Changing Finance By Financing Change: Jasper van Brakel on Regenerative Investing

Jasper van Brakel is on a mission to regenerate the world with the power of finance and business

 As CEO of RSF Social Finance, he leads one of the most innovative financial institutions redefining how capital can serve life—not just profit.

In this episode, Jasper shares how his journey through the early days of finance and impact investing led him to the frontlines of the regenerative finance movement. He unpacks RSF’s bold embrace of the term “regenerative,” and the framework they’ve built to evaluate whether a business is truly healing people, planet, and place—by its very existence.

We dive into:

• Why the type of capital matters as much as the investment itself
• How RSF is using fixed income and Donor Advised Funds to unlock high-impact opportunities
• What medium-return, deeply regenerative investing really looks like in action

If you’ve ever asked, “How can my money do more good?”—this conversation is for you.

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The Regenerative Real Estate Podcast is an independent show exploring the people, projects, and capital reshaping how land gets used and communities get built. Two organizations grew directly out of this work, and they're worth knowing:

Hamlet Capital finances and advises on projects that integrate agriculture and conservation with mixed-use development. If you're building one or looking to invest, let's talk.

Latitude is a real estate brokerage representing sanctuary properties rooted in nature, beauty, and meaningful living.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:08

The way I think about it is there are three legs of the stool. One is financial return to the investors, two is the risk, and three is the impact. And what we provide is a deep impact, low risk, and medium return proposition. And there aren't that many out there that provide that. So it feels like a really unique opportunity to do this.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

Welcome to the Regenerative Real Estate Podcast, a show about human environments and how they can be used as a force for good. Conversations that educate and inspire people looking for a different way to do real estate. I'm Neil Collins, and on this episode, I'm joined by Jasper Van Brackel, the CEO of RSF Social Finance, an investment firm that isn't about chasing unicorns or playing by extractive playbooks, but about aligning money with values and using capital as a force or generation. Growing up, I never had a clear vocational spark like some do with medicine or law. What I did have, though, was a deep desire to create positive impact in the world. And while I'm not sure if I chose real estate or if real estate chose me, what I've come to discover is that this industry is an incredible medium for generalists to explore big questions about how we live, build, and invest. Real estate, after all, is a meta-industry, expanding design, architecture, urban planning, placemaking, marketing, venture building, and yes, even finance. Or especially finance. This podcast to exist to explore those intersections and uncover how we can use them to create the change we want to see in the world. Which brings me to today's conversation. Finance is often seen as the domain of Wall Street titans and private equity firms. But it doesn't have to be that way. RSF Social Finance has been proving for decades that investing can generate not just financial returns, but social and environmental ones too. From fixed income investments to donor-advised funds, their approach is rooted in non-extractive capital designed to support the organizations and ventures that are truly shaping a better future. Jasper and I dive into how RSF is rethinking the role of money in society and what it means to invest with intention. So without further ado, let's get into it with Jasper Van Brackel.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

