“Wealth With Purpose: Sayam Ibrahim on Real Estate, Legacy & Empowering Communities of Color”

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Welcome to the CJ Moneyway Show podcast, the podcast show where we unlock potential one dream at a time. Today we have another guest whose journey is truly worth hearing. Sit back, relax, and enjoy the Moneyway experience.

What's up, my good people? Welcome to the CJ Moneyway Show in association with Believe Network, the podcast that brings you stories behind the success. Today we're diving into the world of real estate investing with someone who's not only making major moves, but is also committed to uplifting communities of color through health-building opportunity. He's a trailblazer in real estate and investor with a mission and a mentor to many. Sayam, welcome to the show, brother.

Thank you, brother. I appreciate you having me on.

Nah, man, I thank you for taking the time out your day, man, to come on today, man. So, Sayam, man, let's kick it off by getting to know more about your journey. Tell us about your background and how you got started in real estate, and what pursued you, you know, saying, into this field?

Yeah, brother, man, so look, I'm— me and my younger brothers are the sons of two immigrant parents. Mother's from Dominican Republic, and my father's from Ethiopia. They both came to this beautiful country with nothing in their pockets, right?

And they—

but they came with hard work. So they came to New York City, where we lived in a one-bedroom apartment, all five of us, me, my two younger brothers, and both my parents. Parents slept in the living room and me and my brother slept in the bedroom. So I didn't come with a silver spoon in my mouth, right? And they worked really hard. My dad was a taxi driver for 21 years. My mother, you know, did hair and did babysitting and helped raise us. They just really instilled hard work ethic in us. When my friends were out there having a good time, they made me read a book, right? I hated them at the time for it, but now I realize it was all worth it, right? And, you know, I went, graduated high school, got a scholarship to go to college, went to Georgetown University on a scholarship. And, you know, that scholarship changed my life. I became a Jackie Robinson scholar, so they really pioneered and helped me to become the man that I am today by making introductions, which ended up helping me get my first job, which was on Wall Street. So did that for a little bit, and I absolutely hated it. I was working from 5:00 AM to 11:00 PM, Monday through Saturday, right? And, you know, realized that quickly that wasn't for me. So when I quit my job cold turkey on Wall Street because of an incident that happened where they wanted me to reschedule my wedding when I wanted to get married, I didn't know what I wanted to do next. Went and started selling cars, flipping motorcycles, and then I eventually landed on Wall Street because my younger brother, who's my business partner, found a house in Newark, New Jersey, right? A beat-up, it was a beat-up house on a nice block. He's like, yo, we gotta buy this thing. We ain't have no money. We know how to do it. We knew that we wanted to do it and we thought it would be a good investment. So we went, we bought $1,000 here, $1,000 there, $2,000, got a title loan on our car. We went all in, my brother, right? And we were like, this gotta work. Either it works or we flop. It worked. We made $60 grand on our first house, and the rest is history, man. We've done over 1,400 real estate deals in the past 15 years and built a pretty nice real estate portfolio, over 600 doors today.

Oh man, I would say moms and dads having you read a book when you didn't want to, it really paid off.

Yes, yes, yes.

That's awesome, man. That's awesome. You know, what an amazing story, you know, what we say, from rags to riches, you know what I'm saying? Like you say, a 5 in a 1 bed, you know, 2 bedroom home, you know what I'm saying? Or whatever, man. You know, that's just an inspiring story, man. So Sam, man, was there a specific moment or the experience besides, you know, you saying you walked away from Wall Street, which is a big step I take. So let's just go here, man. You've completed an impressive number of real estate transactions. What's your approach that sets you apart from other investors?

Yeah, so we've kind of fell into this approach because of a necessity. We did a couple deals that didn't go according to plan. I'm not going to say that every deal was a success, right? There were deals we lost money on clearly on the road to 1,400 deals. But one of the things I think that's a big reason for our success today is that every deal we look at, it needs to work with multiple exit strategies. I never go and buy a house and say the only way I'm going to make money in this house is if I flip it or if I sell it, right? Because if you do that and the market doesn't go your way, something happens where you need to pivot and make a change, you're automatically taking a loss and that can end your journey before you even get started for some new investors, right? So every deal that I look at needs to be a flip but also work for a rental. So if I want to flip, make $25,000, $30,000, $40,000, that's great. But if you know what, I need to pivot and keep it for 3, 4, 5 years, the market changes or catches up, I can rent it, make $300, $400, $500 a month in this house, And I don't— I'm not taking an L on it every single month. So when we go into a deal, we analyze it and make sure it works either way. So regardless, I'm happy, I'm protected, and we don't lose any money.

