Dr. Dionne Payn is the founder and CEO of High Impact Property Investments. Dionne specializes in raising capital for organizations that create ethical property developments in Australia and the United States. Dionne is a speaker, author, and property coach who loves creating win-win outcomes for as many people as possible.
Dionne has a Ph.D. in Natural Products Chemistry, has project managed a number of property developments around Byron Bay (NSW, Australia), and has helped over 30 investors to achieve double-digit returns through property. These property projects range from small ones divided into subdivisions to larger co-living projects.
Dionne’s first taste of ethical property development came in 2017-2018 when she project managed a 14-townhouse project. This development delivered affordable rental and owner-occupied homes in an area well known for its high level of housing unaffordability. The experience of being financially well rewarded for this project while providing affordable homes for low-to-moderate income earners was a game-changer and led to Dionne’s drive to make a difference in people’s lives through property.
Dionne has been featured in Australian publications including The Owner Builder and Outdoor Design Source, and she regularly writes articles on ethical property investing.
if you enjoyed the show be sure to check out my info:
https://app.wingcard.io/ROB3SA64
Dr. Dionne Payn is the founder and CEO of High Impact Property Investments. Dionne specializes in raising capital for organizations that create ethical property developments in Australia and the United States. Dionne is a speaker, author, and property coach who loves creating win-win outcomes for as many people as possible.
Dionne has a Ph.D. in Natural Products Chemistry, has project managed a number of property developments around Byron Bay (NSW, Australia), and has helped over 30 investors to achieve double-digit returns through property. These property projects range from small ones divided into subdivisions to larger co-living projects.
Dionne’s first taste of ethical property development came in 2017-2018 when she project managed a 14-townhouse project. This development delivered affordable rental and owner-occupied homes in an area well known for its high level of housing unaffordability. The experience of being financially well rewarded for this project while providing affordable homes for low-to-moderate income earners was a game-changer and led to Dionne’s drive to make a difference in people’s lives through property.
Dionne has been featured in Australian publications including The Owner Builder and Outdoor Design Source, and she regularly writes articles on ethical property investing.
if you enjoyed the show be sure to check out my info:
https://app.wingcard.io/ROB3SA64
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intro guy:Welcome to the Josh Bolton show. Dive into interesting and inspiring conversations. And now your host, Josh Bolton.
Josh Bolton:So how are you beginning your properties? So you're in Australia, but are you buying like American properties or Australian properties?
Dr Dionne:Okay, so I'm not actually buying properties. I'm raising capital for developers. Yeah. And so I'm doing that in Australia, in the US as well.
Josh Bolton:Okay. So then that's, that's interesting. I know, there's like a lot of people I've talked to talk about, the hardest part is actually just getting capital for the purchase. That's interesting that you you specifically focused in on that. Did you get like a, I guess, like a percentage or something?
Dr Dionne:That's right. I do. I do. So whatever capital I race, I get a percentage of and I tend to work with, because I don't have a large database myself. So I work with organizations that do have large databases of investors, and then split the capital raise fees with them.
Josh Bolton:Okay. Well, I'm just curious, what's your like? Your average percentage is like one 2% or
Dr Dionne:66%? Yeah,
Josh Bolton:I'd say 60 of my growth was point.
Dr Dionne:Nine 6%.
Josh Bolton:What's an average client that you raise capital for? Is it $400 million?
Dr Dionne:Well, I'm at the start of my journey at the moment. So, so far, I've raised 2 million. Hey, that's pretty good. That's yeah, it's awesome. I, those numbers are going to go up. I've got a client that I'm meeting on Friday. And I know that they're looking for about$7 million. So yeah,
Josh Bolton:I'm seeing a vast number of quit 6% on 7 million.
Dr Dionne:Well, actually, I'm planning to raise a billion dollars over the next five years.
Josh Bolton:Interesting. Okay. So what are your some your tactics for that, then?
Dr Dionne:Well, the whole The whole reason behind doing it is because I see the backtrack. So the projects that I'm raising capital for, they've all got some kind of ethical twist to them. So it's either affordable housing, or sustainable housing or building resilient communities or, or building homes for people with disabilities. So the real ethos behind the capital round raising is to help make people's lives better, and where they don't traditionally get looked after in that way. So for me raising a billion dollars, what does that mean? Well, it means a lot of partnerships. It means a lot of working and collaborating with organizations and different groups that have a similar set of values. And that want to essentially see the world being a better place. Because my argument is that if we don't start looking out for if we don't provide more affordable homes, if we don't provide more homes for people with disabilities, if we don't provide more resilient communities, if we don't provide more sustainable homes, all of these different issues that we're seeing in society are going to come and bite us in the bum. So it's not it's not just the people that have been affected because they don't have first homes were affected too. So it's really an insurance policy looking after ourselves while looking after other people, but the twist on it is being rewarded, really well rewarded, because from my experience in doing ethical property investing, you can achieve double digit returns, which is often A lot better than the regular person doing traditional property investment.
