Authentically Detroit
Authentically Detroit is the leading podcast in the city for candid conversations, exchanging progressive ideas, and centering resident perspectives on current events.
Hosted by Donna Givens Davidson and Orlando P. Bailey.
Produced by Sarah Johnson and Engineered by Griffin Hutchings.
Check us out on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @AuthenticallyDetroit!
Authentically Detroit
Fractional Crypto Ownership of Detroit Homes and Transformative Black Entrepreneurship with Aaron Mondry and Racheal Allen
This week, Donna and Orlando sat down with journalist Aaron Mondry and the President and CEO of The Operations School or “OSchool,” Racheal Allen.
Launched in 2019 by serial entrepreneur and nonprofit executive Racheal Allen, OSchool serves more than 1,200 students per year free of charge, helping them get their businesses legal, branded, operational, noticed, profitable, and ready to scale.
Allen founded OSchool to help Black business owners beat the odds by drawing on lessons from her own experiences as an entrepreneur and modeling it into her flagship curriculum, “Get Your Business Legit.”
Housed in Centric Place, a first-of-its-kind incubation space for Black arts, culture and entrepreneurship in Farmington Hills, OSchool is expanding its reach through partnerships with the Apple Developer Academy, the Lansing Economic Development Corporation, and the Michigan Black Business Alliance.
It also now has the financial backing of a 3-year, $2.8 million Small Business Support Hubs Grant from the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. Allen was the only African American to receive the funding out of 27 recipients across Michigan.
For more information on Racheal and the OSchool, click here.
FOR HOT TAKES:
THE REAL ESTATE SCHEME GOBBLING UP DETROIT, ONE DIGITAL TOKEN AT A TIME
Up next, the president and CEO of the Operation School, or O-School, Rachel Allen, joins Authentically Detroit to discuss how she's helping people get their businesses legal, branded, operational, noticed, profitable and ready to scale. But first this week's hot take from Outlier Media featuring Erin Mondry, the real estate scheme, gobbling up Detroit one digital token at a time. Keep it locked. Authentically Detroit starts after these messages.
Speaker 2:Founded in 2021, the Stoudemire is a membership-based community recreation and wellness center centrally located on the east side of Detroit. Membership in the Stoudemire is available on a sliding scale for up to $20 per year or 20 hours of volunteer time. The Stoudemire offers art, dance and fitness classes, community meetings and events, resource fairs, pop-up events, the Neighborhood Tech Hub and more. Members who are residents of the Eastside have access to exclusive services in the Wellness Network. Join today and live well, play well, be well. Visit ecndetroitorg.
Speaker 1:Hey y'all, it's Orlando. We just want to let you know that the views and opinions expressed during this podcast episode are those of the co-hosts and guests and not their sponsoring institutions. Now let's start the world. Welcome to another episode of Authentically Detroit, broadcasting live from Detroit's East Side at the Stoudemire inside of the Eastside Community Network headquarters. I'm Orlando Bailey and I'm Donna.
Speaker 3:Givens.
Speaker 1:Davidson, we are all here. We are back. Thank you for listening in and supporting our efforts to build a platform of authentic voices for real people in the city of Detroit. We want you to like, rate and subscribe to our podcast on all platforms. Happy Black History Month, everybody. We're celebrating all month long. Donna and I are joined today by two very special guests. First, up for Hot Takes, we have journalist Erin Mondry here to discuss a haunting story about Detroit's real estate market Detroit's real estate market. Then we have the president and CEO of the Operations School, rachel Allen, here to discuss her entrepreneurial journey and how she came to form the O School. Aaron and Rachel, welcome to Authentically Detroit. Great to be here.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Thank you for having me. Aaron, you're like an O Pro. This is like your third or fourth appearance, right? Yeah, I think third, you're an old pro, but, rachel, we've not had you on, so welcome to Authentically Detroit. We're excited to talk to you.
Speaker 5:I am so excited to be here.
Speaker 1:We've been talking before the mics were rolling and I mean it's just been a divine conversation already. I'm excited to continue. It has been wonderful, it has, donna, how you doing.
Speaker 3:It's good to see you, I'm great. You know I'm wearing my lion sweatshirt. Wore it on purpose because my team couldn't be there. But you know, I just started watching football in around 2001. And the first team I fell in love with was the Eagles. Really.
Speaker 2:And I fell in love with the Eagles.
Speaker 3:Because of Donovan.
Speaker 2:McNabb, mcnabb.
Speaker 3:Because my dad's name is Donovan, my grandfather's name was Donovan and he's a black quarterback playing for a professional football team at a time where there were so few. So Andy Reid was the coach of the Eagles. And so to see my team, my first team that I loved when I first started watching football. Wynn was great. And then, of course, there was a Kendrick concert which, I have to say, everybody didn't get it. But isn't that great about art that people don't get art and then they have to listen to it and understand it and by now people who hated it are saying oh wait, a minute, that's deep, I get it now.
Speaker 3:So that, of course, I get it because I'm a Kendrick fan, but for those who are just initiated, it was a great day.
Speaker 1:I had to post on Facebook to say we are not about to fall out over whether Kendrick was good or not. I love y'all. This was fun. It's like we are not getting ready to do this as a community.
Speaker 3:You've always been a lot nicer than me. You've always been a lot nicer than me. I saw that. I saw your initial post and I saw you clean it up and I was like look at Orlando.
Speaker 1:I'm so proud of you. I'm going to be like you one day. But wait, Kendrick was really a menace in that performance. Oh my God, did y'all see? It Did y'all see his performance, how he looked right at the camera as he's prancing on stage talking about some hatred.
Speaker 3:If this had happened last year or the year before last, that would have been one thing, but it happened three weeks after an orange menace took, you know, control of the White House and is now trying to be king. And so now is a time for some radical rage, some radical fight back, and so to have Samuel.
