Finance world's odd couple are out to have fund.

James F. Calvano is Central Casting's version of a corporate leader.

His look--from the perfectly fitted custom suit to the coiffed salt-and-pepper hair--screams executive. So does his resume, which is dotted with the alphabet-soup of his world: CEO of this, EVP and COO of that, and GM of the other.

Billy Procida also comes straight from Central Casting but is better suited for the role of mischievous Dead End Kid. He favors a windbreaker bearing the name of his brother's construction company, and he, too, has a resume to match his persona. He swung a hammer for years, developed projects that nobody else would touch and that banks disdained, and now frequently lends on equally out-of-favor real estate and business opportunities. He never attended college, but is the dean of the Dead-heads and plays a mean electric guitar.

Call them the Odd Couple of real rstate, the yin and yang of lending.

Calvano, 69, has emerged from semi-retirement to join forces with Procida and the 40-somethings who were Procida's high school classmates and who now run Palisades Financial, a $100 million private investment firm in Englewood Cliffs, N.J. The marriage couldn't come at a better time, as Palisades Financial--which makes bridge, mezzanine and primary loans to smaller developers and businesses that the banks often shun--is preparing to open its second fund. That fund, which will open in the first quarter of 2006, will also buy distressed debt and take equity positions in real estate deals and business opportunities.

"I told him that some day we'd be working together," Procida, who founded Palisades Financial 10 years ago, says in a voice made raspy by cigars and hollering across the firm's office about the relative value of a deal or a piece of collateral. "He put me off for a while, but I was determined to be the irresistible force that actually moves the immovable object. With his personality, experience and skills, and my personality, experience and skills, it's a perfect fit not only for Palisades Financial and both of us personally, but also for our investors."

Calvano--who ran Avis, Western Union, MoneyGram and the Carlson Travel Group and was vice chairman of American Express--will be chairman of Palisades Financial and run its day-to-day business operations. Joining him will be another new acquisition: John "Jack" Chimento, who spent the last 20 years at Bear Steams, the last 11 as a senior managing director.

That will free Procida--along with his longtime partner, Mark Zurlini, and Chief Investment Officer and partner David McClain--to go back to his roots and search out, evaluate and close deals. Ira Bergstein, also a principal, will continue to oversee the firm's finances.

"I'll sit on the deal-review committee as well because a lot of what I bring to Palisades Financial is my eye for--and years of experience in--measuring deals and sensing what companies we'd like to lend to or invest in," says Calvano, noting that Chimento and his Wall Street background will complement his own corporate background. "We're looking for deals that offer a good chance for significant growth.

"We come from entirely different disciplines, and that's what made this an intriguing possibility for me and a likely success story," Calvano adds. "Jack comes from the finance side. I come from the corporate side, and Billy comes from the deal and development side. He also has the advantage of doing deals from both sides of the equation, as a borrower and a lender. So he'll see things that I might not, and I'll see things that he might not. And Jack will see things that both of us might not."

Procida and Calvano would like Palisades Financial to grow in terms of money raised, money loaned, and the size of deals in which it will participate. The firm is already hugely successful, distributing to investors $7.7 million in profits over three years, and closing its first fund to new money in January 2005 with $42 million in equity raised from 149 individual investors. The principals insist that they won't stray from what made Palisades Financial successful: understanding that many worthwhile projects come with some kind of flaws as baggage.

Recent loans have gone to an undercapitalized developer of the first-ever luxury condominium project in an emerging area of Mount Vernon, a ski area in Vermont that was in need of refurbishing and hotel units, and a condominium project in Manhattan being developed by a New York City fire fighter.

"Just because a bank or a traditional lender is squeamish doesn't make a deal or a project necessarily bad," says Procida. "I started my career developing in the Bronx. Everyone told me I was crazy, and plenty of banks told me 'no.'

"But the projects worked, and they taught me a valuable lesson: if you're dealing with good people who have good ideas, it might not matter that they're undercapitalized or a little aggressive in taking a risk. We understand that, and that is what helps make us successful," Procida says. "We're not gamblers, but a lot of our due diligence is looking into the borrower's eyes, touching the collateral, and sensing what this is all about."

That's true, Calvano says. But equally true and faithful to his corporate training and Chimento's finance background is that the numbers have to make sense. "It has to be the whole package: right person, right ethics and scruples, right comps, and right prospect for growth for our investors," Calvano says.