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COVER STORY The Entrepreneurial Spirit
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A personal pipeline of $200 million in 2019. Hiring dozens of new originators and processors. Blogging weekly, speaking frequently. Shashank Shekhar isn’t going to let a virus stop his growth plans. BY GEORGE YACIK | CONTRIBUTING WRITER, NATIONAL MORTGAGE PROFESSIONAL
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nd over end in freefall, 120-mile-an-hour gusts like icy daggers plucking at your clothing, your ears full of rush and roar. Stepping out of an airplane 15,000 feet above Earth isn’t for the weak willed. For Shashank Shekhar, it’s an escape, it’s an adventure, but perhaps most importantly, it’s a metaphor. Because where some see certain doom, he sees the thrill of victory – the same triumph over adversity that’s helped him become one of the most successful loan originators in the mortgage industry. Or maybe Shekhar’s story is even simpler than that. To quote a shared line in the revolutionary Broadway musical “Hamilton” between Alexander Hamilton and the Marquis de Lafayette: “Immigrants. We get the job done.” When you see Shekhar, you see a fit, well-spoken man who looks comfortable in the way that business casual tech execs or Los Angeles entertainment VPs look comfortable: nice suit, open collar dress shirt, well groomed. He portrays the image of a successful, but approachable, pro. For an immigrant from New Delhi, India, it’s the image of the American Dream. And that’s what Shekhar is trying to nail down. From nothing, he built a personal origination portfolio of nearly $200 million a year. Now he’s trying to build something much, much more. As the founder of San Jose, Calif.-based Arcus Lending,
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| NATIONAL MORTGAGE PROFESSIONAL MAGAZINE
