Why One Good Broker Beats 50 Borrowers in Private Lending with TJ Burns

TJ Burns found a wallet on the street, gave it back, and gained his first real estate partner. Today he runs a private lending fund that grows by serving loan brokers.

 

TJ spent 7 years as an engineer at Amazon. He was doing well by every measure, but he felt stuck. He calls it stagnation.

 

He moved into real estate, did over $20 million in deals with that first partner, then became a fund manager and finally an operator. He chose private lending because it scales across markets in a way multifamily does not.

 

TJ breaks down the three kinds of fix and flip lenders, and why his fund sits in the middle. He shares how loan brokers became the lifeblood of his deal flow, how he finds new investors on InvestClearly, and the order he builds a lending business in.

 

Key topics:

• Leaving Amazon and the golden handcuffs
• Why private lending scales
• The local lender, the big institutions and the missing middle
• White labeling a fund for loan brokers
• Finding new investors through InvestClearly
• Ops first, deal flow second, capital third

 

About the guest:

TJ Burns is a former Amazon engineer from Long Island, New York. He runs a private lending fund that lends to real estate operators, mostly in the Northeast, and is a GP in multifamily in New Hampshire.

 

Connect with TJ Burns: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thburns42/

Prefer to watch on YouTube? https://www.youtube.com/@propertyprofitsrealestate

Want to be a guest on the show? https://www.daveinterviewsyou.com