Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies

Anne-Lyse Wealth: This is the Dreamers Podcast, episode 1 0 4. Today is January 10th 2023.

Yamundow Camara: I did not reinvent the wheel or anything. I just repeat what people are doing. So. 2019. I got a job with the CDC and I'm already in Georgia. I got a job with CDC and three months into the job. I was like, I think it's time now.

I have saved 10,000. Like I've never heard that kind of money. I'm so excited. So in all my research, I always hear people say, oh, contact the local banks contact, like credit unions, your local banks and all that. Right. So I did exactly that. So me being in, Illinois, I was. Because that's the only state I know, cause I've just moved to Georgia then.

So it was like, okay, I cannot afford houses in Georgia. Let me go back and look at where I used to live and close by there. So I kept going every city by. Where I lived was higher. I kept going, going all the way to the little cities, right. The smaller cities. And then I was like, okay, I think I can afford this area.

So I did call the banks. and I tell them, I wanna invest in real estate. What do I need to do? Some of them are like, first of all, your papers are not, all there, even though you are allowed to work with your O P T whatever. And some of them would tell me your credit score.

So it's a bunch of reasons and I got rejected. But there was just one bank that was there to listen to me. And they were like, you know what, if you really wanna do it, these are the things you don't qualify, but these are the things that you can do.

Anne-Lyse Wealth: Hello, welcome to the Dreamers podcast. I'm your host Ann Lees Wealth, and I'm very, very thankful that you've decided to listen to this episode of the podcast. First of all, happy New Year. I guess it's still the beginning of the year, so as far as I know, we are supposed to say Happy New Year all the way until the end of January.

So happy new Year. Thank you for joining me, for today's episode. This episode will focus on secrets from first generation real estate millionaire investors. The people here that will be involved in this episode have started investing in real estate with less than $15,000, and they are sharing amazing gems on how you can do it too.

So let's hear from ya. Muno Camara, Steven Stack, aia Blair, Erica Brown, who all became millionaires from real estate. No more than 10 years. Some did it in a couple years. Others did it in, around 10 years. But out of all these people, the most amount of time that he's taking them to become millionaires was 10 years.

So as you plan out your 2023, take close attention to these gems that they are dropping. All right. Here it.

Yamundow Camara: I started investing in 2020, during COVID. I always knew I wanted to invest in real estate. From childhood. I already knew and I've been inspired I kept reading about it. When I came here, there was so many resources. I'm a read. I like reading. I was loner the whole time. So back home, I would go to any library nearby school library and just take books and read them just because I wanna read, not just, just to escape, but it's not like I wanna read them for fun.

So I would read books and I I'll come across a different books about wealth and stuff and I'll read them. But when I came, I already had a bunch of knowledge about stuff that I didn't even need because I just randomly. Stuff. Butwhen I was looking for a job, I knew that eventually when I got a job, I'm gonna start investing.

Right. So what I did also was put myself in places where I can access resources, free networking events, free YouTube, like YouTube university, go and just put real estate. You see a lot of people talking about what they do, how they achieved. So I've met, a lot of people through.

Networking events that are free and I'll just go there. Talk to a bunch of people. I'll go on YouTube and check bigger pocket podcasts, join those and listen to people, listen to different people. So I already have been doing my research before I even started investing. So before I even got a job.

So what I did was read this books that people are suggesting. So I did not reinvent the wheel or anything. I just repeat what people are doing. So. 2019. I got a job with the CDC and I'm already in Georgia. I got a job with CDC and three months into the job. I was like, I think it's time now.

I didn't know what that was my scholarship at the university was a work scholarship. So I do data analysis for the university and they waive my tuition fee and they gimme a thousand dollars stipend. So with the stipend I pay my, room fees and all the little things and insurance and all that.

So I'm left with like a hundred dollars, go to Walmart, buy grocers. That's it repeat for the whole two years. So I never knew anything about credit cards or how important it is to someone here in the us, especially. So I didn't have, they were like, okay, so the bank, so I guess they go get a credit card capital one, at least get.