Josh Bolton:Oh 100% No. And that's actually kind of funny. The week or two ago was my sister's birthday. And so we she works at a church. So we went out to the church and surprised her by showing up and all that. And for me, like I've always grown up in. It's not the full like, Down syndrome, artistic one where they put them to this cage. But it's not mainstream was like a weird middle in between where was some autistic, but some of the normal kids. So I grew up with the autistic and the Down Syndrome and the deaf and blind to, and I was just one of those as, at a young age, I really like these parents love their children so much that they're practically going into debt, even though they cannot afford, sadly, to keep these kids running. And it was just one of those bad time back to the church thing. The her church is very well off. So they have a whole group for, like 20 of these adults that are autistic. And essentially, it was just one of those. Again, I talked to them because I grew up with them. I knew their their language frequency, how to talk to them. And as one of the guys in elixirs labs, and I just kind of said to myself, no not allowed him like I wish I can like get money so I can build something that their parents can ethically just leave the kids there they're taking care of. And obviously they can visit all they want and bring their own food and stuff. But it's like, they know if they have to disappear for a couple of days to kids not going to be destroyed kind of thing. Yeah. I was just one of those. They said they're like now I got to figure out how to get all this money. Go and behold, there you are. Yeah, so, um, before we get too deep into the woods, I have a lot of editing and early have to do, can we give a little snatches of who you are and what you do? For those? Yeah.
Dr Dionne:Yeah. Yeah. So I'm Dr. Deon Payne. I'm the CEO and founder of high impact property investments. And we specialize in partnering investors that are looking for double digit returns with products that provide affordable and sustainable homes.
Josh Bolton:Awesome. Awesome. So then, I'm just curious, because this is was it is more a combination of everything. What was that moment that are the events leading to saying I want to do this? Because there has to be sequences of events that you just sound like, I need to do this? Yeah,
Dr Dionne:well, if we go back to the very start, and I was also brought up in a church community, and my mum and my nan were a really I was gonna say integral that makes it sound as if it revolved around them. It wasn't that but they were just a really, really big part of the community. And so that's how I grew up. And that's like, I grew up just those the religious side of things, but there's also this service side of things. And that's what, that's the impression that's been left on me anyway. So I've always really wanted to help people take care of people in that sense. And I actually started because my mum's a nurse.
Josh Bolton:Other URLs, you say, Elijah had a kidney. My mom was a nurse.
Dr Dionne:Yeah. My mom was a nurse. And I remember saying, when I was younger, I want to be a nurse just like you. And she said, No, no, you want to be a doctor because nurses are underpaid and overworked. So that kind of directed. That kind of directed my journey. And I didn't become a medical doctor. But I did. I did get a PhD, which and then the PhD was in natural products from sugarcane. So as part of that, I was looking for medicines from sugarcane and be found, sugar cane has anti diabetic properties in it. So really interesting, because the moral of the story, what I took away from that is that when we refined sugar, we actually take away the parts of the sugarcane plant that are designed to help us heal.
Josh Bolton:So what's interesting is that you had a guy on a couple months ago, and he specifically specializes in adding micro hexus into the structure of sugarcane to re re add, like, whatever to make it healthy. And then actually, he's like, it's like an actual viable food is it sounds crazy, just eat sugar, but he's like, it's, it's a viable carb. Now. It's not just to show you that makes you fat. That's really like you saying that I'm like, Oh, wow. So sugar in a different sense is going to be a good frontier for us.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, yeah, it's, I mean, you've got two approaches you've got not refining it in the first place or lightly refining it. And then you've also got the things that you can add into it to make it more nutritious and more beneficial for the human body.
Josh Bolton:Yeah, it was just one of those I guess he said his like his contraption is a small little two foot by two foot thing you can add on the conveyor belt, and it just automatically adds in whatever his product is. And without ruining flavor stuff, and I'm like, that's so cool. And he's like, Well, the only problem is all the sugar refiners are so tightly packed, there's not even like a one foot by one foot to the pump machine. And so he's like, it's hard to convince people to, to use it. Oh, yeah, that'd be a bit of a logistical problem. So you figured out your studies for sugar, and you got Yeah, that what happened after that, we got your peach, your diploma,
Dr Dionne:PSA, I then stopped, stopped everything to have children, because I was in my early 30s at that point. And then we were just in a position where we wanted to buy our own home. And we were on one income because I wasn't working, I stayed home looking after the kids. And so that led me to just think, well, if I don't, if I don't know how to get into property, what about if I learn about property, and then you know, find a creative way to, to be able to afford to get into property. And so that's what we did. And we did a couple of property education courses. And on the very first one that I did that well that my husband did, actually, we found a joint venture partner who had cash, but not the time to actually do developments. And we had the time, but not the cash to do developments ourselves. So we actually joint joint ventures. And then we did our first development. And I was actually thinking the other day, that was my first affordable housing project, because it was a, it was a house with a studio attached. And what we did was we subdivided the block, we took the roof that connected the main house to the studio, and we sold them separately. And that studio that the main house was, you know, it went for a good price. The Studio also went for a good price for the studio. But it was actually it was in that