Speaker 4:L Jackson come out there as Uncle.
Speaker 3:Sam and recast his role, reprise his role as Django to try to soften everybody. And then people play into that. I thought it was genius. I thought it was great. I've watched it several times since. So I'm doing very well this Monday. Happy Black History Monday after the Super Bowl.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes. Well, I'm really, really excited to get into today's show because this next story, the real estate scheme gobbling up Detroit, one digital token at a time. You know like I work at Outlier, right, but I read this when it first came out, like everybody else, and Aaron was not in the newsroom when I finished reading, but I got up from my seat and started applauding because this is phenomenal, phenomenal work, phenomenal reporting coming out of Outlier, and I know I'm biased, but so what?
Speaker 3:No, you're not biased. It's phenomenal. Nobody else is talking about this. Let me tell you something. I Googled this to see what other people are saying, and literally nobody is talking about the risk in low-income communities. To these the fractional ownership or whatever it is yeah the crypto. Nobody else is talking about this, aaron. How did you pick this as a story? Hold on, let me get through it. I'm sorry, let me get through it real quick.
Speaker 1:So one of the world's largest cryptocurrency real estate marketplaces has bet big on Detroit, but the anything goes ethos of crypto investing has created chaos for tenants in its properties and is at odds with Detroiters need for responsible landlords who know what they are doing. For months, this firm's property managers have done little to no repair work on hundreds of approximately 1,000 rental properties it claims to oversee. It doesn't have leases for many of its tenants, some of whom said they don't even know who to pay rent to, but that hasn't kept the company from threatening eviction. County records show that hundreds of its properties are in danger of tax foreclosure. County records show that hundreds of its properties are in danger of tax foreclosure. The source of this chaos is Realty, a Florida-based company with an experimental and controversial business model. It runs an online marketplace catch this y'all that sells what it calls fractional ownership of its properties to overseas investors. There are typically hundreds of investors in each property. Realty outsources property management to local companies, but remote oversight in Detroit has so far been a disaster.
Speaker 1:Shakira errors Ayers had been homeless before moving into her Eastside Detroit home in 2018. She's grateful for the state subsidized rent that's providing stability for her and her two children. But the problems with Ayers home are piling up and she said the property manager Realty hired has been unresponsive. She can't use the shower because the knobs don't work and in 2023, her toilet overflowed, ruining the carpet. Black mold started growing on the walls, ayers said. She put in several work orders but nothing ever got fixed.
Speaker 1:The company's real estate arm, which operates under several iterations of the name Michigan Real Token in Michigan, has racked up more than 1,000 black tickets in just a few years, most of which are unpaid. Ayers wants to move out, but feels trapped by the low rent. Help might not be on the way. The business appears to be in deep financial hole In a deep financial hole. Us Postal Service data suggests more than 100 of its properties are vacant. In addition to residents clamoring for repairs, the company is behind on taxes for at least 300 properties. More than 200 of these properties will be foreclosed unless the debt is paid by March. According to the county and city databases, michigan Real Token owes the city at least catch this $2 million in unpaid taxes and blight tickets.
Speaker 1:Realty co-founders John Mark Jacobson and his brother Remy Jacobson said their problems have nothing to do with cryptocurrency or their business model. Instead, they blame former property managers, saying that one company scammed them by keeping the cash meant for work orders and tax bills. The Jacobsons said they couldn't name the property manager because they're planning litigation, which is ridiculous. It's a lot to unpack. A lot of people are just now hearing about this fractional ownership where they where. That's only happening overseas, here in Detroit, for Detroit properties. Aaron, tell us how this story came to be. Talk about the series on specularities and how you came up with this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because just real quickly I Googled fractional ownership and I see a lot of people advocating for it, so I'm curious how you came up with it and how you realized it was a problem as well.
Speaker 4:Yeah, so, as Orlando mentioned, I'm working on a series on property speculation in Detroit and I've been doing a number of background interviews with experts on speculation and the Wayne County tax auction, and one of them said she noticed some curious LLCs in property deeds. She's like there's this company, michigan Real Token. I wonder if it's related to cryptocurrency. So that was just the little seed that caused me to go down this rabbit hole. That turned out to be substantially bigger than I ever expected it to be, and there isn't a ton of information out there about fractional ownership and tokenization and cryptocurrency and real estate.
Speaker 4:This is a fairly new thing in the real estate marketplace in the United States. Has most of their portfolio in Detroit, is? It's pretty wild and, yeah, there's a lot of different ways we can break this down. Donna, you mentioned harm to tenants. I was mostly curious about this business and how it works, and I sent one of the co-founders a couple of inquiries and didn't get a response, and so then I just decided to start knocking on doors and I found that their work on the ground was severely lacking, and basically every tenant who I talked to cited a litany of issues and more or less non-existent property management.
Speaker 1:Can you make the distinction? Because I remember a story that came out a little bit, I think in fourth quarter of last year, about the city of Detroit now taking cryptocurrency as a form of payment. Some people are like, oh, I heard about this because we can pay for this. Can you make that delineation?
Speaker 4:I don't feel entirely comfortable drawing that direct line from the city's motivation for accepting cryptocurrency, and I have questions about it myself. I wonder exactly why they feel it would be in their best interest. Certainly, most Detroit residents aren't going to be paying their tax bills in cryptocurrency. So who exactly is this benefiting? Um, you know, a lot of Detroiters aren't even banked, let alone, you know, have crypto wallets. So I do think it's probably most likely for, you know, investors like Realty. Um, but you know, I I don't, but I don't know the exact line between those two things.
