TV Episode: Financing the American Dream

Hey, guys. I'm Derek McGowan with the McGowan Mortgage Team at Andie Mac. I've been fortunate enough to be a top 1% lender in the country each of the last two years, and my team's planted the roost here in Overland Park, Kansas. Got a wonderful museum behind us. My awesome friend Tiffany inside. Let's go in and take a look. Tiffany, tell us a little bit about what makes Overland park so desirable.

Yeah, so I have a lot of buyers that come to me, and they want to live in Overland park because the school districts are incredible. They're some of the best in the nation. There's everything within arm's reach for you. There's all the shopping, restaurants, anything you can imagine you want. You're able to watch your chiefs, able to watch your royals. It's a short drive to the airport. You pretty much have everything you're looking for right here in Overlook Park.

Hey, guys, I'm here at Pad Thai kc. Got to be one of the best Thai places and overall restaurants here in town. I've got the wonderful Ann here with me. And tell us a little bit about what made you plant your roots and open up your business here.

Okay. So I love Overland Park. One is because of people. People here support loco. Without my loco community, I wouldn't be here, you know? And I remember one day when it first shut down. Everybody just get in line here just to help and make sure that we afloat during the pandemic. And, you know, we made it through. So I would have to be thankful for people that around us a lot.

It's a little warm out here, and I know there's some awesome food inside. You want to go check it out? Of course.

Of course.

What all do we have here? This looks amazing.

So we have this thing called sushi salmon. It's basically grilled salmon on the sea. Vegetable and beef have the sushi curry on it.

Oh, my gosh.

Sushi curry is blend between red curry and Penang curry.

Okay.

It's one of local favorite.

Okay. That's what we asked for. That's what we. That's what we got delivered. Mind if we take a bite? Oh, my gosh. That looks amazing. Oh, my gosh. I love the curry. The salmon's fresh. Yeah. That's incredible. So this is one of your house favorites, huh? That was amazing. So Ann is actually next door. She's got another restaurant just down the way. Here I am. Frozen dessert. Kc. So I'm excited for some dessert. Let's go check it out. So I'd love to know more, a little bit more about, you know, what's all behind this American dream. You have kind of your journey. So you mentioned born in Thailand, moved to the U.S. how did that happen? You know, did you move over with your family or what's the picture behind that?

I came here by myself in 2006.

Okay.

Came here for school, did not even speak any English.

That's not challenging at all. Yeah, kind of hard. How much longer did it take you to start thinking about business opportunities?

Not long at all. I've been like probably three, four years after photography business. Doing really good with that. After that, bought the restaurant and was like, oh, wow. The restaurant doing so well. I mean, like I said again, we love people so much. I think that's a part of it for me today to maybe do exist. You know, we also have a really good employees group that support me that was there for me since day one and they're still here.

And you know, it keeps growing and growing and growing. So photography, it's a Thai place to dessert shop now. You guys have got some big notoriety lately. I saw some, you know, like top 10 things tell what. What's all about.

A couple weeks ago we actually got top 10 best ice cream served in the best ice cream in the usa.

Oh. In the. Not even just Kansas City. So.

Yes. So it was.

That's huge surprise.

It was a big surprise for us. Yes. We were so glad to, you know, and we just got, I think the first, very first year. We also got the fair dessert top 33 in America.

Wow. Wasn't just one place. You had multiple places kind of throwing some. Some big headlines around, big awards. That's awesome. Sam.