it was it's sold for below 300,000, which at the time was was really amazed. I mean, if it sold for less than 300,000 now still be really amazing. So it was it was actually quite amazing. And I hadn't actually connected those two things. That was my first affordable housing project. A couple of projects in I was looking at a piece of land. So the suburb that I was that I was developing in and I've done a couple of projects, and I started to get to know quite well. And I just saw this piece of land across the road from the shopping center, and then thought, well, that would make a really great project. Now the developers who had that land, I'd already put in development approval for 14 one bedroom townhouses. And so I looked at it, I did the numbers and realize that if I offered$100,000 less, then we'd be able to make the project work. So that's what I did. And they said yes, and I bought some joint venture partners in to that as well. Now, the cool thing about that, which I didn't appreciate initially, was that three of those homes were designated as affordable rental accommodation. And they would be designated that for a period of 10 years. And they had to be managed by a community housing provider. So that was my first project where I was offering consciously affordable housing. And even though we had affordable rental housing, the whole complex was affordable. And the properties were 60 square meters, they sold on average for 350,000. There was nothing in the area that was that price. And at that quality, because it was a new build. And so I had friends that bought into that townhouse complex. And I know that they wouldn't have been able to stay in the area had they not had somewhere like that to go. And so that was my first real project where I could see the impact on the community by doing it. And I really loved it, and that the project itself had some challenges and lots of challenges, actually, but we finished it. And and every time I walk past now I just go, oh, wow, I did that. And I can see how people's lives have changed because they had that option. And so from then and and and the other thing was that I got a really great financial benefit from that as well. So the money that I put in, I got 25% per annum on that. Now, if if it wasn't for the fact that it had that benefit, which like I said I'd really didn't appreciate it at the beginning. But if it wasn't for the fact that it had that benefit, and that I was invested into it more than just the financial return. I don't think I would have done it. Because I fell out with my joint venture partners, the builder went broke. We had so many issues, I probably wouldn't be involved in property development again. Had it not been for the fact that there was a purpose bigger than me for doing it.
Josh Bolton:Oh 100% Yeah, we you have to have interest Something that big, you have to have a mission, a goal, that no matter how much shit hits you in the face, you keep going. That was a lot of shit. So that's interesting. So then that is your first project. And I got you started. How long ago was that?
Dr Dionne:So that projects started at the mid 2016. Actually, yeah.
Josh Bolton:Oh, not too far back. Okay,
Dr Dionne:they'll take that back.
Josh Bolton:So then, what's your current big project that you can talk about that your investors won't get upset?
Dr Dionne:Well, look, I want to talk about two big projects, actually. Because yesterday, I launched a book. And the book is called ethical property investing. And in the book, I really talk about why we should be looking at investing in ethical property investments. And the argument that I make I make a few arguments. But the biggest one that I make is that there's so much happening in the world right now. And one of the biggest things that we can do is to one of the biggest things that we can do to dictate the way that our future pans out is to be really deliberate about where we spend our money, and where we invest our money. So if we're investing our money into things that make the world better, we're going to, we are also going to feel a lot more better about that, as well as getting the financial returns. So if you've got that happening, if you've got good financial returns, and you've got the excellent social and environmental returns as well, that should be our normal, not the old way. Because the old way isn't working.
Josh Bolton:It really hasn't. But we somehow made it work this long, kind of thing.
Dr Dionne:I know. And it's really, it's really about evolution. And it's really about where do we want to go. So if we carry on with business as normal, then we're not going to, we're not going to get to the places that we want to go because we're creating so many problems for ourselves over here. But here's an here's a different way. I was gonna say it's a new way. It's not really, people have been doing it, but it's just not been mainstream. Yeah. So here's a different way that doesn't exclude people, it includes everybody. And that's way more fulfilling and way more valuable for all of us. And I just I think that's a really important point to get out.
Josh Bolton:Oh 100% But that's like I was saying earlier with the the whole story with the church thing it's I grew up with it and like I said that the people are it with the current legal structure, it's legal and it's fine is morally Okay, not really, but I'm making money so screw it kind of thing. I think especially with COVID That's reset a lot of systems, for better or for worse, and I think especially being isolated for at least a year and a half. Almost a year in Australia just alleviated like you're almost your two year stay at home since ah smell Corona, you're like Nope.
Dr Dionne:Well, we, Australia went into full lockdown, lockdown borders, everything. And there was some there was some southern suburb cities and states that were really hit like, Victoria, Melbourne. They really copped it and they were in lockdown for a really long time. I think they were the most lockdown city in the world, actually. And I know that there's a lot of trauma that has happened as a result of that.
Josh Bolton:I was actually just talking to an Australian lady earlier this morning at 1am My time at her time. And she said like she's been a road construction worker this whole time. She's like, but they've been running me 12 hours a day. Push like, as she mentioned, like Yeah, after our two year sentence of lockdowns Oh, yeah, you smell Caronia? Oh, no. Oh, no, we were playing around lock the doors.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, exactly.