Speaker 3:But when I was reading about the cryptocurrency, most people are celebrating it's this new thing, and what it kind of reminds me of is financial derivatives in the 2000s, which were used for mortgages where nobody owned the full mortgage, but you had these people who were purchasing derivatives. And when you fracture or fractionalize the ownership, then it means nobody's really accountable for anything. It means that also nobody's really carrying all of the risk, because I'm carrying a fraction of the risk If this goes south. I haven't invested that much, and so I think, on two levels, that we've already seen what breaking down ownership into these small derivative parts means in terms of real estate markets. That's what collapsed the housing market in the 2000s, and now we're doing it again, but we're calling it something different. Cryptocurrency is a mechanism, but the fractional ownership is. One of the big problems is that lack of integrity, and I think you also said that there's not capital reserves associated with these properties to maintain. Did I read that?
Speaker 4:I don't know if we really got into it in the article. The company says that they have maintenance reserves set aside for each property, but there's obviously some kind of disconnect happening there. But I do think you hit the nail on the head with regards to this thing called the free rider problem. So there's so many people who have so little invested that they don't have the incentive to do the due diligence and make sure the company that's supposed to be overseeing these properties in this case Realty is actually doing a good job, and the company itself is based in Boca Raton, florida, so they're not here on the ground being hands on in their property management. So it's like layers of remoteness here.
Speaker 3:I know that there's also going back to the question about cryptocurrency. There's a push from the president and the shadow president Musk to embrace cryptocurrency.
Speaker 1:I mean they created a coin, they released a coin the day of the inauguration.
Speaker 3:I think that to the extent that this mayor of Detroit is aligned with their thinking in many ways. It's not surprising to me that the city of Detroit is adopting some of those practices, because it feels like there are those cities where people are pushing back and saying being a little bit more resistant, but I don't know that Detroit is one of those places that is really protecting consumers in the way that it shouldn't, or Detroiters, consumers and Detroiters Well, that's what it should be.
Speaker 3:Detroit consumers black folks, okay, I feel like we are unprotected by our government and we have been for so long, and this is just another iteration of what the unprotection looks like.
Speaker 1:Can you talk about whether or not you went down a legality rabbit hole. How is this legal?
Speaker 4:Or is it legal? I mean, I think this is such a new way of operating that the regulatory framework is still sort of difficult to decipher. How exactly is a Boca Raton-based company doing interstate commerce in Detroit, exclusively with overseas investors, subject to laws in Michigan or the United States? I don't know. I genuinely don't, and I don't know if the Michigan Attorney General's office does. I don't know if the city of Detroit does. We're in uncharted waters here, but I also feel like this.
Speaker 3:Fractional ownership is a thing right now. It's how people are purchasing homes. People are purchasing all kinds of things. I think fractional ownership for investor properties is something that is unique, or perhaps not that unique, but it's done in places with very little regulation, from what I can read. But I went down the rabbit hole and found that all of these people are saying, hey, fractional ownership is the new way. And again it reminds me of the 2000s.
Speaker 3:It reminds me of the 2000s when people were really pushing these derivatives and everything's great, anybody can own a home, and you had these people selling mortgages to people and they didn't have to worry about anything because as soon as that mortgage was sold, it was placed with these folks and these derivatives and it was sold and sold and sold again.
Speaker 3:So whoever placed the mortgage did not bear the consequence for what happened afterwards. And it feels like in this instance you have people who are investors not bearing the consequence, maybe not even knowing that these things are going on, that we're not paying taxes. But ultimately, sometimes down the road especially if you get somebody in office who's willing to regulate and support residents you're going to have people losing these properties to tax foreclosure and not being able to get them back, and that means these investors will lose a little bit of money at a time on all of these properties. So it feels like it's a pyramid scheme that is doomed to fail at some point and it will have wide ranging impacts. And then you know a lot of times what ends up happening is we blame the tenants.
Speaker 1:And our fragile housing structure right now Exactly. The housing stock is already fragile. Can I ask you this question, erin? Can you talk about like the cost to play right? You know the fractional owner. I remember it being like absurdly low. The fractional owner. I remember it being absurdly low and people were, if it made money, were being paid dividends in crypto.
Speaker 4:But it also the prohibitions, like nobody in Detroit, nobody in America, can invest in this. Yeah, I mean, you know, donna sort of got at the appeal, potentially, of tokenization. I can see on paper why this might be an attractive thing for people. It's like the barrier to entry is very low it's $50 to buy a single token. And a lot of regular folks are also barred from investing in real estate, either because individual properties are too expensive or things like real estate investment trusts.
Speaker 4:You need to put down a certain minimum amount of investment to get started. So you know, and also real estate is a very illiquid asset. And also real estate is a very illiquid asset. So if you want to sell a house, it's going to take months or longer to get your money back. With tokens, in theory, you can get your money back in a matter of hours or days. Realty says it will buy back up to $2,000 worth of tokens a day from investors $2,000 worth of tokens a day from investors. And there's also a secondary market where these tokens can be subdivided even further into crazy fractions if they want and, yeah, you know, manipulated in all sorts of ways. You know, in a house in a block in Detroit they have no idea about, and the interest is astounding. The demand for these tokens is truly unbelievable. One of the co-founders previously said that all of the tokens for a house costing about $60,000 will sell in less than 10 seconds.
Speaker 4:Yeah, when they put it up, they will all sell in less than 10 seconds Mind-blowing.
Speaker 1:Oh, my goodness, we got to take a quick break.
Speaker 3:It is extremely risky.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's take a quick break. More with Aaron Mondry from Outlier Media when we come back.
Speaker 6:Have you always dreamed of being on the airwaves? Well, the Detroit Eastside Engaged Podcast Network, or DEEP for short, is here to make that dream a reality. Located inside the Stoudemire, the DEEP Network offers studio space and production staff to help get your podcast idea off the ground. Doesn't take a whole lot of work to get started. Just visit the Authentically Detroit page at ecn-detroitorg or call sarah at 313-948-0344 welcome back everybody.
Speaker 1:we are here talking to outlier media reporter, aaron mondry, about fractional ownership of detroit, but being owned in crypto coin. Donna, you were getting ready to make a point, no it's just very risky.
