Complaint Review: Lease One Corporation Lease One Systems Lease One Corp.

Joe Angelo use to brag that the internet gave him the ability to reach thousands of people across America. I found LeaseOne through an internet franchise advertisement and regret the day I did. I also regret the day I signed up and paid my $19,900 to a company owned by a fast talking, snake oil salesmen, con artist. Hopefully this same internet will put an end to this horrible scam. I can assure you that you can get everything LeaseOne promises to do for free and with be 100% better support by joining the NAELB. Go to the website http://www.naelb.org/index.cfm, give them a call. If you decide to join the NAELB its only $295 p/year and gives you access to dozens of funding sources. All LeaseOne does is try to put your leases through these same leasing / funding companies. I paid the $19,900 to LeaseOne and the training and support is amature at best. As a LeaseOne broker / sucker I spent hours with customers, gathering all required info and the result was I had a handful of deals approved that were approved at less than 1/2 of the dollar amount I was asking for with outrageous interest rates and fees. When I complained to Joe Angelo he stated, I got you an approval, I did my job". When I said "Joe, I came in for a $200,000 lease and your back room guru "Slick" Rick Lopez only got me an approval for $75,000 at 18% interest and he tacked on a $3,500 you said "I got you an approval, there's nothing else I can do, then you hung up on me. You're a lying con artist Joe, the scam is over. I couldn't get anything done through you're bogus LeaseOne Company and now I'm getting deals written that you declined through the great folks I found through the NAELB. The NAELB folks are getting me better interest rates with minimal if any fees and providing awesome support. Your back room support of Slick Rick Lopez and sonny boy Joe Angelo Jr. couldn't hold a candle to the professionals I'm now dealing with. Maybe Rickey and laddie buck should spend some time with the NAELB to see how real leasing companies operate. The scam is over Joe. Too many brokers who got robbed my you are speaking out.

I have been a Lease One Corp Associate Broker for the past 14 years and wanted to address the comments posted by "Anonymous from Nampa, Idaho".

In order:

Anonymous states: "They have their sales pitch down: 8 out of 10 businesses will lease some portion of their equipment, it's a $270 billion a year industry and so on. When I inquired about competition, I was told "there isn't any," and this was repeated to me by the "Random" Associate Brokers I was referred to, of course by the company."

It's comical how this person refers to the industry statics that Lease One cites as a "sales pitch." Equipment leasing is a $270 billion industry and 8 out of 10 business owners have done leases at some point in their careers. That is not a sales pitch, it's just a fact. Don't take Lease One's word for it, go investigate with your local Chamber of Commerce or research the internet regarding industry trends and you'll come upon the very same information. Regarding Lease One stating that "there isn't any competition", I am almost at a loss for words. Not only would Lease One never say this, but if they did, how naive would one have to be to place any stock in the statement? If Lease One states that equipment leasing is a $270 billion a year industry, which "Anonymous" states they did say, then how could there be no competition? Is "Anonymous" contending that Lease One meant to imply that they were the sole originator of the entire $270 billion in financings done in any given year? "Anonymous" is making illogical comments that get contradicted by his or her other illogical comments, proving that what he or she is stating can not be accurate. To imply that the references Lease One provides are somehow bogus by stating they "of course" come from Lease One is also illogical. Who esle would the references come from?

Anonymous states: "What they don't tell you is that there are literally 1,000s of independent brokers, just like you out there - bombarding your potential clients with weekly phone calls."

Although this goes back to the same issue of there obviously being competition in the marketplace, I wanted to touch on it again since it's an important topic. Lease One shouldn't have to tell you that the country is filled with thousands of leasing brokers. It would be like getting hired to sell used cars and then being upset to learn that the street you work on is filled with used car lots who employ other used car salesmen. The fact that Anonymous states there are 1,000's of independent leasing brokers out there proves that it is a viable industry. Lease One allows you to become one of those independent brokers. Obviously there wouldn't be so many of us if the industry couldn't support it, so again, Anonymous is citing industry facts and then trying to put a negative swing on them.