Josh Bolton:But okay, so what I was trying to get back to you is the COVID resetting everything. I have especially noticed that in general people like we've been isolated, we're social creatures, we even if like me, I'm an introverted I don't, I don't like going to big parties and loud noises just stresses me out. I go my quarter and just like I love to go home. But in general, I still want to interact with people. And think especially at least the world got a six months lockdown. We realized how important our community or in our earth is because there was a brief poet moment where the earth can actually breathe again, instead of being polluted.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, it was amazing. The other thing that's happened recently which has really strengthened my resolve to get the message out, and our local area so I live in northern New South Wales. It's about nine hours north of Sydney and very close to The Queensland border about two hours south of Brisbane, which is, which is the capital city of Queensland? Well, we've just been hit by floods. And there's a lot of low lying areas here, which were just decimated. We're talking about water up to the roofs of two storey buildings, we're talking about shopping centers that have been wiped out
Josh Bolton:as insurance nightmare. Sorry.
Dr Dionne:No, it's true. It's true. And actually, the nightmare is for the people that didn't have insurance because they couldn't get insurance because they were in a floodplain. And we've got people so it's not just the low lying areas, we've got people that live in the hinterland areas. So you know, they live on the high ground, we'd think our walk they'd be safe. Well, no, they're not that the roads are impassable. Trees have fallen down, roads have completely collapsed. Now we've got helicopters, chopping food, supplies, medical supplies to people that are in those isolated areas, and some of them are staying, most of them been evacuated. Now the big thing for me having done an affordable housing projects and continue to do more, it's like, well, there's not a lot of affordable housing anyway, the pandemic happened. Before the pandemic, we had an affordable housing crisis. Post pandemic, we had an even bigger crisis, post floods. Even worse, in this one town that's been really decimated lives, more of the 1400 homes. 950 of them are unlivable. So where do those people go? And I put a post on Facebook the other day to say, Are we seeing the first climate refugees here? Because these floods are supposed to be one in 501 in 10,000 years, but actually, we had a flood just now. We had a flood five years ago, we had a flood six years before that. I'm not sure how they sort of make those one in 100 year numbers, but these floods are becoming a lot more frequent than that.
Josh Bolton:Oh, 100%. I was to say it was either during a lockdown or near the end of the lockdown. So you had that insane fire over there, too.
Dr Dionne:Oh, that was a that was before the lockdown. Yeah, insane fires. Yeah,
Josh Bolton:the thing like burn like 1009 teen that burned like a quarter of Australia. Yeah, wasn't bore last I heard was just like a quarter. Like if you did a ratio, I always my imaginations Australia, there's a little kangaroo in the top right corner, the little whale in the sea in the left. It's like you were the one in between and just wiped everything out? Or was it in a completely different area?
Dr Dionne:No, no, that was in our local area as well. So and again, in that post I mapped it out was like 2017 floods, 2019 bushfires 2020 to 2022 pandemic 2022 Flats. I just, I'm really seeing the effects of climate change right now. And it's quite boring.
Josh Bolton:So what are some of the projects you're working on to help with all this? Is it like, I have this crazy idea that 3d printed houses are going to be like the thing that saves the world? Are you working on something like that, or more like mud huts or something? Well,
Dr Dionne:I'm not gonna advocate for going back to mud huts. But I go, I see I see the benefit in simplifying our lives because our lives have been a lot complicated. But at the end of the day, I'm somebody that raises capital for property development. So I'm, in my world, in my understanding, and in what I'm trying to do is really about supporting developers who are really making sure that the environmental credentials, they're going above and beyond the current environmental credentials, they're going above and beyond the current social credentials. So I'm supporting a developer at the moment raising capital for him. And he's got a project that says 7272 Bed rooming accommodation, and that's in southeast Queensland. What that means is that it provides affordable accommodation. For women. It's, it's not that it's excluding anybody and but the primary targets are women over 55 and young professionals. And so these are people that can't necessarily live in larger houses, it would just be a bit of a waste for them to live in a house that's really large or they're paying for more space than they actually need. And they're finally getting unaffordable. Anyway. So this project is providing affordable housing is providing sustainable housing because they're working with an architect. Their goal is to be net zero by 2030. This building is designed to be net zero. So when I talk about Net Zero is basically they've positioned the property in a way that it makes the most of the cooling breezes it makes the most of it makes the most of the Sun in the winter so you can heat heats up the building without the need for air conditioning, and they've got community gardens in there. So they can promote that sense of community with the residents. They've got shared car facilities. So basically, you don't have to have your own car, you can use the shared car for each block. There's bike storage available as well. And they've just been very sensible about how they've designed it in terms of the stormwater there. Rather than that, I mean, they what they do have large storm water pits as well. But they also have, rather than just concrete in the area, they've got special, a specialist paving system, which means that water can be captured. So there's still grass in there as well. I don't know the technical details of it. But I just know that it's they've really thought about how it can be the gold standard in terms of the environmental credentials and the social credentials. And investors into that project, the target, the target return on that is 20% per annum. So, in that sense, it's actually those are the kind of projects that I'm really happy to be supporting.