So my parents were actually educators. They were both teachers, and they were innovators in the realm of education in the Netherlands, and started a school in the city that we lived in, and were really interested in the cutting edge of education. And so when I decided I wanted to be an economist and go into business, it was a little bit of a shock to the system. One day when I was studying economics in the Netherlands in Rotterdam, one of my professors said something really, really interesting that I remember to this day. He namely said, All of you are a little bit clairvoyant. The problem is you've forgotten about it. And I thought, probably the same thing you're thinking now. Like, what is this guy talking about? Like what does he mean? What is this? So I went up to him and asked him, What did what did you mean? And he said, you know, it's really interesting if you think about how time evolves from the past into the future, but you can actually also develop a sense for what wants to happen and what is going to happen by really paying deep attention to what's going on. That really piqued my interest from a business perspective and economics and all of that. So fast forward, I spent a few years doing pretty traditional consulting in in kind of blue chip companies in Europe, then started a job at Walleda, the body care skincare company in Germany. I took on a job that was really focused on sales and marketing, and that was my initial move away from finance, which is where I was originally focused on. And at that company, I noticed for the first time, you know, because that's a business and a brand that's operating at the intersection of regenerative agriculture, consumer products, and using business as a force for good, as a for-profit business, a global for-profit business. This is a business where the more we make and the more we sell, the better off everyone and the planet is. Not only the people buying the product, certainly not only the company selling the product, but literally everyone. Because there's this idea of additionality. The more you make, the more you sell, the more of the activity that's really at the core of the organization and of the business, the more of a net positive effect will be created. We didn't call it regenerative at the time, but with hindsight, I think that is so much at the core of a regenerative regenerative principle of addressing, you know, in our case at the time the self-healing ability of the human body, but also addressing the and activating the self-healing ability of nature, of the land, of the planet. And doing that through consumer products, who would have thought, right? So from the south of Germany, I moved to New York and took over the leadership for North America for the company, for the subsidiary here on this side of the ocean. Did that for about seven years, um, had back and forth assignments in other European countries as well, and served on um global teams, you know, really helping to define the brand. And when I left that role and started to engage with a family office and private equity, that was because I had a very strong sense that rather than working with and for one company that does this amazing work of basically, you know, changing the world as you go, I wanted to engage with 10, 20, 100, hundreds of those organizations, making sure that they have the resources and primarily the financial resources that are actually aligned with the mission and the purpose and the values of those businesses. And that was because I noticed that a lot of companies like that that have a purpose that's much bigger than making money, have a hard time attracting the capital that actually wants to do the same thing. There's usually a disconnect between the motive of the money that comes in and the motive of an entrepreneur or a team or a company that at its deepest level are in the business of changing the world for the better and providing some benefit to society and to the planet. That was my motivation of moving from working inside a business to supporting organizations primarily with financial capital. Then about seven years ago, was um made aware of this opportunity here at RSF on the West Coast in California, and we moved our family. We have four children, so it was quite an undertaking to move from the East Coast to the West Coast seven plus years ago, and took over the leadership here at RSF, and have since just really appreciated this community of people who intentionally are putting money to work so that we can make the world better. And, you know, I've continued to be involved with businesses like Walleda that, you know, um on the ground really help make the world a better place through their entrepreneurial activities. And I've really found my place here and my passion of transforming the world through business, especially when it comes to funding those businesses with uh values aligned capital.

SPEAKER_02 9:26

I want to go back to actually the family office and the private equity part of your career because it's what built up to enable you to have that perspective to take over leadership at RSF. Just thinking about the timeline that you're talking about, you watched this whole industry mature from fair trade at the very beginning to B Corp to then, you know, regenerative investing and everything that you're doing with RSF. Was there a theme that you saw with private equity? Because you could just see a ton of companies and a ton of deals. Like, why is there that disconnect between mission-driven companies and the ability to raise capital? And then was there advisory or what what are the puzzle pieces that that you saw that there's companies where they really need support in order to create a playbook for a private equity shop?

SPEAKER_01 10:19

So there are a couple of aspects to this. One is that there's an abundance of capital that likes to feel better about, and I mean the stewards of those capital uh sources, right? The wealth managers or the asset owners who love the idea that their money isn't destroying the world while they're making money, right? That whole idea of, well, if we can just get rid of the negative externalities, but continue to do what we're doing, right? It's kind of going from conventional agriculture to organic agriculture. And don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not bad mouthing it, but just taking away the toxins doesn't drive a healing aspect, right? It's it's you're taking something that's that has negative externalities, the toxins, and you're just not using those. Great. And that's what impact investing um originally was. Well, let's invest in such a way that we can feel better about how we make money. There's still a lot of that going on. And even today, um, you know, in today's world where ESG and DEI, those three-letter words, have become four-letter words, right? Politically speaking at least. Even today, there are a lot of managers, investment managers, and people who really appreciate the idea of not having these negative externalities. But what fundamentally is needed, and this is what I saw when I was working within the family office and doing these private equity deals, is that you really need to get close, very close, to the companies that you invest in. And that's a relationship aspect. So it's it really transcends the transactional in that sense. The best of the best private equity and VC investors know this, right? Even outside of the regenerative finance and impact investing space, they know. And the relationship factor is huge because it trans it helps it transcend just the transactional that needs to be buttoned up. But there's a whole different sense of responsibility with a company, a founding team, with leadership of a company, if they feel a connection to the source of the capital. But this is something that RSF has been doing from the beginning, namely creating this sense of interdependency. Where it's not just somebody writes a check and then whatever, you know, you you do your best or you don't, and it either works or it doesn't work. And it's all about either making a bunch of money for everyone or failure, but it creates a connection and a community for shared risk. That's another aspect. And to your question about what do companies need to do in order to attract values-aligned private equity or or any sort of capital, I think where it starts is being really clear about what the mission of the company is. And if at its core that's connected with um a social and or environmental purpose, and you're able to articulate that as a leadership team and um or as a founding team, then connecting that with the type of money that wants to do that same thing becomes much easier. I mean making a profit is a necessity, and it's so I'm I'm not advocating that you know for purpose businesses should not be for-profit as well. And we work with nonprofits and for-profits at RSF, but this purpose first and purpose as the driver of profits, rather than saying we gotta make a profit so that we can have a purpose or we have to first make money and then we'll establish a foundation that's gonna do a little bit of good. Uh that is not the way to approach that. So if you think about traditional philanthropy, it usually comes from a company that, you know, I'll take oil, right? Where a lot of money is being made in ways that everybody knows today is not the way of the future and is uh the cause of huge externalities. If part of that money is repurposed for philanthropy, that's nice. It's it's wonderful and it's much needed. But where I see the the core of the big change that the system is invited to make, it is making sure that at the core of the business it's already sustainable. So that you don't need philanthropy to fix what's then broken as a result of how you made all that money. So the whole idea of investors coming in to support a business, I think needs to be expanded from just economic and financial arguments to also really being all in on the non-financial bigger purpose of making the world a better place. Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 15:52