Speaker 3:But people Detroit is portrayed around the world as the wild, wild west, this great market, untapped market. You can buy a home for $500 and become a millionaire, and so people have been purchasing property and you know this in Detroit for years, and a lot of the speculators that you're talking about. We have so many people from across the world who've been purchasing property in Detroit and functioning as speculators and slumlords. We know this. But I think that the increased risk of this cryptocurrency just takes that risk to a whole nother level, because you have maybe even good people, maybe even some Detroiters are thinking, hey, I can buy this and I can make money too. It sounds good and you know that's the saying. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is, but unfortunately that's why you have entities like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Speaker 1:That's why you have.
Speaker 3:well, I mean, that's why the czar hasn't to that, you know that's why we had we had we had federal regulations following the Great Depression Right, and all of those things are being reversed and it feels like was the Glass-Steagall Act was reversed under Bill Clinton and that paved the way for predatory mortgages, and now we've moved away from predatory mortgages to predatory rentals and it's all these predatory instruments of wealth extraction from poor communities.
Speaker 3:They're doing this in one of the poorest communities in the nation and there's something really horrible about doing this here, but you do these things in places where people are unprotected by their government and unprotected by knowledge and unprotected by court systems that allow these things to go on. You're not doing this in Bloomfield Hills or in Grosse Pointe although I imagine there's a market there to sell those homes but you're doing it in safe places for investors to be able to get away with just about anything, and so knowledge is power. This is in outlier, I read outlier and I've been reading outlier, but I wonder how we get this story to a larger platform. Of course, authentically Detroit is taking it to another level, but to a larger platform as well as Authentically Detroit, because I think Detroiters need to understand and we are in the midst of municipal elections. Maybe there's something we can do on a local level to begin cracking down on that. What do you think?
Speaker 4:Well, I do hope that other publications pick up this story. I think it's worthy of-. Thank you, WXYZ.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Bridge Detroit. Thank you to all of the media partners who've already republished.
Speaker 4:Oh okay, wonderful, and I think there's more reporting to do. Also, you know there's very serious questions about Realty's business operations that I hope gets looked into either by other journalists or regulatory authorities, and I think that there's harm to tenants happening here. So you know, perhaps there Can we park here for a minute, donna was talking about the people that this has harmed.
Speaker 1:And Shakira Ayers. Right when I read her name and I saw her photo and saw the space where she is living, you know my heart, my heart, was breaking. Tell us about her. Tell us about the process of talking to her and getting her story.
Speaker 4:I mean, she more or less was just ready to, and this was the case with most people I spoke to, but they had been living in sub-park conditions for quite some time In a lot of cases. So Realty bought their first property in Detroit in 2019. And they really ramped up their purchasing in the last three years and they have had, I would say, substandard property management for a while prior to Realty. Even it got worse under Realty in a lot of instances, from what I could find, and I think a lot of these people were just really fed up.
Speaker 4:So Ayers and Kimberly West, who's also featured in the story, and a couple of other tenants you know, if you're it's not easy to talk about. You know a home you've been living in that one tenant told me has smelled like sewage for months. Or you know black mold is've been living in that one tenant told me has smelled like sewage for months. Or you know, black mold is growing on the walls when your two kids are there, it's. But at the same time, I think that you reach a level of desperation where you just need to talk to someone who who might be able to make something happen. You know, improve your situation.
Speaker 1:So this is a series that we will continue to put out at Outlier, the Speculator series. But I think it really also boils down to what Aaron said, that a curiosity and an interest will be piqued on part of other journalism outlets, outlets who have way more resources than we do to pick this up and to blow it up. Erin, it is always a pleasure having you on the podcast. Thank you for coming on.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's so important to have a voice and somebody looking into what's happening in the communities. We hear stories here and there, but I think that you following these stories and doing the investigation is so important. I'm hoping that we can get you back in a few months and keep having you come back so that we can stay updated what's happening in the housing market. There's nothing more important to me than what's happening in housing in our city. Housing is a human right and we aren't doing a very good job protecting that. Thank you.
Speaker 1:We will be right back with Rachel Allen. Keep it locked.
Speaker 2:Rachel Allen, keep it locked. Pop-up events, the Neighborhood Tech Hub and more. Members who are residents of the Eastside have access to exclusive services in the Wellness Network. Join today and live well, play well, be well. Visit ecndetroitorg.
Speaker 1:Welcome back everyone. Launched in 2019 by serial entrepreneur and nonprofit executive, rachel Allen, the old school serves more than 1,200 students per year free of charge, helping them get their businesses legal, branded, operational, noticed, profitable and ready to scale. Allen co-founded or, I'm sorry, founded old school to help black business owners beat some very stacked odds Eight out of 10 black owned businesses fail within the first 18 months, according to a Bloomberg report. By drawing on lessons from her own experiences as an entrepreneur and modeling it into her flagship curriculum, get your blessings legit. Now business I don't know what I'm reading. Business is what he's trying to say. No, we can keep it rolling. Griff. My producer's like oh, you got to do it again? No, we don't, it's okay.
Speaker 1:Now, two years after quitting her day job to run Old School full time, allen's program is picking up some major steam House and centric place. Y'all got to see this place, a first of its kind incubation space for black arts, culture and entrepreneurship in farmington hills. Old school is expanding its reach through partnerships with the apple developer academy, the lansing economic development corporation and the michigan black business alliance. It also now has the financial backing of a three-year $2.8 million small business support hubs grant from the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. Allen was the only African-American to receive the funding, out of 27 recipients across Michigan. The success is not taken for granted by Allen, who invested more than $200,000 of her own money before securing the grant. Wow, sounds like a divine journey and path. Absolutely Tell us why.