Mm, that's a smart approach to go, man. Hey, keep on dropping them nuggets on us, man.

Keep dropping them nuggets.

So, Sayed, man, I'd love for you to share some of the strategies or philosophies that has helped you achieve success in such a competitive field.

Yeah, man. So one of the things I think that we do really well is, or that has helped us, you know, have success, is that we don't really focus that much on on-market deals, right? So a lot of new investors, when they want to jump into real estate, what they do is they call a realtor and they say, "Hey, Mr. Realtor, can you find me a good deal?" And yeah, you can slide through a good deal every once in a while, but the problem with that is that it's too competitive when you focus on the market. Everybody, right? Everyone and their mama is looking for deals on the market. So you're making 10, 20, 30, 40 deals and just like pounding your head, you know, pounding your head against the wall and you start getting frustrated. So what we do is we like to go directly to owners before anyone even finds out about it. We do marketing, we lock in deals, and we have a third or even sometimes even less than of competition because there's no one else that's playing in that field.

So let me ask you before we move on, man. So what's the name of your company, man?

Yeah, so I have a few companies, but Hero Homes is like the basis of all the names. We got Hero Homes University, you know, Hero Homes General Partner, Hero Homes, JB Williams. So Hero Homes is the main name of our company.

Okay. Now I've seen you when Sam sent me the, you know, your bio and everything, man. So I went on your Instagram channel, you know what I'm saying? And I was impressed, man. Can you tell us where can the listeners find you on Instagram and your other social media channels?

Yeah, man. So I'm on Instagram is I am, I am dot Sayam, S-A-Y-A-M. And I recently started a YouTube page. It's called Siam Ibrahim the Professor, so Professor Siam Ibrahim. So check me out on YouTube. I'm posting stuff daily. But what I really want to do is I recently started a community of investors, right? It's a community where we're going to teach you how to do fix and flips, how to do rentals, how to raise money, how to do the BRRRR strategy, how to wholesale real estate. And to get access to that community, all you got to do is text wealth to 689-215-7664. We'll get you access to the community. You're getting— you're going to get access to our lenders. You're going to get— you're going to get all the curriculum. You're going to network with other like-minded individuals and do deals together. Um, and you get access to our challenge where it's a week intensive just getting thrown all this information. You get deals of the week. We can actually take all the information and close your first deal.

Now let me ask you, man, you know, you say we'll get access to your lenders and everything. So is this worldwide or just particularly where you're located at?

So it's all over the US, but we have people in Canada, we got people in Mexico in the group, and they're doing deals in the US. But my strategies are primarily US-based, but it really could work anywhere in the world.

Okay, man, that's good information, good information. So, say, uh, man, you've made it a point to empower African Americans and Latino entrepreneurs to take control of their financial futures through real estate, which is one of the things you were just talking about. Why is that a mission so close to your heart?

Yeah, man, look, I told you I'm half Dominican, half Ethiopian, right? So I got the best of both worlds, you know what I'm saying? It's a shame because a lot of us, a lot of our community, they don't believe that they can own real estate. They don't believe they can be real estate investors. There's all these misconceptions out there that you need a lot of money to do it, that you need to have perfect credit to do it, that you need all these things, you know, blah, blah, blah, to be able to jump into real estate, and that real estate's only for rich people. And I'm here to show them that that's cap. Right, just get in the game, buy your first deal. Your first deal could be the house that you live in, right? You want to buy your first house that you want to live in? Just by owning real estate, right? I read a stat that by owning real estate, you are multiples more, you earn multiples more over your lifespan being a real estate owner than being a renter, right? By owning real estate, you build wealth through appreciation. By owning real estate, you get to save on taxes. I'm literally selling rental properties today for 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, even 10 times more than what I paid for it 5, 6, 7 years ago, and all I did is just own it and hold it, right? Inflation's not going anywhere, and real estate works really well with inflation. So I think that our community needs to go in, get in the game, buy their first, buy their second real estate property, right? And you don't need to have all these things I told you. You don't need perfect credit and a lot of cash to do it, and I'm here to show them how so we can have a huge transfer of wealth to our community. All right, that's not— it's not only for others, it's for us too, man.

