Bentzen Funding Solutions

Back from Vacation

I have received several phone calls from people wondering if I'm OK, given that I haven't written in a little while.  Yes, I'm great.  Just came back from a few weeks over seas with my family.  My oldest child (no longer a child) is entering his senior year of college and we figured we had better grab this opportunity for what will probably be our last (whole) family vacation. 

I was so swamped with preparing for the trip, attending conferences and just normal day to day work that I quite frankly didn't have any time left to write.

I will now do my best to keep you updated on my professional opinions and any newsworthy gossip!

  

2nd Annual ASNP Conference

The 2nd Annual meeting of the Academy of Special Needs Planners (ASNP) was held in New Orleans last week.  I am very glad that I ended up attending this meeting as the educational format was phenomenal.  Patrick Hindert has a great summary of it on his blog.

In attendance were SNT attorney's as well as some members of the structured settlement community, namely, John McCullough, Patrick Hindert, Jack Meligan, Michele Whitmore and Joe Tombs.  David Cover from Peoples Bank and Ben Malsh from First Capital were also present as was Rich Halpern of The Halpern Group.

What came across to me loud and clear from attending this meeting is that the ASNP members are very eager to establish relationships with the right structured settlement consultants in their area.  One speaker actually advised the members "to seek out structured settlement consultants in your area and create working relationships with them".  They believe in structures but not over structuring.

The SSP managed to pick-up 18 new members from ASNP as a result of their presence and speaking at the conference.  I think this will be a very good symbiotic relationship for them both.

   

Settlement Planning Approach

When I was a structured settlement broker, my attorney clients would tell me repeatedly how much better I was than the other structured settlement brokers in my area.  “They” would only ever seem to quote a L/20 or TC20 giving very little thought or consideration to external factors that could possibly threaten existing finances or potential upcoming events, such as possible surgery, etc.   When I put structures together, I went through a thorough exploration of all income, potential income, government benefits, vehicles that may need to be purchased or replaced in the future, children’s education, upcoming potential medical bills, re-training costs and timeframes, and the list could go on and on.

When an annuitant comes to me now wanting to explore cashing out some of their structure, I take that same settlement planning approach to unwinding the structure as I did putting it together.  In a lot of circumstances the structure is the only form of income that the person has and it is brutally important to attempt to not only preserve as much of it as possible but to take many external factors into consideration as well.  It takes someone with that kind of experience and knowledge of the product to fully understand and be appropriate to handle the request.  Who would you want handling a complex trust or estate case, for example? Clearly you would want to know that the person has the background and knowledge to understand the nuances of the more complex cases and furthermore have an expert staff to take it to completion.

A price is just a price - one that any self-serving individual could claim to have the best of, especially when quoting it to someone who doesn’t truly understand the ins and outs of the business.  It’s what comes with that price that makes it all make sense in the end. 

Michael Upchurch purchase The Delta Group

The word is finally out – Michael Upchurch of Upchurch Financial has purchased The Delta Group from long-time industry expert and grand-daddy of the SS biz , Dave Snyder.   I, personally, am sad to see Snyder wrap up, as he’s been a very good friend to me for 18 years now.  If Dave was going to sell to anybody though, he couldn’t have made a better choice, as Michael is young, energetic and fresh with a ton of excellent ideas to make the new Delta Group a real force to be reckoned with.

A number of you have called me to ask, “Who is Michael Upchurch?”.  Michael is an accomplished structured settlement producer who resides in Jacksonville, Florida with his wife and 3 beautiful children.  He started in the structured settlement business with Ringler Associates, worked for a short time with Millennium Settlements and then finally showing his stuff with the National Settlement Consultants (the Goodman’s company).  Michael is committed to making a difference in the structured settlement industry and decided that the purchase of The Delta Group was the perfect way to help him accomplish that.

Given Michael’s superior knowledge of public benefits and the rumors that he’ll be creating some innovative new marketing products, I wouldn’t be surprised to report some very exciting news coming out of Upchurch and his new Delta Group company.  Stay tuned!  In the meantime, I know I speak for everyone when I say “we wish you nothing but good health, happiness and the perfect golf score Dave!! – enjoy it, you’ve earned it!”

Term of the week

Inferiority/Superiority complex - Wikipedia defines:

Superiority complex refers to a subconscious neurotic mechanism of compensation developed by the individual as a result of feelings of inferiority.  The feelings of inferiority in this specific complex are often brought on by social rejection, possibly as a result of the individual's inattentiveness to hygiene, appearance, or lower intelligence as compared to others.  The term was coined by Alfred Adler (February 7, 1870 - May 28, 1937) as part of his School of Individual psychology).

Those exhibiting the superiority complex commonly project their feelings of inferiority onto others they perceive as beneath them, possibly for the same reasons they themselves may have been ostracized, i.e.viewing most, possibly all others as "ugly" or "stupid", and beneath oneself.  Accusations of arrogance and cockiness are often made by others when referring to the individual exhibiting the superiority complex.