The key to what Lease One offers is that they not only provide you with the necessary training and support to get in the game, but they perform a complete back office function which would cost a broker at least one $30,000 salary if they had their own employee handle it all. Either that, or the broker could try to do it all himself only to wind up being stuck to a desk all day with no time to make sales. To clarify, let's go over the typical life of a lease from application to funding:

1. A deal is born and an application gets completed.
2. The application is faxed to the broker.
3. The broker reviews it for errors, contacts the lessee if any updates are required and send the application off to Lease One. The broker is now free to originate more deals.
4. Behind the scenes, Lease One has their staff process the application. The business checking account must be verified, so a request is sent to the bank for a rating. Same goes for the three trade references. Each is a sent a request to verify terms, payment record, etc. The owner's personal credit must be review, so Lease One, at their expense, pulls a credit bureau report. Lease One also visits the Secretary of State website and verifies that the owners listed to the application match the owners of record with the state.
5. Once the above is completed, Lease One packages the deal together and submits it to the appropriate funder. Lease One never made claims to me to state that they fund deals with their own money. Instead, they claimed to have relationships with a number of funders, many of whom specialize in one form of leasing or another. Lease One sends the deal to the funder that will have the most likelihood of issuing an approval based on the specific characteristics of the deal.
6. Once the funder renders their decision, usually within 24 hours should the deal be $75,000 or less, Lease One issue the Broker an approval or decline letter. If the deal is declined, the broker is always made privy as to why the deal could not get approved. Not every deal can get approved and that's just a fact. It's part of the business. If every deal was approvable, then we wouldn't need Lease One to bother with bank ratings, credit checks, trade references, etc.
7. If an approval is issued, Lease One offers the Broker the option to close their own deal with the lessee or they will close the deal for you if you prefer.
8. Once terms are verbally agreed to, Lease One handles getting the lease documents prepared, overnighted, signed and returned. This is not always an easy task and in my experience they are all over my deals to ensure an approved deal makes it to the funding table.
9. Once docs are signed and returned, Lease One arranges the site inspection if required and arranges the verbal audit. Once that's done, the deal gets funded and the Broker is paid their commission the very next day.

It's impossible that I am making any of the above up. It's just how leasing works and you can ask anyone in the business to verify the process as I've described it and I guarantee they won't dispute anything I've stated. The point here is that Lease One lives up to their end of the bargain, and their end of the bargain is to do exactly what I described above. They also have plenty of resources to help you with marketing, a leads program should you want to utilize it and they are always willing to get on the phone with their brokers and offer complete support and ongoing training should the need arise.

Perhaps "Anonymous" confused Lease One's claim that there is a good way to minimize competition with thinking Lease One stated there was none at all? Obviously Lease One would never state there is no competition. It's a silly statement. What they do show their brokers, however, is how to minimize competition by partnering up with equipment dealers who put our lease applications in the hands of their buyers. Once you establish solid relationships with the dealers, you CAN virtually eliminate your competition because the dealer will give you such high praise in the eyes of the client that they will apply to you and as long as you deliver as promised they often times will not look elsewhere.

Anonymous states " Also, that there underwriting department is inadequate, literally killing almost every potential deal with either lack of timeliness, incorrect paperwork or outrageous rates".

Again, this is comical. I have personally had Lease One fund dozens and dozens of deals. Their underwriting department is far from inadequate. Deals get reviewed and processed quickly, rates are competive and deals get done. It's that simple.

Anonymous states "Lease One is not making money by processing leases. They are making a fortune off the deams of those who are willing to invest all they have in their dream of business ownership. Of the 6 Associate Brokers I trained with nearly a year ago, only one has actually closed a lease deal and made back some of his investment. And he has decided it's way to difficult to deal with the company and is moving on to other endeavors. The remaining 5, have not been able to move 1 lease loan through the system to completion. And we are all business professionals who have been successful in the past."

Of course Lease One makes money processing leases. One visit to their office and you'll have no doubt of that. Again, don't take my word for it. Go there and see for yourself. Take a look at the hundreds of active lease application files. Go see the broker commission checks on Joe Angelo's desk. It's just a bogus statement to claim that Lease One is not processing leases and making money from it. As far as the new brokers that Anonymous cites go, I can't really comment on them since I do not know who they are. What I do know is that if a new broker never managed to close a deal, it speaks loudly about their sales and marketing abilities and not about Lease One's process. Lease One can't get a broker out of bed in the morning. They can't force a broker to put in the necessary hours to be successful. I've heard of many new brokers waiting for the "magic pot of gold" to appear after they've paid their $19,900. They simply do not put in the 40 to 60 hours per week that it takes to be successful and then they wonder why they closed no deals. Lease One does not sell a magic get rich quick scheme. They sell a viable business opportunity which largely depends on the broker who is running it.