Speaker 5:You know, sometimes when I hear that introduction being shared, I'm like who is that Like? It doesn't even sound like me, but when I think about the things that I had to go through or experience to get to that point, it makes a little bit of sense. Right and so? No, the journey has not been an easy one, but it is nothing short of being divine.
Speaker 3:So important to have that we were talking a little bit before we started. I had a business for five years and I wish I'd gone through this academy first. I've run nonprofits but you know, running an actual business there's certain things that you have to know. When you're not getting grant money to pay your bills, you know you have actually customers. Can you talk about the challenges why so many businesses fell within the first 18 months? I lasted five years. Okay, I'm a success story. No, I'm just joking.
Speaker 5:Well, you definitely were a success story to get to five years because, to your point, so many people can't get past ideation, let alone celebrate one year or three or five years. So you know, I'm going to say this to say I'm actually a reluctant entrepreneur. So my mom was the first entrepreneur I had ever met and she quit her job, cashed in a 401k when I was 10 years old to essentially offer business support services to businesses on the east side. When you know, when I was growing up and as a direct result of some of the things that she went through or some of her sacrifices, things were always incredibly tight for us financially. So I can remember so many instances where our kitchen table was full of entrepreneurs and my mom was coaching them through a business plan or a marketing plan or something of the sorts in the nineties, and I would see those experiences and kind of correlate them to our lack of housing or stability and things of that nature and I said I never want to be an entrepreneur nature. And I said I never want to be an entrepreneur never.
Speaker 5:And yet somehow, when I was 21 years old, I started my first business. I opened a farmer's insurance agency. I had never sold anything before and I became a top producing agent in a year. And so what I called myself doing was taking everything that I learned at Farmers and I would just replicate it. I would watch friends repeat. I would start businesses in almost every single industry because I just did not want to be poor. So in my mind I thought, well, if I just have a bunch of businesses, then I won't be poor, right, but I hated it, and so entrepreneurship was hard. I always felt like I was starting something, I get really excited about it and I fail at it or quit or just wouldn't have the resources for it. And then it took me a while to realize that the reason why a lot of my initiatives were failing is because they weren't purpose aligned. I was doing them because-.
Speaker 5:That's important, absolutely, because they make money right and I can pay my bills. And if I do this thing a little harder, then maybe I will be able to make the ends meet. And so it was also during a time I had this really expansive professional career and I'm learning operations, I'm running nonprofits, literally managing all of the complexities of these organizations. But I will always keep a side hustle because I also was still in scarcity mode, right.
Speaker 1:And that's what we do in Detroit. This is what we do.
Speaker 5:Everybody has a job and a few hustles, and again it's rooted in scarcity, because I can't trust that I'm not going to lose this corporate job where I have to be able to provide for my family in this kind of way. And I remember having this moment where I was in a class at the Build Institute where I said, well, wait a minute, somebody should come up with a program that teaches entrepreneurs both the things they need to just start their business but also how to operate it. And that's where I saw a gap and, to be honest, I didn't actually want to be the person that solved that problem. I sat on this idea for about two years and just went back to work and kind of was like well, you know, maybe somebody else will come up, do something with that idea. And as I was continuing to find my way professionally, I kept getting promoted or advanced and I was, you know, getting the kind of opportunities professionally that somebody would say you know, that's your dream job, that should be really it.
Speaker 5:But I wasn't content and I started to think that there was something wrong with me, because at this point again, I have all of the material things, I'm getting all the awards and the accolades, but I kept feeling like there was just something missing and I didn't really understand that. It wasn't until the pandemic, when I started having a lot of life happen to me, that I started being really curious about why I was put here. So I shared with you all before the start of the show that my son and my nephew were incarcerated in January of 2020. Again, I was on this big professional facing job where I was supposed to like show up and do all this great community work, but I was dying on the inside. And then throw the pandemic in there and it gave me a chance to get really clear about what I wanted to do with my life and for a while I did not know. So I would ask myself every day what do you want, what do you want to do? And I'm like I don't know.
Speaker 5:Searching for purpose I was searching for that purpose and it's like I'm super smart, I know all these things, but I don't know what it is. And that is when I started to see how all the things that happened in my past were part of that purpose. So here I was. I had gone to Mary Grove to be a teacher. I thought that teaching I was going to be teaching third graders, or you know I learned how to move up in central office, so I learned how to run schools.
Speaker 5:I was employee number one at multiple charter schools getting started, so I was literally building schools from the ground up. I had learned how to run nonprofit organizations and everything that you know, from fundraising to the operations management. It had never occurred to me to put all of that into one place. And so when I took that leap and left corporate and started Centric Place, you know, when I hear, I didn't even know that I had $200,000, let alone to invest it into this dream. But it has been the most deeply satisfying thing that I've ever done, which is to take everything that I've learned, be able to package it in a way that the everyday person can understand business acumen and the things that they need to run a business, and now I realize that part of my purpose is tied to teaching, helping and serving, and if I get to do all three of those things in any one way, then it's absolutely a yes for me.
Speaker 1:You described a multi-year process. I mean, so many people are searching for their purpose and want their output to be in alignment with their purpose. How long did it take, for real, for real, for you to get to this place?
Speaker 5:So I would say it was 2021 when I started asking the deep existential questions, which is you know, man, like I feel, like there's more than I'm being called to do, and what I can tell people now is, when you are feeling that nudge, it's because you are a call for something else.
Speaker 5:It's just you're finally waking up to that purpose. So 2021, I'm asking those questions and, if I'm probably being honest, it's like fall of 21. It was fall of 22 when I opened Centric Place, but there were a lot of things that happened between that year of having to say no to a lot of things and other opportunities. I remember that was a period where, as I was winding down my time in one corporate role, I kept being offered other, bigger, more visible roles, and so I had already decided okay, I'm going to quit my job, I'm going to step out on faith and I'm going to bet on me. This is what I'm telling myself. And then I would be offered a bigger job, and it will almost be as if the universe was saying are you sure? You sure you don't want this good paying job?