Behaviors related to this mechanism may include an exaggerated positive opinion of one's worth and abilities, unrealistically high expectations in goals and achievements for oneself and others, the persistent attempt to correct others regardless of whether they are factually correct or not, vanity extravagant style in dressing (with intent of drawing attention), pride, sentimentalism and affected exaltation, snobbishness, a tendency to discredit other's opinions, forcefulness aimed at dominating those considered as weaker or less important, credulity, and others.

Superiority and inferiority complex are often found together as the different expressions of the same pathology and the two complexes can exist within the same individual.

In the structured settlement business, or any business for that matter, it is common professional courtesy that if you find an error of sorts on someone else's web-site, you simply pick up the phone and notify the person of their error.  You should not feel the need to continually belittle and embarrass publicly that person, unless of course you suffer from an Inferiority/Superiority complex.  For anyone suffering from this affliction, it is advised that you obtain immediate help.

Factoring Fantasy

Law Cash dba SSI had this commercial ready to roll.  What's interesting is that one of the principals of LawCash informed me that they have/had a relationship with John Darer, whereby, they would refer him all of the structured settlement business that they received (in exchange for what exactly?):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTKj7iadros

Our industry's newest reporting folks posted this:

The sight of a tall blonde supermodel in the midst of a pillow fight while also urging people to sell their structured settlements should be enough to alert viewers that what they are seeing might be a joke.  But the short videos that were recorded over the summer but never aired on television were not a joke at all, according Marlies Pinto, 25, the statuesque actress who was cast in the commercials.

Pinto, who is 5'8, 136 lbs, and who has blonde hair and green eyes, said that the ads were made for LawCash and its Structured Settlements Investments affiliate. The parodies feature the company logo but provide a dummy phone number. The factoring company had intended the to add levity to the industry by featuring her and two co-eds in a pillow fight with cash flying about, and another that is a send-up of the old Crazy Eddie discount ads from decades ago, Pinto said.  The parodies can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/practiceactress. 

In all, the actress said that she spent 14 hours in preparation for the two ads, each of which last for less than 30 seconds. 

With regard to her brief experience learning about structured settlements and factoring, Pinto said that she would be hard-pressed to ever factor a structured settlement.

"I think that it would depend on the circumstances, the amount of the structured settlement, and the company that I was working with," Pinto said. "If something seems too good to be true then it usually is.  After all, these people are in the business of selling things before anything else."

Representatives of Structured Settlement Investments declined comment on the matter. A call to the LawCash corporate office in New York was not returned.

Re-org at Prudential

Prudential sent out a letter today informing interested parties about its reorganization, stating that they are merging their Structured Settlement and Defined Benefit Annuity businesses into a combined Annuities organization.  Joe Barnet will be heading up Pru's Structured Settlement business with continued assistance from John Sciacchitano, Bob Florentine and Chris Allen.  Their bright star, Brian Ginty, however, is not staying on.  I know I speak for everybody when I say that we wish him well in whatever do decides to do.

Wasting my time

I'm confused why John Darer, who recently accused me of having too many posts about him, would now bait me with his "Smackdown".  Like I said yesterday, I'm done.  I am sick of the twisted, manipulative lies by a person, who only 3 months ago, was one of my biggest champions.  All because he is unable to have a professional debate.  Quite frankly, there's just no winning with someone like him, one who I truly believe has a serious inferiority complex.

That being said, my price would have been significantly more with or without a broker requesting a referral fee.  For anyone truly interested, call or e-mail me directly.

Of course it was turned down

Deal Flow Media recently reported about a New York factoring case that was (finally) denied (this was an attempt at a 3rd transaction).  Seneca One (owned by an ex Stone Street employee) attempted to offer the annuitant $10,000 for two lump sum payments of $50,000 May 17, 2019 and $50,000 May 17, 2024.  This equates to a 17.5% discount rate.  New York state is known for its especially paternalistic decisions.  What was Seneca One thinking?

 

Skirting the issues

As usual, John Darer, has decided to sling more of his unprofessional mud while skirting all of the issues brought up in my last posting.

His continual silence and immature behavior should speak volumes for what he really is.  As it is clear that is it impossible to have a professional and adult debate with him, I will not continue to waste any more of my precious time attempting to respond and set straight his lies and manipulation.

One cannot wonder, however, if his continual attacks on the structured settlement industry as a whole is to put fear into attorneys all the while making the Halpern product appear as a more favorable option.  After all, it was Darer who claimed a recent interest in purchasing The Halpern Group.  Readers will have noticed Rich Halpern's support of John Darer.   So, between acting in the best interest of the defense and presumably placing business with Halpern, I think we can all agree that an educated plaintiff can do better elsewhere.  If you are a plaintiff, please call me for a list of real plaintiff brokers. 

Should any of you wish for further information, please call me directly.