I like that. I like it, man. You making me excited. I'm definitely gonna check out this community, man. You know, I'm hoping the audience is excited, man, because that is— that's the thing, you know. I've had a few people, real estate, you know, saying people on here and everything, and, and— but not many had that mission like you have as far as trying to transfer wealth into the African-American and Latino communities, man, where, you know, where we can see some of the stuff and start building up our community. And it's time to quit talking about it and start doing it. We say it all the time, "Oh, well, we need to do this," but yet still, we still going out here spending money. We still going out here while our community is dying. I'm from one of them communities like that, Gary, Indiana, so I've seen it, and I want to do something about it. Hopefully one day I will be able to make a difference, man. I'm going to read your playbook, Sam, man. I'm going to read the playbook, brother.

Thank you, brother. Look, a lot of people, they think they don't have the money to invest themselves, to invest in their education, right? But our community, I try to make it affordable. When you go in and you text Wealth to 689-215-7664, you'll see that, right? It's $97 a month, right? Very affordable. If you think you don't have $97 a month, you know, people have $97 a month to go out to eat with their friends. There's no return on investment on that. They got $97 a month to go buy a new bag. Buy new shades, buy new kicks, take that money, invest in yourself so it produces dividends. You can take that $97, it could be your next $25,000, $30,000 deal that you close from the information I'm giving you.

Mm, yeah, I like that. Like you say, we spend, you know what I'm saying, we spend money all the time. Just like you go to the bank and you pull out $100, you make like 3 or 4 stops before you get home, you probably got like $30 left in your pocket. Like, man, I only went to the dollar store and Myers or something like that. So, man, we spend money. A lot, man. But like you say, and I'm a big believer in that too, and I'm getting my mindset more set on certain things too, man, you know what I'm saying? The more— because even doing a podcast and things like that, you have to invest in yourself, you know, you have to invest and believe in yourself. And so some of the money that I spend doing what I'm doing, I don't mind it because I would have spent it doing something else anyway, you know.

So I really get what you're saying on that level.

Siam, man, tell me, man, can you share a story of someone you've helped along the way and had an impact on them?

Yeah, absolutely, man. I got students. So for the past years, I've helped thousands of people learn the real estate game. I've helped people firsthand close the one deal, two deals. Some of them I know that have closed, you know, 50 deals over the last 5, 6 years. Alright, so I got stories for days, but I'll give you a couple examples. So Ramon was one of my mentees. He is one of my mentees still. You know, he wanted to get in real estate for years. He'd been trying to get in for 5, 6 years and had been struggling. And over the span of 2, 3 months of working with me firsthand very closely, he was able to close 2 deals with over $75,000 in profit. He was able to get off-market real estate because he targeted off-market real estate. He had those same struggles I was telling you before where he was focused on deals in the market where he kept beating his head against the wall and getting outbid by other people. So once we taught him these strategies on how to get deals off-market, he closed 2 deals. With over $75,000 in profit. Lawrence, right, Lawrence Joseph, he's out of Phoenix, Arizona, all right. He had dabbled in the wholesaling real estate game. I'm not sure if you heard that term before. It's when you can flip real estate contracts and then just be buying real estate. He had dabbled in that space for a while but never actually bought real estate himself. And so within, I met him last year, October, so it's just over a year that we've known each other now, and he's closed 4 deals in the first year of work with me. He's about to close his first hotel, I think by the end of this month. Right? He stepped it up real quick. Wow. So you know, it's— if you take this information, I give you real life strategies that we do in our business all day, every day, twice on Sunday. All you have to do is take it, implement it, and you'll see the same results because the information is all on me. But the action taking implementation is on you.

So let me ask you, man, before I ask you another question, because I know we talked about the community. You know, you talked about the two guys, you know, two of your mentees that have been off doing things. So with what you do, is everything coming from you? Like, do you give, you know, saying like, are you there to give people firsthand knowledge or do we have to read it? You know, saying online or how they come?