Speaker 1:And there would have been a time With predictable income, with predictable income and you're going to really be in charge and benefits.
Speaker 5:Like a normal person would have said yes, this is what I've been looking for. But it was in that moment where I knew that God has given me a very specific plan, and it included saying no to anything. That wasn't this plan that he had put before me, which is to build something like Centric Place. And so you know I can see it now clear as day but when the steps were happening, it wasn't a linear path.
Speaker 1:And you're helping people find that clarity. Because people need that clarity now, because when opportunities come, I think we feel a lot of pressure to say yes to them without holding them up against the mission, the purpose, the mission, the purpose and the value. Can I just?
Speaker 3:say I actually was in the charter school management business for five years and, yeah, my mission is helping kids and families, but my values were not aligned with that industry at all and it took me out right, I had to listen to NDRR River Rise several times.
Speaker 2:You know Lord, help me find my way. I'm serious.
Speaker 3:I had to really reconnect to who I am as a human being in order to get connected to that purpose, because when you are doing and acting in somebody else's purpose, you lose yourself, don't you?
Speaker 5:Absolutely, and I can't tell you how many entrepreneurs come to me with this feeling of I'm not really sure what my purpose is. How do I find it? And I think sometimes what they love and probably hate about old school is they come to us with a set of businesses In most case, they're serial entrepreneurs so they're going to tell us with a set of businesses. In most cases, they're serial entrepreneurs, so they're going to tell us that they have multiple businesses. But I am usually the person who challenges their thinking, which is, if it's not purpose aligned, I want you to quit it right now.
Speaker 5:I don't care if you've been doing it for a few years, I don't care if it's something your mom and them like that you do. You are doing it because you think that you're going to be able to control the outcome, where what I try to encourage people is, when you are doing the work that you were designed to do, you cannot fail, and the opportunities, the abundance, the overflow, it's going to chase you down, don't you want that? So, again, if you're telling me that you, own a Say that again yes, the opportunities it will chase you.
Speaker 5:It will chase you down. And I'm saying this as a person who you know had been that consultant, or a person who had to chase business and feel like you're selling your soul to find clients. I don't advertise, I don't market, I don't do anything other than just you know, be my whole black self. And we have begun to create multimillion dollar enterprises in a very short amount of time because everything that we do is so purpose-aligned.
Speaker 3:Now you're from the East Side, right, Absolutely so how do we get you on the East Side to speak?
Speaker 1:to some of our folks.
Speaker 3:Seriously. We have a small business hub on Mac not far from here and we're working on the same kinds of things, and it feels like there's a partnership, at least a speaking engagement, where you can come home and have some conversations with the folks over here because what you're saying is really important. I have another question, though Is everybody cut out to be an?
Speaker 5:entrepreneur? Absolutely not. And let me sit there for a second, because I generally will ask folks the same way, that not everyone is called to ministry, not everyone is called to entrepreneurship. So in the same way, I say, could you imagine yourself being in a pulpit? And people are like no, then why do we all think that we're called to entrepreneurship? I think that it is a calling because you have to be both visionary, you have to see something that no one else sees. You have to also be a whole lot of other skill sets that in this generation has been condensed to. I don't want to work for anybody else Versus. You're somebody who can lead in uncertain times. You can operate with nothing right, with a negative bank balance. So I don't believe that everyone is called to entrepreneurship.
Speaker 5:But what I do believe is that entrepreneurship is one of the truest pathways out of poverty. And this is me saying this coming from a family where we were poor. We were so poor that I didn't realize how poor we were, because I grew up initially in 48205 and 48215. And everybody around us was poor, so I didn't even have a frame of reference of how poor we were. Almost everyone that I knew was on food stamps or got a bridge card or relied on public transportation. So again, it was a level of poverty that I just accepted as being what it is. But I'm also saying this as a person who has become that cycle breaker in my family and in the trajectory of my family. Having come off of welfare twice myself, I think I have a really unique perspective, which is, if you really want to change your station in life, entrepreneurship is the great equalizer. Can't nobody take away your ethic and your hustle, and I think that's specifically true about people who come from the East side of Detroit.
Speaker 3:Oh, just one more thing, because you were a business owner and there's no business hours Like when you own your own business owner and I. There's no business hours Like when you own your own business. Your business hours are 24 hours. Something happens on a Saturday evening and boom, you got to take care of it. And I think Some people think they don't want to work for anybody because they don't want to have to do all of that, but the grind is real, isn't it? And how do you help people prepare for that?
Speaker 1:It's a lifestyle change.
Speaker 5:It is absolutely a lifestyle change, and I say this to say when they say, well, I don't want to work for anybody, what I inform them is you're going to work so much harder for yourself than you ever did for a job. So guess what? If you think that you're uncertain about the journey, stay in that job, because there are people. People need to work in some industries, right, we need workers. We can't have everybody be owners, but I also really encourage people to think about the support system that they've created around themselves. If you are trying to do something, build something, have something where other people around you don't see the vision, then you need supportive friends, you need supportive partners, you need supportive children, right. And so these have all been things that I've struggled with and had difficulty with, and so I try to just be super straightforward with people in our programming that this is the reality of it, because not everybody is cut out for this journey.
Speaker 1:Can you give advice to folks who may be listening, who is trying to come up with a clear mission, a clear purpose? What's the first step? What's the first step? It's like I know I'm called to do something else other than what I'm doing, but I don't know what it is. What's the first step?
Speaker 5:I'll say that, in addition to asking your creator why he created you so it's like asking the manufacturer, what am I here for? That might take months to figure out the other piece is ask people who you know and trust. And so I would ask people who really rocked with me, right, didn't matter where I was working, what I was doing, who saw me and got me, and I would say what do you think my gifts are? And I kept hearing something that I had never actually heard before.