Josh Bolton:That's awesome. That's really awesome. Like I said, the crazy idea for me was like 3d printed mud houses. But actually, it's kind of more, I wouldn't say it'd be more ESG friendly, but it'd be more cost effective to run something like that. But an r1 that's always bugs me is the the plastic we have, and there's a lot of plastic we have, we can't really recycle. Because it's so toxic, or just it can't be recycled. And it was just one of those I remember like walking in LA, and seeing like this one trash can out of cement, but it was a lot of plastic in it. And I was like interesting. might wonder if there's going to be like that was just more of like a street art thing. It was back in like the 70s when they made it so it was more like that. But uh, Mike plastic, though, has a very long life. It would actually make sense to throw it in concrete, which has a long life too, and would cut down on a lot of emissions, the remelting it to whatever pellet shape you need, but my time might be a nerve thing that comes and they tell people like Josh, we're not doing plastic and concrete and like you never know. You never know.
Dr Dionne:Well, well. Here's the thing. There's a there's a there's a gentleman, I can't think of his name. But he is making homes out of plastic. And yeah, yeah, so taking plastic out of the sea, taking plastic from landfill, and building homes from that. So it's been a while since I've spoken to him. I think it's been about two years. But it wouldn't surprise me if he's up and running and building. And he's done. He's done pilot studies in areas like Vanuatu as well, where, you know, when the disasters have hit, and they need accommodation really quickly, so they've done pilot studies out there and prove the concept. The last I heard he was raising money to take it on larger scale and actually have a larger pilot study. But I think if any, if any time like now is definitely the time
Josh Bolton:Oh 100% Like the for me like when I first started working in my current job that I have. That was one of those I was listening to some podcasts and you were mentioning how plastic could be the new whatever. And they said actually, it could be like your next house you could actually afford a mansion at a fraction of the price of your current house and the last year at least 500 years and he's like nominal
Dr Dionne:that's really interesting and and actually I think that the only the only issue with that is it depends on the land price. But if you're if you're Yeah, wow, that's cool.
Josh Bolton:That's where they ran the numbers like to get lumber because lumber seeing short we don't have enough or that it's only going up but like she get literally they're like let's see a four bedroom, two bath kitchen and all that made out of huge industrial Lego blocks of recycled plastic. Like at worst might cost you 1020 grand to rebuild that whole house would cost you 300 to$400,000 so to like do the math it makes more sense to get a plastic house and it was just one of those I jokingly mentioned my coworkers like Josh we're not going to buy plastic houses never buy my cheap piece of land and build my little Lego house and and you're pissed at me.
Dr Dionne:Well look when we think of plastic houses, I let my mind goes to Lego. However, another thing that I've not really paid much attention to was in the affordable housing development that we did the 14 townhouse one I was telling you about before and the cladding the decking. And yet so the cladding of the house on the decking, there was something else as well was made of plastic so it was made of plastic and other materials. So there were rice husks in there and and Did you know sort of other vegetable fibers, and it was all recycled. And it looks really good. You actually don't know that it's plastic. It's just decking and cladding on a house.
Josh Bolton:So I want to show you something really quick. So this is a 3d printed little boat. Yeah. Now imagine we could scale that up from this little boat to a house. And this cost me pennies to make this like your decking, that would be an amazing innovation to get going.
Dr Dionne:It would be amazing. And you know, the 3d printing, I know that there's a company around here a startup company mounting, who are looking at doing something like that. That's, that's really fascinating.
Josh Bolton:Awesome. So could you afford to lose track of that one?
Dr Dionne:And I think we're done. Good to me. So plastic houses. It's it's, it's actually it's already happening. And it's, I think, because for me, I do have this, like, you know, I don't know whether, honestly, I don't know whether I want to live in a plastic house, because my mind just goes to Lego. But when I remember, Bill, the project that I did that did use plastic. And it looks really great. There's so much more possibility than just thinking like a house.
Josh Bolton:And it could just be one of those like, like the guy said, If you want a cheap under $10,000 house, you might get the lego one get I think the only thing you might have to change is your proof. Because it's cheap metal every like 1015 years. But he's like other than that he's like we have the world's the your imagination should limit his biases. So malleable, but so strong.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, yeah. And something to lock up all of that plastic would be super valuable.
Josh Bolton:Extremely valuable. Honestly, the only one for me would be installation, especially in your area, my head to double layer it.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's a whole load of things to think about. But then I mean, you know, there are people that are specialists in this. I mean, I've got a friend who is involved in hemp plastic. Oh, interesting. Interesting. And a hemp is one of those things. years ago, before my second child was born, I published a magazine about hemp because I started working for a guy who was involved in hemp, I learnt about it, and it was amazing everybody needs to know about it, you know, we can clothe ourselves, we can eat it, we can build our homes from it, it's just this wonderful product. And it grows so quickly, and it takes up so much carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. And when you put it into buildings, and especially it locks up for a long time, it makes them mold resistant and pest resistant and burn resistant. So it's just this fantastic plant which is so you know, it's natural. There's a lot of stigma around it because of the criminality aspect of it, of course, but as not all, not all cannabis plants are the same, not all cannabis plants will have that effect on you. So I've got really into writing this magazine and, and talking to people that were involved in the hemp industry. And as a result of that, I just love the potential that is there with hemp and the hemp plastic side of things. The, you know, you bring that into cars, you build that, bring that into buildings. And this could be another way that we go. And I you know, bringing the 3d printing, we, as humans, we are so innovative. That's, that's the thing, and I just really want to see us use our innovation, for things that are going to keep us going on this planet rather than wipe us out.