You walk for CDC. Now go join the credit union and build your credit. Maybe get a secure card. I didn't even get a credit card. When I applied for CDC, they, they asked me to do a secure credit card, put 300. and then pay off, use it and paid off until six months. So I did all of that, that the banks against it, I was like, you know what?

I can't wait this long. I went ahead and did it. So I called them back and I say, I did everything you guys say, but I can't wait. So what I did was I went and looked for proper, I didn't stop. I didn't let that discourage me. I kept looking for. Properties. And I just analyzed them just for fun, just analyze analyzed.

So I saw this property that was like 52 was a triple plus 52,000. The seller was going through a divorce and they wanted to sell they're desperate to sell and it needed work. But I didn't know that at the beginning, they told me on paper that it's gonna cash flow $2,000. Cause the rent I saw. And so, and so they gave me the rent roll.

They gave me everything. So I was like, Presented to the bank. I was like, these are the numbers. And I have 10,000 safety of right now, no matter what I could put 8,000 down closing. Cause on everything. 10 grand. I think this will work. They were like, okay, send all the document. They were like, okay, we'll call you back.

And then they were like, they call me back and say, okay, we'll take a chance on you. And they did. And the rest is sister. So that's how I started. I later found out so many issues were wrong with the house, but I ended up going through, it taught me everything that I mostly 90% of the things that, could be wrong in a.

property, but me going through that process, I learned a lot and it's brought me to where I am right now. Now the property costs flow close to 2000 a month, every month. And it's on section eight. And place for higher . do you

Anne-Lyse Wealth: mind sharing which, bank you ended up going

Yamundow Camara: with for that first part?

Yeah, yes. It's called Illinois national bank. It's in.

Anne-Lyse Wealth: so how many banks or credit unions did you have to call and go to, to be able to get that, one person or

Yamundow Camara: one bank to take? I, think I did made a list of all the banks in Illinois. I think I Googled all banks there, all local banks.

And you called I, I think I went all through all of those banks. Yep. I.

Anne-Lyse Wealth: I think this is important, right? Because a lot of times people would, well try. They're gonna try a few, they're gonna hear a few nos and then they're just gonna be done. Right. And what happened here is that you just kept going until finally you got one bank, that's all you needed.

You just needed at one bank to take a chance on you. And here we are two years later. I don't even know how many doors you have, right. 29 plus doors. you said something earlier, too. I think it's important that we touch on it.

cuz it's a very part of, the immigrant experience. You said that you needed to make more money because people rely. whatever your income was, if you had to send however much, every. then you wouldn't have much to save or invest in your future. for anyone listening, who might be in the situation where, you know, they're helping take care of, some people they're sending money back home, I think the solution that you came up with is the best one.

You have to earn more, right? Find a way to increase your income, increase your cash flow so that you wouldn't. Help others and not be able to build wealth for yourself. I think that's very important. And you said that you were doing section eight For the most part okay, so what attracted you to, investing in and properties?

Do you turn them into section eight or are they already section eight work properties when you buy them?

Yamundow Camara: So when I buy them, they're not section eight. So the beginning that I wanted to show the bank that I guarantee money. So the banks wants to see that the money is guarantee, right? I'm not gonna be struggled cause it's out of state.

And this is my first time. For me to prove to them that, okay, I can really do this out of state. I was like, let me go with section eight. Right? Cause that's guaranteed money. So no matter what, at the end of the day, cause I open an account with them. They will see the money coming in every month. They will see the 2000 coming in and it's direct deposit and it's the first of the month the government never fails.

You. When it comes to paying you. Right? So that's why I went to section eight route, but also because it was during COVID, remember when I started it was during COVID. Right. And a lot of people were not paying rent, so it didn't make sense for me to find someone and they would sit, stay there and I would not be able to evict them.

So going to section eight route was great for me.

Anne-Lyse Wealth: That's brilliant. And you know, there's a lot of misconceptions about section eight, right? So, it's great to hear that you are doing it and that you're, basically highlighting the fact that it's guaranteed money, because again, during COVID a lot of people, didn't pay rent, right?

