Try getting onto a mortgage lead list when you don’t want to be.

It started on Thursday – calls from mortgage companies, asking for my ex-wife (who hasn’t lived here in many years) saying that she had requested information on a refinance.  The first couple I just said “No – and you shouldn’t be calling me – I’m on the National Do Not Call List“.  But it quickly became obvious that this was going to be a big problem.  I got 3 more calls that night, 4 more on the answering machine the next day, and 4 more that night.  They called on Saturday, too.  Several even emailed me.  It’s basically a nightmare, and could take WEEKS to get through all of these calls.  So here are my questions:

1.  How MORONIC are these lead companies to not KNOW they are going to be found it?  They sent this lead to DOZENS of companies.  Once I have confirmation of the source (and I will get it) I will DESTROY them.

2.  How bad is the mortgage market getting that these companies will just take ANY lead they can get?  Turns out that mortgage leads are about $20 per, and word from friends is that they are routinely “cut” with 20-30% made up fake leads.

3.  How TOTALLY MORONIC is the guy who actually tried to pitch me ANYWAY – even after I explained that I had a good rate, had no intention of refinancing, and was just EXTREMELY irritated with this whole deal?

Bottom line – if you need a mortgage, refinance, or have other capital needs – my buddy Ron at Platinum Capital is the MAN.

A question I’ve been asking myself since Google bought YouTube for $1.65B.  Now make no mistake – that is a LOT of money, and it’s hard for me to envision a time when I’d turn that down.  But it begs the question:  if you GET that offer, how can your company not be WORTH that much – and therefore MORE in the long term?

At my last job, the owner and founder made a HUGE mistake when he took the company public for absolutely the wrong reason – he needed money to pay the bills.  It wasn’t a good business model, and it really COULDN’T make money at that point.  If he had any idea how lucky he was to have the management team he had, maybe he’d still be leading he company today.

But what happens when I get an offer for someone to buy my software company when it is really profitable?

I think the answer is this:  the money I’m potentially going to make pales in comparison to the legacy I can build, the people i can employ, and the businesses I can help to become successful.  I picture user group meetings where people bring product improvement ideas to us by the boatload, and we work to implement them all.  Making goo-gobs of money will be a lovely side effect of all of those things.

So would i sell?  Maybe – but it sure would have to involve more than just money.