I know Joe Angelo welcomes Anonymous to call him so they can go over where the miscommunications have occurred and try to rectify the situation. This fact alone shows that Mr. Angelo is not trying to hide form anyone, mislead anyone and certainly not scam anyone. I just wanted to offer my feedback as a satisfied Lease One Broker to assure all who read Anonymous' post that Lease One is definitely not a scam. It is a solid business with close to 20 years time in business at the same location, having done hundreds of equipment lease deals and having supported many successful equipment leasing brokers.

I have been a Lease One Corp Associate Broker for the past 14 years and wanted to address the comments posted by "Anonymous from Nampa, Idaho".

In order:

Anonymous states: "They have their sales pitch down: 8 out of 10 businesses will lease some portion of their equipment, it's a $270 billion a year industry and so on. When I inquired about competition, I was told "there isn't any," and this was repeated to me by the "Random" Associate Brokers I was referred to, of course by the company."

It's comical how this person refers to the industry statics that Lease One cites as a "sales pitch." Equipment leasing is a $270 billion industry and 8 out of 10 business owners have done leases at some point in their careers. That is not a sales pitch, it's just a fact. Don't take Lease One's word for it, go investigate with your local Chamber of Commerce or research the internet regarding industry trends and you'll come upon the very same information. Regarding Lease One stating that "there isn't any competition", I am almost at a loss for words. Not only would Lease One never say this, but if they did, how naive would one have to be to place any stock in the statement? If Lease One states that equipment leasing is a $270 billion a year industry, which "Anonymous" states they did say, then how could there be no competition? Is "Anonymous" contending that Lease One meant to imply that they were the sole originator of the entire $270 billion in financings done in any given year? "Anonymous" is making illogical comments that get contradicted by his or her other illogical comments, proving that what he or she is stating can not be accurate. To imply that the references Lease One provides are somehow bogus by stating they "of course" come from Lease One is also illogical. Who esle would the references come from?

Anonymous states: "What they don't tell you is that there are literally 1,000s of independent brokers, just like you out there - bombarding your potential clients with weekly phone calls."

Although this goes back to the same issue of there obviously being competition in the marketplace, I wanted to touch on it again since it's an important topic. Lease One shouldn't have to tell you that the country is filled with thousands of leasing brokers. It would be like getting hired to sell used cars and then being upset to learn that the street you work on is filled with used car lots who employ other used car dealers. The key to what Lease One offers is that they not only provide you with the necessary training and support to get in the game, but they perform a complete back office function which would cost a broker at least one $30,000 salary if they had their own employee handle it all. Either that, or the broker could try to do it all himself only to wind up being stuck to a desk all day with no time to make sales. To clarify, let's go over the typical life of a lease from application to funding:

1. A deal is born and an application gets completed.
2. The application is faxed to the broker.
3. The broker reviews it for errors, contacts the lessee if any updates are required and send the application off to Lease One. The broker is now free to originate more deals.
4. Behind the scenes, Lease One has their staff process the application. The business checking account must be verified, so a request is sent to the bank for a rating. Same goes for the three trade references. Each is a sent a request to verify terms, payment record, etc. The owner's personal credit must be review, so Lease One, at their expense, pulls a credit bureau report. Lease One also visits the Secretary of State website and verifies that the owners listed to the application match the owners of record with the state.
5. Once the above is completed, Lease One packages the deal together and submits it to the appropriate funder. Lease One never made claims to me to state that they fund deals with their own money. Instead, they claimed to have relationships with a number of funders, many of whom specialize in one form of leasing or another. Lease One sends the deal to the funder that will have the most likelihood of issuing an approval based on the specific characteristics of the deal.
6. Once the funder renders their decision, usually within 24 hours should the deal be $75,000 or less, Lease One issue the Broker an approval or decline letter. If the deal is declined, the broker is always made privy as to why the deal could not get approved. Not every deal can get approved and that's just a fact. It's part of the business. If every deal was approvable, then we wouldn't need Lease One to bother with bank ratings, credit checks, trade references, etc.
7. If an approval is issued, Lease One offers the Broker the option to close their own deal with the lessee or they will close the deal for you if you prefer.
8. Once terms are verbally agreed to, Lease One handles getting the lease documents prepared, overnighted, signed and returned. This is not always an easy task and in my experience they are all over my deals to ensure an approved deal makes it to the funding table.
9. Once docs are signed and returned, Lease One arranges the site inspection if required and arranges the verbal audit. Once that's done, the deal gets funded and the Broker is paid their commission the very next day.

