daily, weekly basis.

Steven M Weinstock: 24:45

Sure. Okay, we're gonna wrap up. I'm gonna ask a quick few questions. Don't pontificate too much, just try to give a quick answer. One thing that you would do differently than most real estate operators,

Zane Schartz: 25:00

we only buy investment grade tenants a hundred percent.

Steven M Weinstock: 25:03

Okay. One mistake that you're happy you made early.

Zane Schartz: 25:07

I would say learning from. Other operators mistakes and watching the. I don't wanna throw anybody under the bus. So just watching other people's mistakes and seeing how things shouldn't be done or how things shouldn't be ran, and learning that hey, investors want communication, even if it's good or bad. You should tell investors when things are going. Bad. You should tell 'em when things are going good. So I'd say like it wasn't necessarily a personal mistake that I made. It was more so watching somebody else's personal mistake closely.

Steven M Weinstock: 25:43

Got it. If you weren't doing real estate, what would you be doing? I. Besides hockey? Ah,

Zane Schartz: 25:49

I'd probably be a missionary. Really? Okay. Yeah. I my faith's the most important thing about me, and I'd probably go across the world telling people about the hope that changed my life and the hope in Jesus that I found. And I try to be a missionary to the real estate world and I try to be a missionary to the hockey world. And, my life changed when I when I surrendered it to Jesus. And honestly, like that was the biggest thing in my life. So when I went out of hockey, I actually considered going into ministry and working outta church, but the Lord made it pretty clear that business is where I was supposed to be. So I think that's my part of the puzzle for telling the world about the hope that I have.

Steven M Weinstock: 26:24

Yeah. Faith is very important. It is to me as well. And if more people in the country had faith I think the country and the world would be a better place. We appreciate you. What's next for Freedom, CRE over the next few years?

Zane Schartz: 26:38

Oh, man. We want to be. Just known name in the space for triple net investment grade tenants. We want to build offerings for investors that cash flow day one. And then something that I really haven't talked about, so this is a grand re reveal, but something that we're excited about. We want to get into tokenization of real world assets. So we are going to be looking to. Create tokens that represent ownership in these funds that can be transferred to anybody across the world at any point. I think the future is here for Bitcoin, not Bitcoin, for blockchain. It's not crypto. We're not talking crypto, and I'm not the bitcoin king. This is going to be a digital representation of ownership in hard assets, real world assets is what they call 'em. And I think the future is going to be, people are gonna own everything on a digital wallet and in that will be their investments. So that's really what the next three to five years will be.

Steven M Weinstock: 27:41

Okay, Zane, this was great. That's it for today's episode of The Wealth Clock with Steven Weinstock. Big thanks to Zane Schartz for breaking it down. He went from pro hockey to building a $300 million portfolio and why he sticks to a single tenant retail and what it actually takes to stay disciplined while scaling. If you enjoyed this one, share it with someone who's thinking differently about real estate business or just trying to build something of their own. I'm Steven Weinstock. Thanks for listening. I'll catch you on the next one.