Yeah. So. the thing with section eight is that you do have that guaranteed income coming in. how about like troubles with the people who are renting your properties? Because I think there's also a misconception about that.

Yamundow Camara: I never have any issue, actually. It's not The stigma is saying, oh, the section eight tenants are bad. They're gonna destroy your. is the person it's not the program. Does that make sense? Yeah. cause when I give out a product, when I fix the house, I fix it. Like I could live in this house. I'm not fixing it thinking, oh, it's section eight, they're gonna trash it.

I put vinyl flooring. I do nice paint. I make sure other appliances are working. Everything is working, everything looks good. Like I will literally stay in my units right in my houses. if you fix a house, just because it's section eight, put the cheapest carpet cheapest. It is like, oh, it's section eight.

If you give somebody a trashy product, they will treat it as trash. But if you make it look good. And for me, when I'm looking for property, I look for properties that are desirable So I buy the worst house in the best neighborhood. So those people will be happy cuz they don't wanna lose that cuz their kids are going to that schools.

So once I, bring in, let's say a single mom that has four kids, right? That it been the age four or five. Cause I like to be in that range. Cause I know that no mother wants to put their child. in school and then take them out and move again to another school, right? So when you have a mom or a single or family that are younger, they stay longer.

And because of the school, the school district is good. They will stay and they will take care of place. And because a lot of landlords are not fixing their houses to meet that level. My competition is low. Cause when I fix a house, when I list a house, I literally get 200. applications because the difference between how I fix mine and the, my competitors is it's high.

So everyone's like asking me and when I list the property, I never take it down, even if it's occupied. So I want people cause I'm always fixing houses. So I want people to always inquire, say, oh, This one is booked, but I do have one is already taken, but I do have one devs coming up in two weeks.

So I get the application. I get attendance in, cause the section eight process takes a while. So by the time the house is done, they sometimes go by drive by to look at the house while my contractors are there. So that's how I do it.

Anne-Lyse Wealth: I've heard you on other podcasts, say that you are a debt free millionaire, I'm curious to hear now about your decision to be debt free, because if I'm expanding on what you're saying, then why not leverage debt to continue to build, your real estate portfolio.

Steven Stack: Right, you're really hitting the nail on the head of where I was at, Like my understanding was, oh man.

What if I have this much debt? I know I don't have that much money to be able to pay for this. So if this goes sideways, now I'm having the work to keep these properties up rolling. it was beyond what I could handle. Like it really would've meant that the investment would've had to work.

But the reality is it would have worked. But I was, it was already working exactly because it was already working. and, know, I've got a different relationship with even how I view debt. ultimately, I still, I look at debt as it, I understand that it is something that you do have to pay back. But there's bad debt of where you are going into debt for things that don't go up in value, that's really how I would define, quote unquote bad debt.

And some people, again, I've never said this publicly either, what I'm about to say, but some people say good debt and bad debt. I won't call it good debt. I call it strategic. because you do have to pay it back, like, cuz if, you're called on it and they say, Hey, we need you to pay it back, now you're in a spot where you have to pay it back.

But strategic debt says, I'm acquiring this debt. To get access to an asset that goes up in value and potentially generates income or cash flow that has a surplus beyond the debt payments I have to make. so yes, I am a debt. Millionaire, which includes even my home is paid off, which that was just a, a personal decision, to do that.

And I don't regret it. But here's the cool part about it. If I want to, I can always leverage against this thing. . Yeah. Literally at any point. Like it's, been paid off for years now. but it's not like I can't tap. The equity on the home, and for those who are wondering, it's called a home equity line of credit or a helo.

Like I could do that if I wanted to, have access to a, fairly high six figure amount to deploy strategically to build more assets.

Anne-Lyse Wealth: I really like the strategic debt versus good debt because it gives you a clear understanding that even though there is debt that is better than other kinds of debt, you still shouldn't leverage too much.

Correct. about it. I love that. since hitting the Millionaire Milestone, how has your life changed?

have you made any adjustment to your.

