There aren’t too many people with more experience in the worlds of real estate sales, mortgage lending and property management than Bill Schunk.
His career path began as an employee in property management in the New York City boroughs. Schunk went on to build his firm National Standard Mortgage in Tarrytown, employing 80 workers and making an average of 250 loans a month in the 1990s and early 2000s.
When that firm was done in by the Great Recession of 2008, Schunk came to Peekskill to partner with long-time friend Herman Poritzky in a successful mortgage lending business.
Today he heads up family firm Schunk Realty Group in an office in the Riley Building at the corner of South and Division streets while also running a private lending operation that finances contractors renovating houses and other real estate ventures.
He still brings his enthusiasm and drive to work every day, and uses his talent for relating to people to get deals done. Sitting at a desk waiting for the phone to ring has never been Schunk’s style.
“One of the things I do is I walk into a building and I look for the guy with the grey hair,” Schunk says. “I strike up a conversation and say ‘are you the owner’ and usually the answer is yes. Then I say ‘ever think about retiring’ – yes – ‘do you want to sell your building’ – I will soon – and then I stay on it. It may take a couple of years, but the deal often gets done.”
All his years of meeting people, making deals and solving problems make Bill Schunk an invaluable real estate resource for others.
“Primarily I like interacting with buyers and sellers,” he says. “When I walk into a room I feel really confident. I have a lot of life experiences and it doesn’t take long at all for me to form a bond with whoever I’m talking to. I enjoy being able to share my experiences with people and see them benefit.”
In the hub of the Peekskill real estate business
A fixture in his corner office since 2017, Schunk is always on the run, completing house sales, overseeing the 80 apartments he owns, and lending money through his private financing business.
He bought the former Arthur Weeks Jewelry building (now R&D Jewelry) across the street to add to his portfolio, and today calls the four upstairs apartments his “pride and joy.”
His workers completed a total gut renovation down to the bricks of the apartments in the 150-year-old building during Covid, turning them into high-end units that bring top dollar and are constantly occupied. “Every time someone moves out I have a new person in the next day.”
Peekskill is on the move forward again according to Schunk as the redevelopment of the river towns continues up and down the Hudson. The train station brings a lot of appeal to Peekskill and there’s positive publicity about the current redevelopment plans.
Property manager Simone Bardowell oversees operations for the rental apartment buildings Schunk owns, as well as for owners who hire Schunk Realty Group to manage their buildings. More than two dozen sales people help clients buying and selling properties through Schunk Realty Group in Westchester, the Hudson Valley and Fairfield County in Connecticut. And Schunk is still in the private lending, or “hard money,” business.
“We have a pool of investors, primarily family members and people I’ve come to know over the years, mostly in their 60s or 70s or 80s and we give them a nice steady stream of income.”
He makes loans to people who need money quick or can’t get a bank loan. “We’re doing a lot of lending to contractors who buy a two-family house that needs a few hundred thousand dollars of work.”
Buying and selling properties and hard money lending work well together. “When you do a hard money loan it often turns into a sale — either they want to sell the property or they want to buy another one. It’s a great business.”
The green and white United Real Estate sign on the corner office and in front of properties seen around here for nearly a decade recently changed over to Schunk Realty Group after nationwide giant United Real Estate told Schunk to stop using their name.
[Knowing he had properly registered the name in New York, Schunk girded for the fight until United pointed out they had millions in lawyer power to crush him.]
The next generation steps up
Now 72, Bill Schunk would like to slow down his pace and he’s grateful his sons are ready for leadership roles. “Don’t think it’s always easy working with your sons, but there’s a lot of love in our family,” he says. “It’s very rewarding to have two sons that are taking over the show.”
The three men work together in many aspects of the business, including analyzing potential lending deals. “Both my sons and I can check the numbers in our sleep at this point because we’ve done so many and we have our own portfolio.”
Son Nicholas is the detail man who knows all the rules and ins and outs of the real estate business. He’s a licensed salesperson, now pursuing his broker’s license.
His brother James, a super salesperson who “shoots first and asks questions later,” is now the principal broker of the firm and a licensed loan originator. “James came to me one day and said ‘dad, you’re getting a little older and our clientele is younger and I think you should make me the principal broker.”
At a business meeting in New York last year, Bill Schunk met a real estate man who worked for one of the many people he trained over the years. After being introduced, the man said “Bill Schunk — you’re a legend in the business,” Schunk recounts. “That was nice to hear.”
