I think it was Groucho Marx who once said something like, “Any club that would have me as a member, I would never consider joining.” Or in my case, “Any company that would be so stupid as to buy Howell Associates, I would never consider selling to.”

In many ways the two companies–and the two CEOs– could not have been more dissimilar. ZA was a down and dirty company whose services included helping private owners maximize profits from Medicaid and avoid going to jail for Medicaid fraud. Their clients were mainly nursing home providers. Howell Associates clients were mainly nonprofit CCRCs, mostly faith-based. The ZA staff mostly had accounting degrees from second tier colleges. The Howell staff had degrees in history and English and most had gone to prestigious colleges and universities. The principal owner and CEO of ZA, Steve Fishman, was from a working class neighborhood in Philadelphia and the first in his family to graduate from college. I was the fourth generation of Southern gentlemen who except for me and my brother were all clergymen or bankers. He was a towering figure and overweight. Though there was still much I could not do because of polio, I was a physical fitness fanatic and weighed about half of what he did. He talked with a strong Philly dialect. I had a Southern drawl.

When the merger happened many in the senior living consulting world rolled their eyes and said, good luck.

Chalk up another one for GA. The merger worked. The one thing I value most in people is authenticity. I felt that Steve Fishman if nothing else was authentic. He was comfortable in his own skin, smart, and had a big heart. Two people could not be more unlike each other than the two of us, but I respected him and admired his gumption, honesty, and ambition. And I had to admit he appeared on the scene when I was reaching the desperate phase. I had run out of steam and there was no one else who was willing or able to step up to the plate. Having to wind down Howell Associates would have depleted most of the money that we had made that year, leaving me with essentially nothing to show for twenty years of blood, sweat and tears.

The first two years with ZA were great. The merger had expanded our market, and we were thriving and making good money for ZA. I reported to a very smart man, who was not much older than my own two children. He was the one person who could have made my life miserable, but he didn’t. He was very supportive of everything Howell Associates did and gave me all the respect that I thought I rightfully deserved. The company had weekend retreats once a year at major resorts where spouses were also invited. The first three years, I, Embry, and most of the Howell senior staff and their spouses joined the ZA staff in Mexico, Maimi and Puerto Rico for bordering on over-the-top weekend retreats, which were lavish and fun, and where Howell Associates was welcomed as part of the ZA family. In a word, I had lucked out.

But it was not always to be so. Storm clouds were lurking on the horizon. During these early years of the merger, Fishman had his eye on other companies, and several had joined ZA as affiliates like us. It had been the best of both worlds for Howell Associates. We had our own identity but were part of a larger group, which at that time had a pretty good reputation. Then toward the end of 2002, we got the word that the affiliation was to be dropped and that the brand, “Howell Associates” would be retired. Now we were just another business line within ZA. This would not have been so bad except that we were not compatible with some of the new firms that Fishman had acquired. The Howell Associates director of marketing services clashed with the head of another marketing company Fishman had bought and left the firm, which was a huge loss for us. Others at Howell Associates left as well due to “culture differences” and morale problems. Our revenues plunged. My guess is that many of the new affiliates were experiencing the same thing.

I think that we could have handled the situation were it not for Fishman’s decision to move Howell Associates to be under the umbrella of a firm which was part of another recent acquisition and that company was losing money. Our work remained steady but the revenue we generated from our efforts went to cover the losses from the other company. It was too much for me to take, and I quit in 2004 when my five year commitment to stay on expired though I remained on good terms with Fishman and his chief finance guy. This was important because ZA still owed me money for the buyout.

Now if anyone thinks I got rich on the sale of Howell Associates, sadly you are mistaken. The initial price offer was one million dollars but half of that was in stock in another venture that never materialized and half in cash. But of the cash part, I got half of that up front and half as a note to be paid out over a 10-year period. Hey, I am not complaining about getting a check for $250,000, but not long after I left the company, ZA stopped payments on the note. It did not take much time for many of the acquisitions to get into financial trouble, and I figured the company was running out of cash. However, following the advice of a good friend in a similar business, I retained the meanest, nastiest, junkyard dog lawyer I could find and sued ZA, hoping the squeaky wheel would get the oil, which it did and the payments (with interest at ten present) resumed. In another five years the note was paid off in full.

And whatever happened to Steve Fishman? I tried to track him down and found little online except for several lawsuits and legal proceedings by the Securities and Exchange Commission. He apparently was dismissed from being the head of Genesis Health Care and was being sued by his former partner at Formation Capital. He had not posted on his Linked In account for years. ZA Consulting had long since disappeared. When I queried AI about Steve Fishman, this is what I got:

Steven Fishman faced personal financial difficulties and subsequently became the target of an SEC Cease and Desist Order in February 2020. He was penalized for using outside investment capital to covertly meet his personal funding obligations to Formation Capital funds. He later founded and served as CEO of Eagleline Acquisitions.

ZA Consulting LLC, a Jenkintown, PA-based healthcare and nursing home consultancy, ceased its operations and disbanded due to a combination of market forces, systemic Medicare revenue shortages, and complex vendor liability issues.

The closure was closely tied to these factors:

• Medicare and Industry Crises: As a primary consultancy and management partner for long-term care and nursing facilities, ZA Consulting was deeply impacted by rising healthcare costs and Medicare payment cuts. These macroeconomic shifts created widespread financial distress for their clients, eventually rendering operations—such as their management of 22 Acquisition Corporations—untenable, leading to massive vendor obligations.
• Vendor & Liability Disputes: The collapse of ZA Consulting’s associated nursing home portfolios resulted in high-profile financial and legal fallout. The consulting arm became entangled in litigation concerning the financial priority of vendor payments and bond obligations during the distressed sell-offs of healthcare properties.
• Business Restructuring: In the early 2000s, as a result of shifting healthcare market demands and the fallout from these operational failures, the firm disbanded and restructured. Following its dissolution, real estate and development clients who previously relied on ZA Consulting (such as Essex) were forced to replace them with alternative marketing and management companies.

Not a happy ending though given what I observed during the period we were part of ZA I must admit I am not surprised. Saved again by GA, my guardian angel, having gotten out when the getting was good. But also, how sad. He was a smart guy from a working class family who had pulled himself up by his own bootstraps and had a big heart. At the time I believed that he was fundamentally a nice guy though I thought some of his actions were reckless– like paying a lot of money for a company like Howell Associates!

So in 2004 I was free at last, free at last. But what to do next and how to make the most out of my retirement years? I was only 62, still had my marbles and some energy. That will be the subject of the next post, the penultimate one, so stay tuned. The Day in the Life series is almost over. Thank you for reading and hanging in there with me!

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