So in one sense, there were things that didn't change because, mean, the reality is if you were 800 grand or nine 50 and now you're at a million, it's like, okay. cool I'm at a million and now it's over and continuing to, you go. so in that sense, a little surreal, but, it's easier to make money, because you just have more of it. So the compounding effect of it, when the market is churning or, you've got all these different assets, you see how much easier it is to make it, another thing that's kind of just changed with life is I've got more ownership of my time and I'm mindful of it, of being in the spaces that I actually wanna be in versus, less of just kind of what I have to. even right we're doing this podcast, I wanna be here.

Steven Stack: I'm glad you feel . Right, right, right. I wanna be here. mean? So meeting with just good people. And having the space to be able to do that. So those would be kind of like the two big things is it's easier to make money, or make larger amounts because that compounding effect of wealth building and more ownership of my time.

we talked about. know, knowing that you have value within yourself and not having to spend money on things to feel valuable. But I would love to hear about the last thing that you sludged on.

Steven Stack: I'm glad you asked. So, when I actually met you at the conference I was wearing, the last thing that I had splurged on there was some Nike, shoes. That I had bought a pair of these kicks, back in 2019, and they're like my favorite shoes. So comfortable.

simple, stylish, classic field at white and black, which is kind of like my essence of me. I'm more of a, classic kind of guy with style, but I don't have to be like super flashy, you know what But you know, I'm put together, right? So. I bought these kicks again,

So I literally bought the same pair of 'em, that I'd had before, and it was kind of as a celebration because Right before going to that conference, I had done 200 days of exercise for the year, which was my goal to hit that. So I had just hit it the night before.

Um, and I had already bought the shoes they had shipped and I'm like, Man, I'm. Because they super comfortable and they look nice too. if I ain't have to get up, I would put 'em in the camera. .

Anne-Lyse Wealth: were you using your profits to invest in the next property? Tell me more

Attiyah Blair: about that. Yeah, I was super disciplined. So I only did one at a time. Cause that's all I could afford. I could Now. I actually have five rehabs going on right now. Cause I've really gotten good at using other people's money.

But all I could afford was one at a time. And then I saved all that money. And then I did it again. So literally I was rolling the money from one project to another. I was not at the mall. I was not at Louis Baton. I didn't go to start buying designer stuff. And this is important, right? Cause people wanna look rich and not be rich.

I didn't start buying designer things until until my net worth was at seven figures, you know, super, super disciplined and just rolling the cash from one project to another. And so

so when I was 23, that was back in 2007. I purchased my first rental property. I lived in there moved out. That was 2007. It wasn't until 2011 that I did my first flip that I'm talking about right now. So that was a four year, um, timeframe. I was still working in television, saving up my money. I left in 2011

Anne-Lyse Wealth: how long did it take you to save that first hundred

Attiyah Blair: grand? I didn't save the first hundred thousand dollars. I leverage other people's money. Mm. So that's one of the common misconceptions. and that's one of the things that keep people from getting started at all. or, waiting forever to get started, because you feel like you have to come up with all that money by yourself.

You can leverage business credit, and get anywhere even with a brand new LLC, anywhere between 40,000 and a hundred thousand dollars, to go ahead and get started for down payments, things like that. You can leverage hard money. Harm money lenders.

if you have good credit, a little bit of experience, they'll fund the whole thing a hundred percent. But on average, they're giving you, 75% of purchase and a hundred percent of construction.

There's so many. Ways to get the money. And this is what wealthy people do when these business owners are buying whatever companies. I don't care if it's Amazon, Netflix or something smaller, like, a mom and pop shop that you never heard of.

They're either raising capital. Or getting debt. I know debt's a dirty word, right? Certainly in my household growing up, it was a dirty word. Like debt is bad. If you have 0% interest, it's free money, but let's say you get a business line of credit, And it's at 7%, you can get a hundred thousand dollars business line of credit at 7%, and it costs you about $700 a month. Right. But if you are going to make, 80% on your, flip or 80% return on your cash, , if you're doing a buy and whole deal, that money costs you nothing. Versus if you did not take that line of credit and didn't have the money at all to do the deal, you would have nothing, So it's better to have, 93% and you're giving up that 7%, then to have zero of nothing because you didn't have the money to do it

Anne-Lyse Wealth: at. So obviously at this point, you are an expert in real estate investing, not everyone listening or watching the show has the experience that you have and are able to tell really, Hey, um, if I purchase this property, you put this much money in, this is what I can expect my return to be.

what are some of the ways that people who are just getting started can, analyze deals.