Yeah, absolutely. So I have four courses, four curriculums that are out that are fully recorded, hours and hours of content. We do live Zoom calls where I do Q&A and answer your questions, either myself My younger brothers, Emil and Xavier, or Jonah, who's our business partner from another mother, right? Brother from another mother. We're the ones that are actually on the Zooms giving you real-life strategies and answering your questions firsthand. And these are my business partners. So if you want, if you're having questions on property management, Jonah is the one who handles the property management in our business. He's giving you how we do our property management. If you're having questions about acquisitions and finding new deals, Xavier is the one that's found all 1,000+ deals that we purchased over the years. So he's telling you how we did it, right? So you know how we still do it. If you're looking about managing contractors, renovations, Emil is the one that— my youngest brother is the one that's telling you that because that's his role in our business. And if you're looking to raise money, structure, structure the deals, creative financing, that's my wheelhouse all day long. So I'm giving you those direct responses.

Okay, man, thanks for that information, man. Really appreciate it. Now let me ask you, say, I mean, a lot of people talk about real estate as the ultimate path to financial freedom. Why do you believe that's true? And how has it shaped your approach to investing?

Yeah, man, look, you know, I told you I went to Wall Street after college, right? I was in the Wall Street business. I was in the stock business. I was a trader on Wall Street. And I don't touch stocks today. All right, that's ironic because I don't touch stocks today. I am all in invested in real estate. Now you might say, you know, you should diversify your portfolio, but I do. I diversify locations. I diversify types of real estate from commercial buildings to houses to land, I'm in all these hotels, I'm in different kinds of real estate in different locations, so I'm diversified. But I believe in real estate because it's a real asset, right? It's real. Stocks, crypto, all people talking about that, you can't see it. It's too volatile, they fluctuate. One day you feel like you're on top of the world, and next day I literally know people that are crying because they lost everything that they thought they made over the past 10 years in just one day, right? Real estate's not like that. Real estate's real. It's not going anywhere. There's literally wars today going on around the world, and you know, on the other on the other side of the world right now over real estate, right? So I believe everyone needs to own their little piece of this big world and secure your financial future. By owning real estate, you will build wealth. I can almost guarantee you that if you own a piece of real estate now, in 20 years from now, that piece of real estate's gonna be worth more, and a lot more at that. If you take real estate 10, 15, 20, 30 years ago, it's worth significantly more today. So just by getting in, buying real estate, owning it, holding it, you start building wealth over time. Not to mention all the tax benefits you get. So the more real estate you own, you think the more tax you gotta pay, but actually the least tax you pay, 'cause you have something called depreciation that you can use to offset your tax liability. So you get to appreciate, you get cash flow from owning rentals, and you get depreciation. So it's that trifecta, baby. It's the best way to build wealth out of any strategy out there, hands down.

I like what you said, man, because, you know, like, let me ask you this. What's the age limit, or, you know, saying, what age could a person really start thinking about doing this? Because I got a 14-year-old, right? A few months ago or so, he told his mother, you know how you ask your kid, what do you want to do? And so he said, you know, I want to do real estate. So she was like, well, you know, that's a lot of reading and stuff like that. And so one day, me and her was talking, you know, something about what you just said, because we buying our house or whatever. We got mortgage. And so we was thinking one day, like she was saying, like maybe we should move, get us another house and let this be his first, you know what I'm saying, property, if that's what he really want to do. And I was telling her, and I just told her this probably during the new, you know, New Year's Eve or right before New Year's, or something that you just said, man, just made me think about it, was if he wants to do it, you know what I'm saying, and he may need somebody to push him, maybe all three of us should get into it and learn how to do it. You know what I'm saying? And it will push him even more.

100% agree on that, man. Now is always the best time to buy real estate. NOW, that stands for no opportunity wasted, right? So don't waste this opportunity for your son. Don't let your son waste this opportunity. If he wants to buy real estate now, he's getting started earlier. And I wish I started earlier, right, buying and holding, because I started flipping at first. And the things I flipped 12 years ago, 13 years ago, are worth 3, 4, 5 times more today. So I wish I held some of those. So I think that that's a great approach. If he needs to get his money up, right, or get his money, his cash, right, I'd suggest that your son starts with wholesaling real estate to kind of flip some contracts and build some wealth that way, and then use that to put down payments to buy real estate. But, you know, but I definitely think that if you guys are there to support him and, you know, co-sign with him and help him on his journey, man, I can only imagine where he'll be in 10 years, right, when he's only 24, 25 years old. Right, already owning a few pieces of real estate, he'll be way further than all his peers.