And and so whenever you take the helm of RSF and you're you're looking in the rear view mirror of, well, this is a very established organization, but also I mean, we're uh going through what I would consider a renaissance in in the industry with a lot of technology, a lot of consciousness, if we're gonna use that word. You know, I believe you came in around 2017 or 2018, is that right? Where did you really see that that growth path? Like what has really excited you about taking the helm of leadership at an organization with those kinds of roots, with its history and and its resources, uh, but but squarely looking to the future.

SPEAKER_01 16:36

Yes. Well, that's easy to answer for me because my personal commitment, my personal passion, my personal stand, if you will, is to transform the world through business and especially how how they're funded. That's just my thing. It's what excites me, it's what's what gets me out of bed every morning, and it what RSF is the perfect platform to do that with. So for me, it really connects what I personally stand for and how I um am looking to contribute to society in general and how I want to live my life with an organization that has that so much in its DNA that it wouldn't be able to do anything else. So coming from first principles of living systems, um, really rooting all that we do in principles of regenerative finance is something that really excites me. And big picture, the way that I see this moment is really an invitation to make all finance regenerative, all of it. And that doesn't mean that I think that we at RSF are going to acquire JP Morgan Chase tomorrow. That will likely not happen. But I want to build with RSF or continue to build this organization that's gonna be infecting the host, together with a whole lot of other organizations that are moving in that same direction, because yes, there is a momentum right now. There is a sense of yes, we have so many crises today, and they're real. They're real, the crises. But there's also opportunity, and the crisis presents an opportunity, and I don't mean that in an opportunistic sense, I mean that in a very deep sense, if you will, where there's a real opportunity to create something that's different, and to look at shifting systems by showing that it can be done. And when I share with people that RSF has been around for over four decades, and we have no endowment or anything that we can lean on, and we, you know, as an organization, sustain ourselves because we work with both investor clients and donor clients on the one hand, and on the other hand, with social entrepreneurs who borrow money from us. That is a business model of an intermediary, and it's working. And it's working because we are able at RSF and our team is able to embrace complexity. We have a high tolerance for complexity, whereas it seems like the rest of the financial world has a decreasing tolerance of complexity. It's like, oh no, that's too complicated. We don't want to do this deal. You know, banks will say that's too risky. Why? Because we don't want to under, we choose to not want to understand it, how it really works. And so, in addition to the values alignment, there's this complexity element that we can bring in. So that really excites me because we're able to fill a need. It's a real need out there created by change makers. And in the process of serving those change makers, we're actually changing the financial system. So it's changing finance by financing change. That's the way that I think about this and the role of this organization. And being able to lead that effort is just an incredible privilege. And you know, working with our clients on both sides, so those who provide the funding, whose money we can borrow for a while, and those who we serve by funding them who borrow that money for a while, then it comes back. It creates this really interesting, yeah, very conscious um community of people who are working with money in a different way. So it's not philanthropy, right? And it's also not purely return chasing capital. It's really the the way I think about it is there are three legs of the stool. One is financial return to the investors, two is the risk, and three is the impact. And what we provide is a deep impact, low risk, and medium return proposition. And there aren't that many out there that provide that. So it it feels like a really unique opportunity to do this.

