Judging from the current state of the economy now may not seem like the ideal time to start a new business.

But for Bill Bartmann, a serial entrepreneur who has had his fair share of scandal, nothing could be further from the truth. Sure there are risks to starting a new business, even during a healthy economy, but Bartmann said opportunities abound if you are willing to ignore the headlines that scream doom and gloom.

“When everyone is running to the exits the people that stand tall and firm almost always end up making a fortune,” said Bartmann. “If you’re not yet in a business this is the absolute prime time to get in.”

Bartmann is a 59-year-old self-made billionaire who started now defunct debt-collection company Commercial Financial Services with a $13,000 loan. The company grew to be a $3.5 billion company with 3,900 employees but imploded in 1998, after a former business partner committed fraud. Bartmann, who was indicted on 57 counts, was acquitted. Six-and-a-half years after the company’s bankruptcy, the Federal Bankruptcy Trustee issued its report, which publicly acknowledged Commercial Financial Services wasn’t a fraud.

Bartmann said there are a number of opportunities that could put a start-up in a good position to succeed and all it takes is monopolizing on the downdraft of the economy.

“If you are prepared, it puts you in a position to win and win really big,’’ said Bartmann. 

The number one opportunity for those thinking of starting a business is the ability to fund the new operation, he said. Conventional wisdom would say there’s no funding available for potentially risky businesses, but Bartmann said the opposite is true.

“Intuitively, in a downdraft credit becomes tighter, but it doesn’t evaporate,” he said. That’s because companies are in the business of lending money and if they don’t lend then they will go out of business, he said.

While you may not be able to stride into a bank and walk out with a bag full of money, Bartmann said if you are prepared with a solid business plan, the opportunity to get cash is there.

“It’s almost a buyer's market with the buyer being the borrower,’’ said Bartmann. “You now have the opportunity to get credit with lower interest rates.”

According to Bartmann, while you will need to be prepared when making your case to a financial institution, that doesn’t mean you need to come armed with a voluminous business plan that will likely never be read. He said to come with a set of loan-proposal documents that include your business and marketing plans and includes a fair amount of history about you and your relationship with the kind of business you want to start.

It should be a “thin document. It doesn’t need to be War and Peace or weigh five pounds,’’ he said.  “You’re trying to get to the second date, you’re not trying to get them to say 'yes' today.” Lenders need to have confidence in the likelihood that your business will survive, he said. 

Start-ups can also take advantage of company failures to get equipment and furnishing on the cheap. “All of the people that go out of business no longer need what you may use,’’ said Bartmann. “If you are in that industry, it’s a great time to buy needed and useful equipment to expand your business for 10 cents or 20 cents on the dollar.” Not to mention that marketing efforts will cost less now, given there are fewer companies to compete with.

Taking advantage of a failed business may seem opportunistic, but look at the deal JPMorgan Chase (JPM) got when it bought Bear Stearns (BSC) earlier in the week for a mere $236 million. People may say opportunities like that are unusual and only happen on Wall Street, but Bartmann said it’s happening on Main Street all across America.

“When one competitor sees another competitor suffering it’s a great opportunity to do a merger or acquisition,’’ said Bartmann.

In a slowing economy, when layoffs abound, start-ups also have the chance to hire talent that may not have been present previously. Those people, who would have likely stayed with there company indefinitely, are now available, which means you will have a healthy pool of potentially good employees to add to your roster.

“How powerful that could be for someone getting started to go and hire someone that has a wealth of experience and is looking for a job,” he said.  “You didn’t create the dilemma, your getting into a business advantage.”