Yeah, man, I thank you for that advice, man. You know, I'm just like the audience, you know, sometimes I have people on, hey, I'm sucking up information too, you know what I'm saying? I want to know the knowledge. And by you talking, man, and things that you saying, you know, I'm gonna go back and talk to my wife again. I think that's something that we're really going to focus on.

Get him in the club, man. Get him in the real estate club. It's the Wealth Wednesdays Real Estate Club. I'm getting him on. I know for a fact we can help him get into whether it's wholesaling, you know, fix and flip and buying rentals. Well, he'll learn all the strategies and pick which one he wants to attack first.

All right, man, I'm gonna look into that, man. Because you know what, kids though, man, they so, you know what I'm saying, the attention span, you know, that's why I was telling her maybe we all should get in and learn the tricks of the trade. And you know, because, you know, at my age and the things that I'm doing, I'm trying to think beyond where I'm at too. You know what I'm saying, as far as generating wealth and things of that nature. So I'm gonna take you up on that, man. So let me actually say, all right, man, 'cause you know, I'm about, I only got a few more questions for you. There's often a focus on passive income in real estate. What's your perspective on it and how do you make it work in practice?

Yeah, so that's a great question. So passive income, so essentially passive income is owning rental properties, right, and getting rental income. I love it, right? I just told you I got a passive income portfolio of 600 properties, right? And I think it's great because when you buy, renovate, and you resell something, that's active. You're in there managing contractors, you're in there doing the renovations, you're in there, you know, trying to make it sell, and you're waiting for some third party to say, "I like it," to buy it. And it works. I mean, it does work. You make a lot of money. But when you are doing passive income, You get paid each and every single month, although it's little drips. You're getting paid while you're doing something else. I love when I'm out with my family and I just check the bank, I'm like, oh, I got an $800 rent deposit, right? Nice, right? Or another one, I got a $1,000 rent deposit. So you're not actively working for that money, and that's the best way to be wealthy, because the definition of being wealthy is having more money coming in than you need to spend to survive., right? And passive income is what allows you to do that. So I believe everyone should start building their passive income portfolio sooner than later. So you can have, so you can live your best life and spend more time with your loved ones doing things that you like, as opposed to actively trying to make money to survive the next day.

I like that, man. It's this guy, he's from Detroit, Don Barton. He was the first Black guy to own a casino. Wow. And yeah, he owned the Majestic Star here in Gary. It was right beside Trump, 'cause we opened them both up in 1996. And he made a statement. He said, I make money in my sleep.

Yes.

I thought about that when you said, hey, I'm out with my family and I look at my account, oh, $800 here, $1,000 here, you know. So I'm making money in my sleep, you know. That's the way to go right there.

That's the best way to make money, man. That's the best way to make money.

Yeah, I feel you, man. Instead of being out here on the grind, helping somebody else make money while they sleeping. Try to get you something where you can make money while you sleeping. Hey, I like that, man.

Your 9 to 5, no matter what your salary is, if you're getting paid great money, or you feel like you just— are you struggling to get by? Your 9 to 5 is not there to make you rich. It's there to make your boss rich. It's there to make your company rich, right? Invest in something that's for you and your family to get rich. And real estate's the best, the only vehicle that I know of in 2025 to do that predictably and safely.

Mm, I like that, man. I like that. Hey, man, I love the nuggets that you bring. I knew you was that type of person because I said I went on your page and checked you out, man. I see, you know what I'm saying, how energetic you are. And, you know, you talk with confidence, you know what I'm saying, because you like, hey, I've done it, I'm doing it, I'm trying to tell you. And, you know, and what I like about it the most, man, and this is what I tell some of my guests, is that what I like about you guys are— it's not all about you. You know, like, you got yours, you're doing your thing, you know, you got 600 companies in your portfolio, you got a hotel in the DR. I know we ain't talked about that, I was gonna leave that on another note. But how you, you know, say, how you guys come back and want to help others, man? How you want to see other people succeed? And I think that's the biggest thing, you know what I'm saying? Because I can take it all for myself and do what I'm doing and don't care about nobody else. But I appreciate you guys, man, and you today especially for sharing this wealth of knowledge and telling us and showing us how we can go get this and do some of the things that you doing. May not be on the scale that you doing it at because you've been doing it for a long time, but for us to get on the path where we can begin building something for ourselves, man.