Attiyah Blair: So it depends on the strategy that you're gonna. So, and how are you gonna fund your deal? And that's a whole class, so I'm gonna try to keep it as simple and easy to understand as possible. So, one of the cheapest, options for funding is an FHA loan.

It stands for federal housing authority. It's backed by the government. Um, you're getting it at 3.5% interest, um, which is super low. That's almost free money. and everybody gets one. So I would encourage everyone to use their one. I love multi-family, I'm a multi-family investor, almost never buy singles anymore.

And so with the FHA loan, you can get up to a four unit building, um, with that money. So, if you can get a four unit and they do require you to live in there for a. So if if you're a single or you have a nimble family that can be moved, I would say, go with that all day long. And if the property needs construction, They will give you something called like 2 0 3 K loan, um, that will come from the bank.

And if you plan to do that, you wanna make sure that your bank offers both. so the strategy that I love the most is when I purchase the property more cheaply, then I renovate.

And now after I renovate it, it's worth a lot more. And then I go refinance and pull the cash out. Not all of it, but a good chunk. let me give you a specific example. So there's this house that I bought for $35,000. It was super cheap and really is teen.

not in, the best condition. It needed about $70,000 worth of work. Uh, was under a thousand square feet, so small two bedroom house rowhouse in Philadelphia and I put about $70,000 into it. And so now I'm all in, at a hundred thousand dollars. At that point, I take it to the bank and just so you know, um, I use hard money for this process, to purchase and for the construction, then I go to a more traditional bank and I say, Hey bank, I have this property.

I added value to it. Let me get a loan. Right. They say, okay, they send an appraiser out the appraiser appraises property for $212,000. Now you, all it cost me was a hundred thousand and it wasn't even my money. So at that point, what I do is I decided to keep the property and not sell it.

Right. Even though it's worth $212,000, I wanted to keep it because once you sell it, You don't get the wealth building part of it. And we could talk about that. Uh, everyone's talking about building wealth, but you can't build wealth, flipping houses. You can make money and which is great, but you can't build wealth.

So what I did was I decided to keep the house, the bank is willing to give me 75% of the value of the property. So that came out to about 1 65 or so. So I was able to pay back the hard money lender, a hundred thousand dollars. Then I was able to keep the rest for myself.

So I got paid to pick up this rental property. And then now I have this chunk of cash. Next time I might not have to get a loan cause can this chunk of cash to pay off the next one. Now you're thinking, okay, I have this debt. I have to pay off this loan. Yeah. Your tenants pay it off when they pay their rent and you pay your They are paying off the debt on the property and you are able to get your monthly cash flow. So you're able to get that cash out. You're able to get your monthly cash flow and you're able to get the long term equity that is where the wealth is built.

Erika Brown: I shared the story of how we bought our first investment property. We saved up, we put 20% down, and then we did that three more times. Eventually after I got a mentor, after I began educating myself a little bit more, I realized, wait, there are other ways that you can scale. Buy more properties without using my money.

Cause when we were at property, maybe like four or five, it was like, this is great. We have a good cash flow coming in. But man, we're missing all the deals. I remember we were under contract for our second investment property and it was. A friend who actually becoming a contract and he was like, I'm gonna try and flip this house.

I'm gonna sell it. And I was like, well, maybe we'll buy it. And then that's kind of how that happened. But we were under contract with him, and again, we hustling selling houses and sashing money and we had. Stashed another 20,000 to put as a down payment for this next investment property. It was my husband's, one of his frat brothers called him and was like, Hey, I have this opportunity.

I have this property. You can buy it in this. It's this neighborhood. It's also on the west side of Atlanta. And it's like you can buy it for $20,000, but I need to know tomorrow. Did you say 20,000? $20,000. This was four years ago. Four or five years ago. But he was like, I need to know as soon as possible.