Speaker 5:People would say things like you have the gift of administration. I didn't even know that was a gift. I thought everybody could do the types of things that I could do easily. And so when I kept hearing that, I'm like there's something to that. And so if you trust people who know you, see you and get you, and they are all on the same page about where they see your gifts being, trust that, because even if you don't see it, they probably see it. I think the other piece is embracing the gift, right? So I would take for granted that I again have been employee number one in multiple things or that somebody told me your brain works a little differently than most people.
Speaker 5:I was so used to growing up in chaos that it served me well to make order out of things around me. I did not realize that that was a gift. And so, again, if I go into organizations and so by day I consult and at night I teach, I go into nonprofits and do fractional operations, support and capacity building things, I go into organizations that are chaotic and make sense out of them. So I say all that to say, when you can look back and put the pieces together, it'll start to make sense that if your gifts look like this, this and this, then lean into something that allows you to naturally make money being exactly who you are. And so now you know, sometimes I find myself.
Speaker 1:You don't have to be nobody else.
Speaker 5:You don't have to be nobody else. And I'm going to tell you something, and so many people you know. Sometimes I find myself you don't have to be nobody else. That's the best part. You don't have to be nobody else.
Speaker 1:And I'm going to tell you something and so many people are cosplaying other personalities and all kind of stuff, and this work is so much better being you.
Speaker 3:And some personalities do such a bad job trying to fit into those squares. You know my personality Nonprofits, right, I ran a nonprofit and it was more like a bureaucratic nonprofit. I was supposed to look at this state run case management system and learn all, and I just my brain wouldn't do that. I refused to learn it. I just I was so busy trying to create something new and the board was like ma'am. So when I came here, there was a freedom of being able to be fully myself, and when you find that match between yourself and your work, whatever it is, that's a beautiful thing. So what kind of businesses have you helped start? I mean, you said some of them are multimillion dollar businesses. Can you talk about specifically what they do?
Speaker 5:Yeah, so I started Operation School in 2019.
Speaker 5:That's our nonprofit that helps primarily black and brown business owners for free, manage and scale their operations, and so that is kind of our bread and butter. We do that at Centric Place, and so Centric Place, which I co-founded in 2022, is a first of its kind hub for black arts, culture entrepreneurship across the state of Michigan. That is where we do everything, from provide mailbox services or offices for rent, event rental space, but mostly a space where all of our businesses can gather. So folks are always coming together at Central Place for community based initiatives. But then I also lead a management consulting firm called Obsidia, and through that I have a team of diverse practitioners. We specialize in everything from operations, finance, all things tied to running organizations and small businesses, and so we partner with organizations all across the state, including some that you mentioned, apple Michigan State University, through their Apple Developer Academy.
Speaker 5:We are currently in nine sites across southeast Michigan and we're gearing up for national expansion, and so all of this work is work that kind of, to your point, orlando has happened very exponentially, but also organically, and this is what I really encourage people to think about. When you're doing what you love, it sounds so cliche, but when you are doing what you love, the opportunities will chase you down. So when someone says, hey, come to this community, it's a natural yes because it's in alignment with what I already desire to do. So even though I don't work traditional hours or you know, I'm always juggling multiple complex projects, because I am so divinely aligned Right, I say no to a lot of things so that I can say yes to the things that I truly desire. For the first time in life, I have more harmony. I won't call it work life balance, but I call it more harmony.
Speaker 1:Because people like us won't have balance. They got to be harmonious.
Speaker 5:Correct. I'm able to strategically take time away from my businesses so that I can lean fully on my teams to be able to keep things going, so that I can stay the visionary. But, most importantly, I take everything that I've learned going so that I can stay the visionary. But, most importantly, I take everything that I've learned so, as I hit new milestones and learn new things, I take that right back and prove it upon our curriculum and teach our small business.
Speaker 3:So again, one success story, one business that you've worked with, that you helped grow. I'm interested in learning what that story is.
Speaker 5:Yeah, so I love sharing stories about some of our alums. One business that I can share is Bianca Williams started with us in our very first cohort and she now runs Locks of Love. So just last year at the end of the year she celebrated a million dollars in revenue.
Speaker 5:And she, at one point, was my stylist when I had locks, and it's been phenomenal to see her grow from having started in a salon and exponentially grown to see her grow from having started in a salon and exponentially grown. We also work with you know folks like Catherine Coleman, who was opening Detroit's first balloon store, and so what we find is that businesses are getting a little bit of everything from other places in the ecosystem, right, so they're going to go to this program, that program, and they're going to piece it together. What we're hearing, though, is, when they come to old school, they're presented with a framework for the non-sexy parts of their business, and that's what we specialize in. We're going to talk about the stuff you don't want to talk about, but, particularly from a cultural competency perspective. We're going to talk about your credit being bad and how we cannot put you in front of commercial lenders if you cannot even look at your credit report. We're going to talk to you about all the— Help us.
Speaker 5:Listen and that's how we have to approach it, from a different lens than some of our providers in the network does. But, most importantly, we support everything from product-based businesses, service providers, folks who are the first entrepreneur in their family, who don't have a community of other people that they can just talk to about this journey, and also folks who literally come through our program multiple times because they'll say something like I went through it the first time, I mastered this and we'll let them come back. So I literally have had somebody go through the program three times because they're applying the work differently as their business grows.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's amazing. Are nonprofit startups too? Are they included too?
Speaker 5:Yeah, so interestingly, we've developed something that we call Executive Director School, which we would love to be able to expand in Detroit, because what happens is nonprofit leaders find their way into old school because they have the same challenges and problems. So we've been working with some funding partners to make that program more robust, where it's a whole curriculum just for nonprofit leaders, but with an operational lens.
Speaker 1:What have you learned? Talk about lessons. What have you learned from triumph from failing?