Absolutely, brother, man. That actually, there's nothing brings me more pleasure and more fulfillment than seeing one of my mentees or seeing somebody else that I showed how to do this actually do it and get success out of it. I can go buy another house tomorrow. That doesn't get me excited. I've done it so many times, right? It's just repeating my business. When I see someone that I showed from the beginning how to do this and I see they closing their first, their second, their third deal, I'm like, yeah, that's right. They listen. I love it. They doing it. They killing it. That brings the most fulfillment out of anything that could possibly happen in this world, guys.

Man, and I like what y'all do, man. So keep the name Jeremiah Johnson on your lips, man, because when he closed his first one from the things that you had taught him, man. Hey, I'll be like, hey man, I say, hey, hey, you listen to him, boy. We all listen to him now. We all got some property. Hey, I like that. I'm telling you, man, I'm on it. I'm on it for real, for real. So just let me ask you one more question, uh, say, all right man, I'm gonna let you go because like we said, like I said, I know you just came back, got off the plane, man, from one of your hotels out there, the DR, man. Congratulations on that too. That's a big, that's a big thing, man.

That's a big thing.

Yeah, that ain't no small feat when you got a hotel in a whole nother country that you running, you know what I'm saying? I, I could just imagine how cool that is. Um, talk to us about your evolution in this space, man. How did you go from being an aspiring entrepreneur with big dreams to becoming a seasoned investor with a proven track record?

Yeah, no, it didn't always happen that way. So in the beginning, I started off by you know, doing fix and flips. As I told you, my first deal, I bought it, renovated, sold it, made a nice little profit. We started off doing fix and flips, and then we started off adding wholesaling to build some more cash flow, because sometimes you wait 6, 7, 8 months to get that flip done, your bills still come between, right? They don't wait 6, 7, 8 months. So we did wholesaling to get some more consistent cash flow. But then, you know, we kind of came to a roadblock. We wanted to expand, and we didn't know what to do or what to do next to get to the next level. So I went out and got coaching and mentoring And that really changed everything because I was focusing on on-market deals. I was only calling realtors to find deals. I was going to auctions. So I was doing all those things I was telling you about where I felt like I was hitting my head against the wall. I was making so many offers to get a deal. When I got that coaching, when I got that mentoring, when I followed someone that was taking the steps that I wanted to go in, right, it changed everything. I learned how to find off-market deals. I learned how to evaluate deals. I learned how to do marketing towards sales. I learned how to raise money. To do deals and really didn't have to be use my money or use my credit or going, you know, so it really changed everything and that allowed me to scale and realize that any deal you want to do, there's more money out there than you ever need to do it, right? That's why if anyone wants to do anything, whether it's crypto, stocks, real estate, or whatever, start a business, buy a business, right? Find a mentor that's taking the steps that you want to take, all right, that's doing what you want to do, learn from them, copy them, and you'll see similar results. But if you're going to hire a mentor, make sure they're verified and they're actually doing the business. But there's too many of these, these, you know, fake gurus out there that ain't really doing the business.

Hey, hey man, I like the point what you said because I've heard this before and I know a lot of celebrities do this. I used to hear with Michael Jordan when they say he'll go out to the restaurant, you know, we know how much money Michael Jordan got, but when he go to restaurants and stuff, they don't have to pay, you know, like the restaurant is like, oh, it's on us. And so I like the point where you made, you say, hey man, use other people's money.

You know what I'm saying?

Hey, that's the best way to go. I had this tax lady, a tax repair lady, that's what she told me how she built her credit up. She said it's always good to be able to use other people's money.

Yes, OPM, baby. Other people's money is the best way to do any investment or real estate or whatever you want to do because you only have so much, right? Especially when you start out, you only have so much. So if you really want to scale, take things to the next level, you have to learn how to raise money and use other people's money to make money.

Hey, y'all heard that right here, man. Learn how to use other people's money to make money. So that's my final question for you, Sam. Were there any moments in your career that felt like a turning point?