I just looked. I was like, dang, this money that we currently have in our savings is earmarked for this next property. And I said, no. Hm. I didn't even look at any other opportunities. I didn't try to refi. I said no. And he sold it to someone else. And a year later, that home resold for over $300,000. So you were gonna tell me thousand thousand.

Of course it was renovated, but they bought it for 20 and they probably put a hundred into it. So it made a lot of money. Wow. And so that was a big aha moment for. That woke me up and said, no, I'm never gonna be in that situation again. There was a lot of things that I learned from that. I learned. One, I'm never gonna only have $20,000.

I think to really what that hope that taught me is you gotta figure out how to do this. You gotta figure out how to scale. You gotta do this seriously. You need to find some real mentorship, someone that could really help you to do this seriously. And then I need you to figure out how to use other people's money to.

so you can keep your money and continue to grow, and that's what I do now. If I would've learned that ahead of time, I probably would've had a hundred units about now. I would've been multi-millionaire versus two millionaire right now is by having that knowledge up front. Back then, when

Anne-Lyse Wealth: you had the opportunity to buy that property for 20,000 and you said no,

Erika Brown: what would you have done?

Differe. Oh girl, I would've done so many things. one. I mean, I guess my first easiest thing is I could have sought out an unconventional lender. I have access to what we call hard money lenders I have where you can get short term financing to purchase a property. The interest rates are higher, but they are basically for investors to be able to.

Home short term to then either sell them or later refinance them after they renovate them and or I would've just called a friend, called a rich friend. Mm-hmm. , Hey, , let me borrow $20,000 and I can pay you back 25 in a few months. Something I would've definitely not said no. I would have said yes. And then figured it out.

And that's what I do now, . So now you have a network of hiring

Anne-Lyse Wealth: lenders and you have all those resources. But for someone who's new into this real estate world, how can they find potential lenders outside if they

Erika Brown: don't have any rich friends? If you have opportunity where you do know someone that is an investor, and hopefully they are the type of investor who they are helpful, they wanna help people, then you engage that.

If you don't have that, then you seek out someone like me who has a. Hate mentorship program that can offer you the same opportunities for in a formal relationship. So I have students now right here in Atlanta, we have a mutual friend and we talked about yesterday where I've connected her with my lender, contractor, et cetera.

And it's not just in Atlanta. I have students in Dallas and Arkansas, in California that I connected with people as well. And that's a formal relationship. So I say if you have that internal network, don't be. Ask them, if you don't have it, you could hire someone like me that could provide it for you at a cost.

For people who are ready to get started,

Anne-Lyse Wealth: how much do you need to put down to be able to secure an

Erika Brown: unconventional loan if you decide to go the private long route? Generally, it's between five to 15%. It's generally for new investors, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend that. It just depends on your scenario.

So there are different ways to invest that I wasn't aware of. Do you have ways where you can buy your first home and you can buy it as a owner occupant and you can get all of the amazing low interest raise low down payments. We even have clients that take advantage of a hundred percent financing where they come to closing.

They don't have to put down anything, but you move into it and you live there for one. Live there for a year, and then guess what? You go into this with a strategy and then after one year you go and buy another one and that home becomes a rental property. And you are strategically buying in places that are appreciating in value that are also good for future rental income.

So that's one strategy. There are other strategies like you can take advantage of if, say you don't wanna move, like we were in a position where we did not want to. Kids and life and stuff like that, you can take advantage of a home equity line of credit or a home equity loan, and you could stay in your current home, but then use your equity to help you put down as a down payment on another home without using your cash.

That's another thing I wasn't aware of at the time. So I teach all different strategies depending on the person's custom. Personal finance scenario. So there are all sorts of ways that you can invest without having to put down the standard 20% out of your own money, your own savings.

That was secrets from first generation millionaire real estate investors. I hope you enjoy today's episode. Next week, season four is finally launching. You will hear a brand new episode of the Dreamers podcast, so I cannot wait to see you back The podcast will also be back on. . All right, that's it for today. I will see you soon for another episode of the Dreamers podcast. Until then, dream on Dreamers.