SPEAKER_02 21:36

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SPEAKER_01 24:00

Yes. Great question. Well, doing good is not an excuse to not make money or to not generate returns. You know, I view it as a spectrum. So there's all the way from negative 100% return, which is pure philanthropy, right? I mean, from a financial perspective, um, namely you give it away, to extractive, you know, chasing above market rate returns. That can come, it is that's not always the case, but it can come with an extractive gesture of just pulling value out of a system. And the way I look at it is that choosing where you are on that spectrum is something that requires dialogue. It requires dialogue with who is being funded, what is being funded, what the source of the capital is, what the risk is, and also what value is being created and for whom. So I'm I'm not at all opposed to market rate return investments. And we are at RSF also moving closer to market rate returns for fixed income products, which is what we provide. You know, we call it fixed income for good, actually trademarked it. Um and so to to provide a a market rate return for that, it's what pension funds, institutional investors just need. It's what's needed, and and I respect that, and we understand that, and it's a reality. And there's no you know ethical issue with any of that. Then there are investors, you know, ultra-high net worth individuals, or or family offices, or also foundations, that say, well, we want to be more catalytic than this, and we would like to really double down on the impact, and the return isn't that important to us. Or they might say, the return is really important to us, we just don't need all of it. So, what do I mean by that? If you view the return as a as a pie, then it becomes a challenge of how to divide the pie. So, how much goes to the investor and how much might go to a beneficiary who's not the investor, depending on needs within that system. That's why I'm saying it's a dialogue. One might say, well, this is just the return that we need. It's the return profile that we need. And others might say, well, I prefer for part of this pie to go somewhere else because I want to support that and I want to be catalytic in that way. So the entire world of impact investing and regenerative finance is sometimes viewed as all concessionary return, which is a word that I really don't like, because the question is concession to what and to whom, right? And if you really view this as a systems approach, then you have to look at the entire system and not just one actor, and say this can't fly because this one stakeholder in the system is not getting the same thing that other people get. Well, that's not the game that is necessarily being played. So again, dialogue between the stakeholders to determine the right relationship to each other to find that point on the spectrum between pure philanthropy and extractive returns driven by um self-interested behavior.

SPEAKER_02 27:50

You also mentioned lowering risk. How how do you translate that to your investors whenever they're asking how that shows up? I I believe that you're making 100% debt uh investments, is that right? Is that a piece of it?

SPEAKER_01 28:07

Yes. Most, it's actually not 100%, but most of our work is uh centers around senior secure debt. So that means it is collateralized with actual assets, and uh that's only one piece of it. So in the in the case of a commercial real estate loan, for instance, which is a great example on this podcast, of course, and we do quite a few of those. There's a building that collateralizes the loan. But the purpose of making the loan is not to sell the building out from underneath the social enterprise that's operating it. It does make it safer, but reducing the risk is actually precedes that. It means really looking at the cash flow of a business. Are they able to make monthly payments? Are there enough reserves? What is the track record of the organization, of the team? Who else cares about this organization? Are there investors if it's a nonprofit? Are there donors there? And really getting a sense, again, from a systems perspective, of what's going on here, what are the interdependencies, and really fundamentally understanding the business model that they're operating with, what the risks are, how they're being mitigated, that is the underlying risk mitigant that helps us not to have to foreclose on a building, for instance, right? So, yes, the senior secured aspect really helps, but the underwriting and the detailed and high attention relationship management that's being provided by our portfolio management team makes that they're oftentimes the first phone call that a borrower makes because they're saying, hey, I'm seeing some trouble on the horizon. I was hoping that you all can help me figure this out. That's the phone call you want to get because then you can help them actually get there. And these things did happen during COVID, for instance. And we were able to, you know, navigate that with our borrowers in a way that helps them, helps us. That makes sense. And that helps our investors. It de-risks everything. The second element that de-risks our operations is that we have 1,300 investors, noteholders, in our loan fund. That means that the risk is spread out over a lot of individuals. So there's that aspect of spreading the risk and really having a community of shared risk. Over the course of the 40-something years that we've been around, we've always repaid principal plus interest to every single investor. So that's a track record thing. And we can do that because we have strong reserves that we've built over the decades to absorb losses. Because sometimes a loan does go bad. And if it would never do that, it would mean that we would not be taking enough risk. But it's such a low percentage that it can easily be absorbed with those reserves.

