Al Goldstein is the President of Pangea Properties and founder of AvantCredit. He was recently given an award for reviving neighborhoods in inner city Chicago. In this interview, Goldstein discusses his real estate investment strategy and why he focuses so much on the low-income demographic. Goldstein was also named as a Top 40 under 40 entrepreneur in Chicago. He gives his tips on how to become more entrepreneurial.

Growing up in the Soviet Union in the 1980s, Al Goldstein used to watch government-sponsored cartoons “teaching you to be a good little communist.”  But the message never rubbed off on Mr. Goldstein, the main character in a capitalist success story. By age 28, he had built and cashed out of his first entrepreneurial venture: CashNet USA, an online payday loan company he sold for $265 million, just two years after starting it.  Now he’s well on his way to building his second business, Pangea Properties, a real estate investment trust that owns 7,000 apartments in Chicago, Indianapolis and Baltimore. Pangea mainly buys properties in lower-income neighborhoods, catering to the same kind of customer whom CashNet targeted.

Find out more about Pangea Properties at www.pangeare.com.