Speaker 5:What a beautiful question, I would say. The first one is if your vision does not require things that you don't currently have to fulfill, it, it's not big enough. And that is the team, the opportunities, right. Like when I saw this vision for Operation School, I paused on it for two years because I was too afraid to say, oh, I don't know how to do that, I don't know how to build a nonprofit from the ground up. But what I know now is that when the vision is so big that it forces you to have to grow up to fit into that vision, you're probably on the right track.
Speaker 5:I will also say that I am a very highly intuitive person and I listen to God and I listen to spirit a lot. It's caused me to lean into my intuition way more. So that's from making business decisions right or sharing vision with people who don't always see it. So trusting my intuition has been. So. That's from making business decisions right or sharing vision with people who don't always see it. So trusting my intuition has been a very, very valuable lesson, as it's related to the business, success and challenges. But then, lastly, I would say, to also not be ashamed of the struggles. I think what resonates with so many people in our program is I talk to them about. You know, the success story is okay. I was able to spend 200,000 of my own money, but I also had to do that. While most times my account might've been overdrawn, my credit score dropped 200 points. There were times when I didn't know how I was going to pay the rent at my building.
Speaker 5:Absolutely, and so we can talk about, you know, the season of overflow today, because I stuck with it when things were uncertain, and so I try to just be super transparent so that when people are having those experiences for themselves they don't feel alone or like a failure. I tell them that is part of the journey, do not quit, because if I had to quit in those years where it got progressively more challenging, I would not be sitting here today.
Speaker 1:Tell the folks how they can get in touch with you and get involved.
Speaker 5:Tell the folks how they can get in touch with you and get involved. Folks can check us out at operationsschoolcom or also rachelallencom.
Speaker 1:That's right, she's a business.
Speaker 3:I know right, that's amazing, she's a business.
Speaker 1:Rachel, thank you for coming on with us. Thank you for having us. We appreciate you. Listen. If you have topics that you want discussed on Authentically Detroit, you can hit us up on our socials at Authentically Detroit on Facebook, instagram or X I think we're on blue sky. Now, too, we are on blue sky. We are on blue sky because I think we're leaving X or you can email us at AuthenticallyDetroit at gmailcom. All right, donna, it's time for shout outs. You got any shout outs? I do.
Speaker 3:Can I shout out Serena for a minute, her block.
Speaker 1:You had any shout outs? I do. Can I shout out Serena for a minute? Crip, blocking her joy, come on girl Doing the C-walk Okay. That's what CBS called it this morning the C-walk.
Speaker 3:Okay, here's the story. Allegedly, she and Drake were in a relationship for five years.
Speaker 1:And it was very public.
Speaker 3:They were public, but not public enough, for she was his woman and he was her man in a way that made sense to most women. Ok, just bringing it from the sisterly point of view, this is not what most people want is, every once in a while, you dropping in and dropping out, but they are looking for something that Drake does not have the capacity to give other people based on his past and future and current performance. And so she finds love, she gets married, and he has the nerve to put a song out there degrading and disrespecting both her and her husband, and sometimes you just got to quip, walk away from those men and say you know what? I'm free now. And so I felt like she was doing it for pop out and show. But yes, she popped out and showed a few.
Speaker 3:I was so happy to see her because I love seeing people find their joy and, quite honestly, rachel is so wonderful listening to you find your joy. Um, that's, that's one of the pleasures in life. Yesterday it was Serena.
Speaker 1:I would like to shout out uh, professor Bernadette Atuahene. We have not had the podcast since her book launch talk that I moderated at the UDM Law School. If you guys don't have it, plundered is for sale at your local bookstore. Is for sale at online retailers. Go and get it. She tells an amazing history and really a frightening history of how Detroiters were dispossessed of their homes because of inflated and illegal property tax assessments, through people, through two main families who've experienced one of one family, one white family who've experienced, you know, the other side of it and how wealth and how they were recipients of spatial racism and segregation, and another family who, whose grandfathers worked at the same plant, made the same money. That piece of wealth, that home, wasn't passed down. It's an amazing tale of story, so go and get it. Shout out to her.
Speaker 3:She also does such a great job at explaining the legal framework for it all.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like she tells the story and then she helps you understand why. And the great thing about what she does is she doesn't point to an individual and say this is that person's fault. You can have racism without having racist intent. The problem is that the structures aren't protecting people, and so, much like Aaron's conversation earlier, we have to look at protecting people being intentional as opposed to saying and of course, in the past you did have intentional racism, but in 2025, most of these policies are colorblind and still perpetuating the same harm as if they had racist intent With many, many proxies.
Speaker 3:And if you look at, even going back to that earlier story, responsibility is so fragmented and fractionalized that no one person can be held accountable, and there's a lesson in that that we're going to have to think about for a minute as we think about how harm is perpetuated. It's not because necessarily of bad people and bad intent, and so she really does define and help us understand the structure Really. Great, great talk.
Speaker 1:Aaron Modry, do you have any shout outs?
Speaker 4:Sure, yeah, I'll shout out my lovely partner and two little kids who she is picking up from daycare now. And I just want to note your logo, which is really nice. It's headphones with three towers of the Ren Sen, which is still going to be relevant if they knock down two of them, so that's great.
Speaker 1:We were prophetic in our design of this. It took us a long time to figure this out.
Speaker 3:We need some of those $20 million coming our way for to figure this out.
Speaker 1:We need some of those.
Speaker 3:We had some Coming our way for the architectural and design Many different iterations.
Speaker 1:We can keep them up. Rachel, do you have any shout outs?
Speaker 5:I just want to shout out our students in old school we just kicked off a new cohort and we're expanding and so just super thrilled to be able to work with some new small business owners this week.
Speaker 1:All right, y'all that's going to do it for us. We thank you so much for listening. We'll see you next time. Outro Music.