Meaning there was a struggle and I went through that struggle?

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so I had this one situation. So, you know, you spend all this time trying to grow, scale your business to the next level, and things are going really well, but you never know what's gonna happen that's gonna kind of like take your feet out from underneath you, right? And so we were so focused on building our rental portfolio, and, you know, we said, you know what, managing rentals, when you have so many rentals, takes a lot of time, right? It's a lot of work. I'm not gonna lie, real estate's work, right? It's just like anything you wanna do. So we went out and we hired a third-party property manager in thinking that the property manager is a professional at this, they're going to manage my rental properties, they're going to do a great job. And I learned very quickly that that was not the case. They literally robbed me blind. So I gave them a rental portfolio that was fully occupied, 96% occupied, they gave it back to me at half occupied. I gave them a rental portfolio that had very little delinquency and late rent, they gave it back to me with a whole lot more delinquency. They didn't pay me rent for months. It literally derailed my entire business very, very fast in a period of a few months. So, you know, I thought I verified them, I didn't do it well enough. So my learning experience from this was, you know, if you're gonna go out, you're gonna hire a third-party property manager, or you're gonna bring on a contractor to work your business, or you're gonna hire anyone to work in your business, period, right? Do it in stages. I should have given them 20 properties to manage and said, they do a good job, okay, I'm gonna give them 40, I'm gonna give them 60, but I gave them 500, right? Mm-hmm. Manage in one shot. And when you got mortgages of over $200,000 a month that you gotta pay, but you ain't getting any rent for months, right? Because they taking all the rent, it's only a matter of time before things start to crumble, right? And luckily, by owning real estate, you build equity. I was able to sell property, to get out of this stuff, to get money back, to be able to bring things back to current. But it was for a very period of time, it was very stressful and not knowing what was gonna happen with the whole business, thinking the whole business was gonna collapse. So yeah, man, it's never peaches and cream, it's never all gravy when you're trying to build a business. There's always obstacles that come up, but if you know where you wanna go, if you know what your ultimate goal is and you push hard enough, you will make it there. Guys, the universe just works that way. You just got to put the hard work in, and by owning real estate, you start building wealth so you have the extra equity and cash to withstand any of those storms that come along the way. So that was probably my biggest obstacle when growing my whole real estate business. Luckily, I've been able to weather the storm, and we're much better for it now.

Yeah, I mean, you say $200,000 a month, so you go 5 months or so, that's $1 million. You know what I'm saying? Exactly.

I was 2 months. I was 2 months.

Oh, $2 million then. I mean, I know math.

I can count.

Hey, so, Salam Aleikum, man. Before we get out of here, is there any last piece of advice or anything, man, that you would like to share?

Yeah, man, look, guys, I invite all of you guys to come be a member of our club, right? It's the Wealth Wednesdays Real Estate Club. Text Wealth to 689-215-7664, right, to get in the club. In this club, you're going to be part of a community that's gonna support you, right? I heard a quote that if you wanna go fast, go by yourself, but if you wanna go far, go in a group, go together, all right? So let's all work together, support each other as we all achieve our goals in life and in real estate specifically. We're gonna teach you guys the curriculum, how to do fix and flips, how to do wholesale deals, how to build a rental portfolio using the BRRRR strategy, how to raise money, all right? We're gonna— our lenders, our network becomes your network. We share our network, we have accountability calls, All right, and you have Q&A sessions where you can ask all your real estate questions, but you got to get in the club. Take the actions today so that your future self will thank you, and I can guarantee you won't regret making this decision and investing in yourself.

Mm, you heard it right here on the CJ Moneyway Show. You won't regret it if you invest in yourself. Sam, man, hey, this has been a powerful conversation filled with insight and inspiration. Before we close, thank you for the advice that you gave, man. You know, invest in yourself and everything, man. And so to my audience. Thank you for tuning in to the CJ Moneyway Show, and thank you, Sam, man, for sharing your story, man. For those who want to learn more about Sam and his work, we'll have the links in the show notes. Hey, start your future today. Don't hesitate. Me, my wife, and my little son gonna get together sometime this weekend, and we gonna talk about this thing, man. For real, for real. You have been listening to the CJ Moneyway Show with your boy CJ Moneyway. Until the next time, we outta here. Peace.

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