It's impossible that I am making any of the above up. It's just how leasing works and you can ask anyone in the business to verify the process as I've described it and I guarantee they won't dispute anything I've stated. The point here is that Lease One lives up to their end of the bargain, and their end of the bargain is to do exactly what I described above. They also have plenty of resources to help you with marketing, a leads program should you want to utilize it and they are always willing to get on the phone with their brokers and offer complete support and ongoing training should the need arise.

Perhaps "Anonymous" confused Lease One's claim that there is a good way to minimize competition with thinking Lease One stated there was none at all? Obviously Lease One would never state there is no competition. It's a silly statement. What they do show their brokers, however, is how to minimize competition by partnering up with equipment dealers who put our lease applications in the hands of their buyers. Once you establish solid relationships with the dealers, you CAN virtually eliminate your competition because the dealer will give you such high praise in the eyes of the client that they will apply to you and as long as you deliver as promised the often times will not look elsewhere.

Anonymous states " Also, that there underwriting department is inadequate, literally killing almost every potential deal with either lack of timeliness, incorrect paperwork or outrageous rates".

Again, this is comical. I have personally had Lease One fund dozens and dozens of deals. Their underwriting department is far from inadequate. Deals get reviewed and processed quickly, rates are competive and deals get done. It's that simple.

Anonymous states "Lease One is not making money by processing leases. They are making a fortune off the deams of those who are willing to invest all they have in their dream of business ownership. Of the 6 Associate Brokers I trained with nearly a year ago, only one has actually closed a lease deal and made back some of his investment. And he has decided it's way to difficult to deal with the company and is moving on to other endeavors. The remaining 5, have not been able to move 1 lease loan through the system to completion. And we are all business professionals who have been successful in the past."

Of course Lease One makes money processing leases. One visit to their office and you'll have no doubt of that. Again, don't take my word for it. Go there and see for yourself. Take a look at the hundreds of active lease application files. Go see the broker commission checks on Joe Angelo's desk. It's just a bogus statement to claim that Lease One is not processing leases and making money from it. As far as the new brokers that Anonymous cites go, I can't really comment on them since I do not know who they are. What I do know is that if a new broker never managed to close a deal, it speaks loudly about their sales and marketing abilities and not about Lease One's process. Lease One can't get a broker out of bed in the morning. They can't force a broker to put in the necessary hours to be successful. I've heard of many new brokers waiting for the "magic pot of gold" to appear after they've paid their $19,900. They simply do not put in the 40 to 60 hours per week that it takes to be successful and then they wonder why they closed no deals. Lease One does not sell a magic get rich quick scheme. They sell a viable business opportunity which largely depends on the broker who is running it.

I know Joe Angelo welcomes Anonymous to call him so they can go over where the miscommunications have occurred and try to rectify the situation. This fact alone shows that Mr. Angelo is not trying to hide form anyone, mislead anyone and certainly not scam anyone. I just wanted to offer my feedback as a satisfied Lease One Broker to assure all who read Anonymous' post that Lease One is definitely not a scam. It is a solid business with close to 20 years time in business at the same location, having done hundreds of equipment lease deals and having supported many successful equipment leasing brokers.

Hello,

This is Joe Angelo, President of Lease One.

To the broker who posted this outrageous claim, please call me so we can work through this together...We have an abundance of sales and marketing services available to you and our brokers are processing more deals now than ever before. If you are willing to call me, we can get you back up and running in no time.

I do hope to hear from you!