SPEAKER_02 31:13

As you're talking, Jasper, I realize like this is what a bank should do. In some sense, of like, wouldn't it be amazing if banks actually did this? Especially community banks. You know, I know that you're not taking deposits in the same way that a bank is, but what is that difference between a community bank and what RSF is doing, providing loans to businesses that can make an outsized impact within their operations?

SPEAKER_01 31:42

Such a great question. And there are lots of differences because RSF is not a bank, right? We're a non-bank lender that has all kinds of regulatory and compliance implications. So we are registered on a state-by-state basis, so there is compliance and all of that, but it's different than if you're a bank, which is just much harder. It's a lot harder. And and banks need to put frameworks around their lending that we do not need to put around it. So there's that. Shouldn't banks do this? Yes, they should. Are there banks that do this? Very, very, very few. Well, the mutual bank is one that does this. And they're there are friends in the industry and and a partner of ours, but they're the exception. And so why don't banks do this? There are a few reasons. One is the complexity that I mentioned before. So I'll give you an example. Our underwriting team got comfortable with underwriting against green coffee beans owned by a cooperative that are on a container on a ship in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. And most banks would say, No, I can't do this. Like, who owns it? Where is it? How am I gonna sell green coffee beans? Who wants that in the first place? Plus, the company that's doing all of this is a cooperative that has like hundreds of owners, you know, that are technically not even owners, and the governance model is too fragmented. So, why does RSF get comfortable with it? It's because we get really close and we really seek to understand and go like, oh, you can actually do this. If there's um a major event that impacts this borrower, we can get repaid. There's a source of repayment, there's a path, there's a lot of alpha, if you will, in really diving into the world of complexity. And most banks, not all of them, but most banks, and that includes the regional banks, shy away from complexity because it costs money. And if you look at the margins that banks need to operate under, it's tough. Um, it's it's not easy to do this. And because of the capital stack that we at RSF are able to work with, with again, you know, noteholders who are somewhere on that spectrum that I described before, we are able to do that. And because it it costs money to have the team to make those deals, to do the underwriting, to do the relationship management, to find them in the first place, and to um to determine whether it's the right fit, not only from a mission perspective, but also from a financial and fiduciary perspective towards our noteholders. Interesting.

SPEAKER_02 34:47

Uh how about the the thematics of RSF? Do you do you view it as like we're gonna we're gonna focus on these sectors because we there is relationship there and you can create more of an outsized influence, or are you more agnostic on where the companies are coming from?

SPEAKER_01 35:11

Yeah. Great question. So we do have thematic focus areas, and it has a few reasons. One of them being that we have expertise in those areas, and that's important because of the complexity issue that I described. But another reason is also that, as mentioned before, we provide mostly senior debt, and that's hard to do, for instance, in early stage pure tech or in the service industry, like an advertising agency. You know, if there are no real assets in the business, it's difficult to do that. Or if a nonprofit doesn't have assets and is 100% dependent upon uh philanthropy, very difficult to underwrite against. So the areas that we focus on today are climate, which includes clean energy, there's a lot of solar in there, but also recycling and some other climate-focused and environmentally focused solution providers. Um there's the entire regenerative food and agriculture value chain that really goes from the farm to the shelf onto composting, actually. Um that includes regenerative food companies, so consumer products. Then we have education and nonprofits as an area that we focus on, and that's also how RSF started out with lending primarily to Waldorf schools across the country. That's part of our origination story. Then there's community, um, so community wealth building and community support. Um, that is kind of a um all the rest um theme that includes workforce development, unhoused youth, and themes like that.

SPEAKER_02 37:10

I'm curious because I would be remiss if we didn't bring up the real estate aspect uh since this is the regenerative real estate podcast. I want to start with that question now that I'm thinking out out loud. One, just your perception around regenerative finance and regenerative real estate, because we are both couched within this larger movement that I think has the the plow has been regenerative agriculture. And and even hanging out in those circles, they're they look at me and they're saying, regenerative real estate, if you're not moving cows around a field fast enough, I I don't know if if you're actually being in integrity with regeneration. So I I am curious what what your thoughts are around regenerative finance and regenerative real estate, because one one is a conduit for the other, and they're so intricately tethered together.