Josh Bolton:As much as Elon Musk is awesome. And I appreciate all his innovations, but just a moonshot for Mars. Like, why don't you shoot to the moon and we call is there if we're gonna do anything kind of thing?
Dr Dionne:Why don't we just protect our problems here
Josh Bolton:and then figure that out?
Dr Dionne:Because if there's that thing if you you know, if if we've got the same consciousness, doing a shot from us, and we get to Mars, great, but we're just taking our problems there as well. And then you know, what are the planets you know? Yeah. I think as much as as much as I love Tesla, I don't think Elon Musk is is on the mark with this one.
Josh Bolton:We'll see like, especially with like the neuro link scandal that came out
Dr Dionne:here I didn't know anything about that. No,
Josh Bolton:no. Oh my god. So they're the neuro link is like a little device to put in your brain and it connects to everything. And essentially a monitor its marketing is to monitor Alzheimer's and figure out which root cause but it's also one of those if done right, it can fire electrons. And essentially, we play golf. You can turn off emotions. And, or you could stream straight stuff into your brain like you could watch Netflix straight in this. Well, they're try, they're we're working on it. And the closest they can get is chimps to our brain. And it came out within the last two weeks to a month that essentially Yeah, it came out that they were these poor monkeys were suffering and what brain dead over this chip and a monkey still trying to push for human trials. I'm like, Screw you, you're not gonna do that to me. If those poor monkeys went through all that, and you still don't know why, what makes you think is going to work on us?
Dr Dionne:Yeah, that is a really bad idea.
Josh Bolton:Right? Like, um, no, no, you're a great innovator. And you're a great dreamer. But there are certain things you just read. One of them is you shouldn't play God like that.
Dr Dionne:And why turn off our emotions. That's what makes us human. That's what keeps us connected.
Josh Bolton:Exactly. Because like, for me, I'm trying to learn trading and how to make money off the market kind of thing, ethically, and safely. But that, for me, the sense of fear is that the important if I turn that off, I'll just be buying stuff from my neighbor thinking about the consequences. And then when I turn off, and I'll look ahead and be like, Oh, shit, why did I do that? So like, emotions are very vital kind of thing. I don't know. It's must he dreams rig. That's what I admire about him. But if he ever hears this in the future, please contact me. Correct me.
Dr Dionne:I look there's so much in that there's the animals that died as a result of
Josh Bolton:brain dead vegetables. They're still alive. but barely.
Dr Dionne:Yeah. See, that's That's not cool. That's
Josh Bolton:not. And I thought we were way past that like animal testing stuff, personally.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, it surprises me when I see when I see makeup products that say, oh, you know, we don't test on animals. It's like, Well, why do you even need to tell us that like you shouldn't test that doesn't that doesn't pick you up in my mind.
Josh Bolton:I always think of this as like a like a Bugs Bunny loose from cartoon where like, the guy like paints up the rapid and has all the mascara and the features like a woman. That's when we do makeup on animals. So why why are you trying to make it look human? It's a cute little rabbit. You don't need to change it. Yeah, that's just another one of those is like, why? There was there was no real reason. If you needed to test it. Get a control group. Just tell him disclaimer. This could happen. Pay him a good chunk of change. Let him go.
Dr Dionne:I even then I think that's really unethical. Well, yeah.
Josh Bolton:Because Because you could burn their face with all the whatever. Yeah, huh. Yeah, it there's it's hard, tricky route without that. But so I'm just curious. We talked about when your project What's the second one you want to talk about?
Dr Dionne:Oh, well, the first project was a book. The second project was the okay. 72 the room? Yeah, yeah. And was the 72 bed rooming accommodation. And so that's, that's in progress. Now. The developer is actually just working on the plans and getting plans into council. So actually, as of now, as of this month, we should be ready to go on to stage two, which is actually demolishing and building. And that's a conversation that I have with that developer at some point this week. The last the last three weeks have been maybe in four weeks have been very intense. And myself, my family had COVID. We recovered from COVID and had the floods. And in the midst of all that it was getting the book done and the new website builds. So I just need a couple of days to come up for air.
Josh Bolton:Versus like nah, Miss Payne is going to go through a lot of pain right now.
