My Soccer Beginnings

I had been training hard in soccer for many years, doing 5,000 keep-ups at the age of 15, among other stunning tricks with the ball. I used to soccer freestyle shows for Adidas, even performing at the opening ceremony of the Rogers Cup in Toronto and appearing at nightclubs, shows for Kappa, and other special events. I was young, and most flatteringly, big brands were noticing me.

Growing up, I always dreamed of one day playing for one of the best soccer teams in the world, and when Official AC Milan scout Giampaolo Montesano   scouted me out of Milan, I felt like everything was coming together. I was 16 years old. The scout sat down me and my father in his Mercedes and said, “I watch millions of kids play soccer every year, and your son is one of the best players I have ever seen in all of Europe for his age. Normally I tell players to stay in school, but your son is one out of a million.”

I knew then that I had made it. Continuing to play in Italy, I made the Primavera, which was the reserve / farm team for F.C. Messina when they were in Serie A, the highest division of soccer in Italy. In the locker room, however, I watched as other players did drugs. Combined with the poisonous politics of the league, that caused me to lose my ambition in the game. After getting home sick for my family and friends in Toronto and flashing back to the asthma attacks I used to get as a child, I escaped camp in the middle of the night, hopping on a bus and heading to my aunt’s house in Pachino, Sicily, where I arrived eight hours later.

Love for People

I have a passion for people. At a young age, I learned that “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know,” and I put a lot of time into meeting people and connecting.

In my late teens and early 20s, I would walk into store after store at the mall and get 50% off all my stuff, discount after discount coming in from my dear friends there. In return, I got those workers into nightclubs or had them served free drinks. Fun-loving and always quick with a joke, I grew up valuing fun.

I try to remember at all times that “People are the people that are going to help you!” People matter; I believe that wholeheartedly.

Promoting, Entertainment, and Business

Having made a lot of friends playing on soccer teams, I got a job as a nightclub promoter when I was 14. I loved going to the nightclubs anyway, and because I spent so much money there, it just made sense. After all, why not get paid to have fun?

Early on in my promoting days, I would get all in a fluster meeting the club owners. Coming from a Sicilian family and watching Scarface and The Godfather, I was convinced that club owners were gangsters, and they intimidated me a little bit. I made $80 a night at Tonic Nightclub in Toronto. A year into the job, I was more comfortable with the scene, realizing that neither the owners nor the managers were gangsters – they were just regular, working people.

As I saw how much the top promoters were making, I thought “Why not me? I know more people than these guys.” So I got bumped up from $80 to $150 to $400, and eventually I was making more than doctors and lawyers, even though I was only in my early 20s. To me, promoting was serious business. I saw other promoters fall in with the wrong crowds and get themselves into trouble, but I stayed focused, had fun, and made money.

Although I felt blessed to be doing what I was doing, my parents often told me that I needed to get out of the club scene and find a normal job. I went looking for opportunities, settling on an Extreme Pita franchise This was a big step for me, and the franchise owners let me build a brand new store from scratch, using my brother for the construction contacts and opening my franchise with an initial investment of $220,000.

Two years later, on Sunday, February 13th, 2011, to be precise, I had lost it all. I filed bankruptcy, and when all was said and done, I was $300,000 in the hole. That experience was deeply stressful for me, but I learned a lot from it. Getting back into promoting, I started throwing huge parties with more than 5,000 people in attendance. Promoting just made sense to me. Why? Because of the people!

My Entry into Real Estate

So, I knew one thing first and foremost: I was good with people. Knowing that, I realized that there was one business that I could definitely thrive in: real estate. Investing my own money before I was even registered as a real estate sales representative, I was confident that I was doing the right thing.

In my early 20s, I had bought a property in Florida after the real estate market crashed. There were residents telling me they had $550,000 mortgages out on properties now valued at $200,000. How could I pass up such an obvious deal? Then, I invested $200,000 in a house, which I sold three years later for a profit.

Because I love to help people, working in real estate is an excellent fit for me. I find real pleasure in teaching people how to make the right kinds of investments in real estate and in offering outstanding, stress-free service. My approach to real estate is unique: I think of people first and making money second. After all, when you are good at what you do, the money will always come on its own anyway!