SPEAKER_01 38:09

Yes, such a great question. And we actually did some thinking on this recently as we were thinking about what does regenerative finance mean, or what does regenerative social finance actually mean? You know, we came up with five principles that I can share just really quickly, and we can decide whether we want to double-click into that. So number one is act from abundance, as a basic principle of how to approach money, which is, when you think about it, a really odd thing because we're being taught to focus on scarcity, not abundance. So act from abundance. Number two, center relationships as a basic principle of regenerative finance, where stakeholders, all stakeholders, matter, and it's not just about maximizing self-interest, but really looking at this aspect of dialogue. Third, empower everyone, and number four, transcend ego as a as a really important tenet of of how we work. So it's not only about me, me, me, but about supporting system um change. And then talking about change, the fifth and last principle is move with change. And that's it's really a principle of humility, of saying we don't own the truth. We're we're on a path and we're figuring it out as we go. And we discovered a few things that we know work well, and we're pioneering and figuring out how to do the rest. So, with those five five principles, we're touching on what type of behavior is going to make finance regenerative. And I would summarize it with the notion that money can be a tool and money as a tool for change. So I think there might be a parallel there to regenerative real estate. Namely, you ask the question, what's the purpose of real estate? Why is it there? Why does it matter? And how do we work together around it? What it is we know, but it's about the why and the how. I think there's a huge parallel there with regenerative agriculture, regenerative finance, regenerative real estate, around the notion of leaving the world a better place, being, you know, having this additionality as a as a living principle and using it as a tool, as a tool for something that's much bigger. Right? So agriculture in itself isn't the only goal. The goal is to heal the earth, right? And through that enable people to thrive and you know, eat the type of food that enable them to think the thoughts of the future, um, you know, on a very esoteric level. And I think the same can be said for finance and for real estate. So I see it when treated the right way, not as a buzzword, but as something that's fundamentally different and fundamentally transformational.

SPEAKER_02 41:40

How how do you make the tent bigger for those folks that are adjacent? They're curious. These are relationships that I'm sure that you have, that I have. They're wanting to walk in a different world. They're coming from a very different place, though. So how is RSF thinking about uh inviting those people to become changemakers through their wealth? Do you have a playbook for that?

SPEAKER_01 42:12

I think we do. And it doesn't raise it resonate with everybody, but it does resonate uh with a lot of people we're finding, and it goes something like this. You know, we have this financial and economic system, and we're just system in society. And collectively, we're creating outcomes that nobody wants. Right? Not all of the outcomes are things that nobody wants, but we are creating outcomes that nobody wants. Think about the global warming, climate crisis, um, income inequality, you know, what's happening um on many levels. Uh mental health crisis, um loneliness epidemic. I mean, there's so many things. The healthcare system. So we're creating outcomes that nobody wants. And now I'm quoting um Otto Sharmer, um, who I've come to really appreciate as a as a teacher in this area. With all these crises, there's one fundamental underlying crisis, and that is the crisis of agency. Namely a lot of people have the sense that the world's going under and they can't do anything about it. Like, what what can I do? Who am I? What can I do to to contribute to creating a better world? That sense of powerlessness, that sense of I have no agency, it doesn't matter what I do, the world's going under anyway, is a is the the fundamental problem here. And what we do. At RSF, we're saying you can actually do something. You can purchase a note in the RSF loan fund at $1,000, and after 90 days, you can take it back out, you'll get a little bit of interest, and your money is doing something meaningful. Or you can take $10 million and give it to us for 10 years, and you'll get more interest, maybe, and you know, then it comes back. But anywhere on that spectrum, you know, you can do something. And that's an act. It's an intentional act. We're building our proposition around this concept of agency. That is what RSF is providing. We're providing a way for people to do something meaningful. And those change makers out there, these enterprises that are providing climate solutions or whole child development or supporting community wealth building, you name it, regenerative food and agriculture. I mean, bless them, that's hard work. That's tough. It's not nothing's easy. There are no more no-brainers, right, in this world. That's really hard. They need the type of funding so that they can do what we want them to do. That's the agency that we're um that we're offering. It's just a privilege to work with people who are then saying, well gosh, in my portfolio, right, if it's a high net worth individual, for instance. I do have a carve out for fixed income. I never thought I could do something like this. I've always thought I should put it in a money market account with, I don't know, Fidelity, Schwab, something like that. We're not investment advisors, but we're offering, you know, an opportunity for people to take that sense of something's off, but I have no idea what I can do about it, to saying you can actually do something about it, and it's not giving away your money. It's letting your money do something on your behalf while you focus on other things, and then it comes back and you can make the decision again.