Dr Dionne:Do you know what though? Do you know what? Because I've never done anything like that before. Like I've never I've never never lived through anything like this before, to be honest with you. A lot of us haven't know. But the thing that kept me going was this is important work. I'm not I'm not religious, I would call myself more spiritual. But I feel that this is the work that I was put on this earth to do. So it didn't feel hard. But there were times where it felt intense. And you know, I needed to take breaks and whatever. But it didn't feel hard. It felt it felt like fun. It felt like okay, this is okay, communications down for a week. Okay. How am I gonna? What do I need to do? Like how do I keep going like, I need to really rely on the team that Funny thing is, is that I decided that I was going to publish the book on International Women's Day I was gonna actually launch the book then. And that was about about four weeks out, I decided that and you know, for about a week, I was just looking for places to, they were looking for speakers for International Women's Day. And I couldn't find any. And I just thought, you know what, I'll just create my own event. And so I'm the launch was going to be a fundraiser for two fantastic organizations that are providing affordable accommodation solutions for women. And one of them's called the Women's village collective, and the other one's called the Northern Rivers Community Foundation. So that was the fundraiser, we're gonna go to a restaurants and celebrate the launch of the book and raise some funds. The business community were amazing, they sent heaps of donations that we could auction on the day. And then we had the floods. So communications are out. And so that, you know, there are a couple of things in that I thought, Okay, we'll we'll move it online. And then hopefully, by that point, that communications will be better. And then I realized that the the amount of devastation that we're seeing around us, nobody's really in the framework to celebrate yet, there's just a lot of cleanup that needs to be done. So I did manage to get the book out and out, which was fantastic. We are still raising money, we've got an online fundraiser that's happening for that, an online auction site, and both objectives will be met, which is fantastic. But just it just didn't turn out the way that I thought it was going to be. So
Josh Bolton:I'm just curious. Someone's probably listening right now and just say, What's this website? So where can they go? But hopefully, we don't have to get to the end and lose them?
Dr Dionne:Yeah, absolutely. So my new website is called if I go to www dot HIPPI dot global, which is H I P i dot global, and they'll be able to, to have a read of the book, I've got a I've got a page where they can go and download the first chapter of the book. And then if they love it, they can write the whole book of his links on the website for that.
Josh Bolton:Awesome. Awesome awesome. So other than all that I'll just say madness going on. I think that's accurate. Just it sounds like madness. Hero like you like oh, man, my I don't know if I can handle so, in all that madness and stuff going on what was oh, sorry, you mentioned it, I didn't even touch on it. So, um, you got COVID It was just like on the crown or something. And you're all doing okay.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, we're all fine. We're all fine. It was it was I went down quickly. I wasn't looking after myself as I should have been doing so I went down quickly. But then you know, within within a week I was I was better within two weeks, maybe not back to full strength and and you know, it's been busy as well so I know when I'm back to full strength that I'll start my running program again and I'm realizing how much I miss it. So I think tomorrow and getting pounding the pavement and running again.
Josh Bolton:So did you get like the classic COVID brain fog or lung scanner thing?
Dr Dionne:Um, so what happened for me was I had fever I didn't really know that I had a fever though but I had a really pounding headache on that first day and then I had a little bit of a cough and sort of on the next days just tired yeah a bit brain foggy couldn't really I had to not do work there was no way I could do work and really have the level of conversations that are needed to know I couldn't really string a sentence together to be honest with you. But it didn't last long. The blessing is it didn't last long
Josh Bolton:obviously that probably sounds like I'm the cried because I got the it wasn't the original the Alpha strain but it wasn't the mainstream deltas that were B or C Greek letter that no one wants to talk about. And that one was intense i I was out called I got the brain fogs actually lasted at least two months afterwards I was foggy still like two months my lungs didn't really come back to normal till like six months after and it's it's for me being like the I'm very hardy my immunity is very strong. But to like she she could see the others can't read my bed is just the other way. It's about 10 feet to get up from my bed to go to the restroom. It felt like I ran a marathon Wow. So it was one of those because like they said being the tough guy great immunity and all that. My dad for some reason was coming over use the restroom too. We're both just winded be unbelieving, like just look at him and I said I can see where people die from this. Just really hard to kill by agazi Repeat die from this. Yeah. So can I use the restroom first? I'm like, Alright, cool run their marathon back to my bed.
Dr Dionne:Oh, wow. Well, I'm really glad that you made it through.
Josh Bolton:I'm glad to it was just a bummer that I was the one that introduced it to house but it spurred me to it really encouraged me to start this because really Dick Boss, he's gone now so I can I don't want to say his name. But essentially, this is when our government was paying people 600 bucks a week cash to stay home. And he's like, Oh, well you're replaced buying gets stolen by tomorrow I'm like good luck with the government pays 600 bucks a week you barely pay half of that. Give it someone to come in to give up the government money, I will give you my apron and quit the job right there. I never could promised myself when I recover from COVID. I'm like, I'm going to figure out a way if I'm in that situation. It's by choice and I'm getting a lot more profit from it than just the I have to work for someone else kind of thing. So that's what started my whole podcast journey in a nutshell. What are what are some other things that you're working on? In like, the not just like, instead of business, like you said you do running what other like hobbies are you working on? Oh, oh, okay. Um, I,
Dr Dionne:I it's not it's not a hobby as such, but I made a decision at the start of the year, because, you know, we've come out of COVID. And it was actually before we had COVID. But you know, the whole, the whole of last year and the year before was just so intense. And over Christmas, I was like, we get to have a proper Christmas break. And we went camping. And it rained a lot. And so it wasn't the most fun camping. But what I loved about it was the area that we were in was absolutely beautiful. And we we just had no internet reception. So that was that was a time that I didn't want to have internet reception. I just wanted to completely switch off. And I did and it was fantastic. And I was out in nature and and you know, just felt really rejuvenated all over again. So I made a commitment that at the end of every month, we would go camping. And so I've booked that in for I put that in for the next six months. Now unfortunately, our first month that we were going to go camping, which was the end of February, we didn't because we're still my husband was still recovering from COVID There was no way we could go anywhere. And that's the weekend that the floods happened. So he had a holiday home. But, and actually, we didn't have communications
Josh Bolton:till we get to it. That's awesome.