Joe Angelo
President, Lease One Corp.
781-406-2000

LeaseOne franchisee is a scam and I fell compelled to spread the word. LeaseOne makes approximately $2, 400, 000 per year that comes from signing up 10 potential brokers per month. Over the past year, President Joe Angelo has spent approximately $100, 000 developing a cool website to sucker you into thinking it's a professional organization, its not!! Don't let that swindler in the suit and tie who appears on the LeaseOne website fool you. LeaseOne has no capital of their own; repeat they have no capital of their own!!! LeaseOne puts the majority of their leases through another leasing company, First Financial Brokerage in Princeton, NJ. The owner of First Financial is Robert Searcy who is Joe Angelo's buddy. Robert will take LeaseOne deals that LeaseOne Broker's submit and try to get them approved by a leasing company he does business with; often times it will be Leaf Financial. If under rare occasion your deal is approved, Leaf Financial will tack on a fee, First Financial will tack on a fee and finally LeaseOne will tack on a fee and you'll be left with a 24% interest of which you'll have to add to make your profit. I say rare occasion because 9 out of 10 times your deals will NOT be approved, repeat 90% of your deals will NOT be approved!!! The person taking your calls for approval at LeaseOne is Rick Lopez. The only deals Rick will be able to get approved are for business in existence for 10 years with a 900 credit score. If its approved you'll have to try and sell to these people at 12% - 15% interest; they'll laugh at you and call you a crook. Lease One's business is not to write leases, it's to sign up brokers/suckers who tried to put a few deals through, got rejected and sick of wasting their time and walked away. LeaseOne is in the businesses of selling the Broker program and they'll leave you high and dry once you finish the training in Boston. I worked directly in marketing for Leaseone in the Boston office for a few years so I know the inside track. All I can say is stay away from the scam. If you want to be a lease broker many Leasing companies will do what Leaseone promises to do for free. To get started I recommend you first join the National Association of Equipment Leasing Brokers (NAELB) for $295 and utilize their resources for free. LeaseOne tries to write your leases through the funding sources who are NAELB sponsors so you'll ultimately end up trying to get your deals done through them anyway. It will actually be cheaper because you'll cut out the two middlemen you'll have to pay by going through LeaseOne. Go to the NAELB website http://www.naelb.org/index.cfm and take advantage of what they have to offer. LeaseOne is a waste of time and more important, a waste of $20, 000.

Before Lease One addresses the posted compliant, we would like to illustrate exactly what it is that we do.

For a one-time investment of 19,900, Lease One will provide a complete business package including training, start-up materials, and a website. We also provide a complete back office

Transaction Processing:
We complete 100% of the back end process, which saves the Broker time and money.

Marketing Support:
Custom Brochures/Flyers
Creative Lease Displays
Trade Show Support
Power Point Presentations
Special Incentive Programs
Email Blasts

Sales Support:
Prospecting Meetings
Creative Sales Approaches
Continuous Trainings (via teleconference)
Trade Show Support
Conference calls with prospects
Corporate Presence for larger scale meetings
Close Support

All of the above is provided at no future cost to the Broker. As you can see, we do absolutely everything we possibly can to help our Brokers build their business.

Now to the complaint

First off, we would like to point out that our so called sales pitch is not a pitch at all. Equipment leasing is a 270 billion dollar industry and 8 out of 10 businesses prefer a lease over a loan. This is not our opinion; it is a pure and simple fact. Furthermore, we never made the claim that competition does not exist of course it exists. Like any good industry, competition is always going to be a factor, we have come a long way since 1989, but unfortunately, we have yet to achieve a monopoly on equipment leasing and would never have made such a far fetched claim. Even a rudimentary business sense would suggest that competition will and always exists. However, we did say that plenty of opportunity is out there as the industry is constantly being under serviced.

With regards to our references, of course they were provided by us, where else would they come from? Each reference on our list is an active Lease One Broker and in no way shape or form have ever or will ever receive compensation from Lease One.

We would also like to point out that most banks do not offer leasing, they offer loans. Furthermore, in a recent attempt to reduce long term debt, some of the larger banks that do offer leasing, GE Capital for example, are holding back on their funds to raise stock prices. This is phenomenal news for smaller brokers as this change will literally free up billions of dollars in new business. We couldn't imagine a better economic time to be in leasing.

We referenced all of the applications sent in by the Idaho broker only to find that a small handful of applications were generated. The claims about our back office do not hold any water as she barely used it. Here is an actual example of a deal sent to Lease One from Idaho.


Credit: 466
Time in Business: 0 (start-up)
Credit Profile: previous BK, slow pays, collections, and a tax lien

The broker backed off on an approval and we had and our inadequate processing team closed the deal for her. However, the deal did not fund due to equipment discrepancies on the vender side. We would like to challenge any leasing company out there, as well as the so called big boys to try and get this deal approved.

We have been in business since 1989 and ensure any reader that we are in no way shape or form a scam. To get a better feel for the true Lease One, please visit our website www.leaseoneopportunity.com

In closing thoughts, we would like to add that www.ripoffreport.com should not allow false accusations and corporate slander to be posted in a public forum. We are not a scam and expect that this message will be removed as soon as possible as this is now under review by our legal advisors.

If any questions pertaining to this matter would like to be addressed, please contact the company founder and CEO Joe Angelo Jr. at jangelo@leaseone.com

Sincerely,

Lease One Corp.