SPEAKER_02 46:01

What's been one of the more meaningful investments that you've been a part of since joining the RSF team? And I know this isn't throwing shade on all the other companies uh that you're a part of, but just one that really sticks out.

SPEAKER_01 46:18

So one that really sticks out for me is a relationship, a lending relationship that we have with a company called Goodur. G-O-O-D-R. Not the sunglasses company. There's another company that's called Gooder. And Jasmine, their founder and CEO, who actually did a TED talk um as well about this that I highly recommend. She was looking at the problem of hunger in this country and was saying, Well, there's gotta be a way to fix this. And her conclusion after she took a deep dive into this problem was this is not an availability problem, it's not a scarcity problem, it's a logistics problem. There's enough, so much food gets thrown out, but we don't get it to the people who need it most, who do not have the means to actually um get to that food, which leads to many, many children showing up hungry at school in the morning, right? So she built a business around collecting food from retail manufacturers, hospitality industry, you know, restaurants, and redistributing it through small stores inside a school, for instance, in a you know, in neighborhoods that really need it in in our cities. And she started this out of Atlanta, uh in Georgia, so that the children who come to school there or their parents who drop kids off can grab a few cans of this or some of that for free and you know, make sure that they can feed their families. Now the leftovers, the the m the the food that cannot be redistributed is being composted and sold as compost, which you know helps drive the business model. So I think that's really one to be incredibly proud of that has you know a social and an environmental impact right here in the United States, clearly helping to solve a problem by just being smart and bringing people together. Because all again, all the actors in this system, from manufacturers through retail to restaurants to the schools, are saying, well, absolutely, this is a problem that we want to help solve. How can we help? And she said, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna figure this out. And she needed a loan to make sure that she has the working capital to do this. And RSF was able to provide that loan.

SPEAKER_02 49:02

Jasper, what was her name?

SPEAKER_01 49:03

Jasmine Crow Houston. Okay. And the company name is Gooder.

SPEAKER_02 49:07

Yeah, and if anybody's interested, I I didn't this story started to sound so familiar. I I believe she did a uh a podcast with uh Guy Roz on how I built this. Uh I'm pretty sure it was that podcast. So if anybody wants to go deep on that story, it's um it was a really good one. And that's so fun to know that RSF was a part of that journey. And so Jasper, the the last question uh and you can take this any direction that you want, either personal or professional. What what do you want to be celebrating in five years? That can be at the organizational level or or maybe it's getting kids out of the house. Uh you you choose your own adventure on that one.

SPEAKER_01 49:48

So in in five years' time. I mean, that is such an interesting question because who knows what's gonna happen tomorrow, right? I mean, in this this environment, uh it's so easy to get whiplash from the daily um news that it becomes hard to um to have a look into the future. But I actually find it easier to look five years out than to look at what's gonna happen tomorrow or next week or next month. And in five years' time, I want to celebrate that through partnerships, more and more organizations around the world are putting money to work for good and using money as a tool to transform fill-in-the-blank system. And it will be a really proud moment to celebrate that RSF has supported that. And I see us in a role of serving and connecting and serving, but supporting both lots of social enterprises here in the United States, but organizations around the world that are starting to adopt this. And that if in five years' time you and I have this conversation again, the question of why don't banks do this will not pop up again because they do. They started to do this again.

SPEAKER_02 51:13

I love that. Jasper, it's been a pleasure. Let's let's schedule it in for 2030. We'll we'll circle back and see how it's going.

SPEAKER_01 51:20

Neil, thank you. This was such a fun conversation. Really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 52:02

I'd love to hear about the projects and ideas that you're working on. The best way to connect with me is on LinkedIn, just search Neil Collins. And if my team at Hamlet Capital or Latitude Regenerative Real Estate can help bring your vision to life, whether it's buying or selling a home or developing a community integrated within a farm, do not hesitate to reach out. Let's build something meaningful together.