Dr Dionne:What a great manifester I am.
Josh Bolton:Bar is funny because I've been doing the same thing. It's like I chose every quarter instead of every month. So every three months, I just go like for three days. Even if there's like where I am, there's a lot of local camping spots where I can be crazy and try to sleep in the hills of the lion two wolves but I'm not that crazy. But yeah, that's my promise. Just like a three day detox from the month, the grind the noise and everything. And it's been really nice is that you kind of got into boys by little like, alright, Josh, get through the next like two weeks and then you can go camping in the hills kind of thing.
Dr Dionne:Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's, that's really great. And it goes back to what you were saying before about the microchip in the brain. Okay, and we, my gosh, can you imagine having having always on that, you know, having things constantly streaming it we have enough to deal with. And so those breaks are super important.
Josh Bolton:Oh, yeah. Well, so this one did the one thing I didn't know about until one of my co workers told me is so Elon Musk was saying how, like memes and the memes are just little packets and knowledge. We we put pictures and text over making money. We said like a meme in general could be upload to your brain. And then you process it. Why also they thought that was the way it was. And they didn't that's one of those they just said in my that's extremely powerful, and a great way to brainwash people. And I'm very certain he thought about that, too. I'm like, Yeah, just one of those. I'm like, I really, if it becomes mainstream, I'm like, I'm not going to touch it.
Dr Dionne:Me neither. It's interesting though, because I was talking to a friend about this the other day and she didn't go into the depth that you had explained but and I did say to her it's interesting because I do I don't know sometimes I think something and just go I should action that but I'm not really interested. To be able to vaccinate, and I keep thinking of how cool it would be to, you know, do an action at the speed of thought, but actually know that, that could be pretty bad sometimes. But yeah, yeah, just, I think if we used it very deliberately so, you know, there's times that I think I need to talk to my mom or I need to call my mum, I can't quite do it now. But you know, I'd love to just be able to send a message to her. And, you know, see my brain to her.
Josh Bolton:Yeah, see, like that, that would be cool. That would be very cool. But it's like the the direct interface of the mind a, like my own see how you mentioned you were more spiritual than anything else. I seem here. There has to be a higher power, goal, whatever you want. But I don't think it's like the formal religion. But my my personal thesis, my whatever you want to call it doctrine. I think the subconscious is more bigger in the sense that we realize, because I personally think like souls are our energy, or like, the electrons in our mind. And it's one of those if you tamper with the data, you're literally tampering with your soul kind of thing. And that's one of those like, I mean, I can't prove it. But that's a no no, for me. It's like voodoo. Do not touch with voodoo either. I can't prove it, but I didn't touch on it.
Dr Dionne:Well, I think I think I think it's as simple as that. If you don't understand something, don't do it. Until Until you understand it. If it's something that you're interested in, then, you know, take the time to understand it. But yeah, that for me, that's, that's something that a motto that I live by, if I don't understand it, then I can just put the pause on it until I learn more about
Josh Bolton:it. 2%. So I don't want to take you too long. How long do I got you for
Dr Dionne:another four minutes per minutes, and then it's getting kids to school time.
Josh Bolton:Perfect. So real quick, we already went over what you did during the lockdown times? What are some tips tricks or advice for someone aspiring to be like you to start on that
Dr Dionne:path? I think look, I I feel like I'm really just on the cusp of my journey. And in terms of achieving the things that I want to achieve. And I mentioned to you before, I've got a goal to raise a billion dollars. That it really comes down to finding for me, it's been about finding my purpose and finding what I feel like I was brought here to do. And, and that took a lot of soul searching. And you know, there's a lot of it's been a very windy path. So I think that there were times where, for me, you know, the difficulties that I encountered. I felt like giving up, and even other people or the friends advised me to just give up and just, you know, like, you know, stop, stop trying to strive to do that. Like you can just be you can just be ordinary, you can just be normal. And I think that we're all born for greatness, actually. And so aspiring to be normal, whatever that is.
Josh Bolton:Yeah. It's very subjective. Because my normal is not normal for other people kind of thing. But by the definition, it's normal. You should be doing it too. So yeah, exactly.
Dr Dionne:So let's just raise the bar for ourselves, right? Let's just, let's just find out what our purpose is. And really go for it, and raise the bar for for us and for everybody around us. And it's not like it's not I'm not coming from a judgmental place. I'm coming from a, we've got so many challenges that we're facing in the world. Let's go and solve some problems. Let's go do that. Let's raise the bar for other people, let's all be leaders, because if we can do that, then we're going to have a much more cohesive society
Josh Bolton:100% So working everyone gets you at
Dr Dionne:WWW dot hippie dot global, which is hihi p i dot global and you socials. Yes, I'm on LinkedIn. And my if you do a search for high impact property investments on LinkedIn, you'll find me and you'll also find us on Facebook as well and Instagram.
Josh Bolton:Wonderful. It's been an absolute honor and a pleasure to have you on.
Dr Dionne:It's been so much fun. Thank you, Josh. Sam.