Yamundow grew up in an environment foreign to many of us. When her parents passed away in her youth, she was forced to live with relatives that treated her as a nuisance, not someone worth nurturing. She slept on the floor of her family’s home and was sometimes lucky enough to have a cardboard box as a mattress. She was set to be wed in her early teenage years, but thanks to her drive, determination, and pleading of her aunts, Yamundow was given a chance to go to high school and college and later immigrate to the US.
From there, Yamundow put success as her sole focus. She not only academically overachieved, but was able to do an INCREDIBLE amount of investing with almost no money, no credit score, and no experience in the industry. She now sits on over thirty rental units, with a monthly income that rivals most Americans’ yearly salaries. Yamundow has one of the most incredible stories we’ve ever shared on the podcast, and you’ll have to tune in to hear her unimaginable path to success.
David:
This is the BiggerPockets Podcast, show 761.
Rob:
This is the BiggerPockets Podcast, show 761.
You have about 34 doors now. 34 I think, is what you said. When you were a kid, sleeping on the floor, all you wanted was a bed of your own in a house.
Yamundow:
Yes.
Rob:
How does it feel to achieve what you’ve achieved?
Yamundow:
It’s unreal. It’s sometimes like, “This is me?”
David:
What’s going on everyone? This is David Greene, your host of the BiggerPockets Real Estate Podcast. Joined today, by that echo you hear in the background, Rob Abasolo with an episode that frankly I don’t have words for.
If you don’t like to cry, you might want to just turn this one off right now, because even the toughest person out there is probably going to shed a little tear and be incredibly inspired.
Rob:
Yeah. It’s a story of perseverance that I think hit home for me and will hit home for everybody at home. What do you think?
David:
Today’s guest, Yaamu Camara is like the poster child for BiggerPockets success. I mean, she built in three years of portfolio that you’ll be shocked by and she just used the basic techniques we talk about.
Before we get to this interview with Yaamu, which I know you’re all going to love and I’m going to ask you ahead of time to please share this podcast with other people, even if they’re not super into real estate, they will be, after listening to this.
I’m going to throw it to Rob for today’s quick tip.
Rob:
Ooh, we got a little curveball here, Dave. Well, lucky for you and for everyone at home, I came prepared. And my quick tip is, I’m not stalling. Buy your contractor lunch.
David:
All right. Without any further ado, let’s get to Yaamu.
Welcome Yaamu to the BiggerPockets Podcast. How are you this morning?
Yamundow:
I’m doing great. Thank you for having me.
David:
Yes. Let’s jump right into this thing. I want to hear about your story. So tell me where are you originally from, and can you give us an idea how you grew up?
Yamundow:
Sure. So my name is Yamundow Camara, but I go by Yaamu for short. I’m from West Africa, a small country called The Gambia West Coast is by Senegal. A little country inside Senegal literally. So it’s about two point something million.
I’m the seventh child of my family. And I grew up in that small village. I lost my mom when I was two and I lost my dad when I was 11. So I was raised by my elder sister and that’s a little background about me.
David:
So what was it like growing up there? Most of us have not traveled to the continent of Africa, much less where you’re from. Tell us a little bit about what daily life was like.
Yamundow:
Yeah. So it’s more of, we live in extended family. So when my mom passed, I was two. When my dad passed, before my dad passed, he was really sick so my sister was forced to get married, so she took me with her and my brother. My elder brother was four or five years older than me. So I grew up as an orphan in her in-law’s house.
It was hard growing up in an extended family that you don’t belong in. Because usually we live in a family. So let’s say, a family member. A husband has maybe four wives or five wives and they have kids. So that household is all, let’s say the last name is Greene. It’s like Greene Kundami. Everybody in the house is called is Greene.
So you coming in with a different last names, you don’t belong. There’s some activities that you will not participate in because you’re not a child of that household.
David:
So it was clear, growing up from an emotional standpoint you were a stranger in a sense in the house. I mean, they knew who you were but you were not welcome with open arms as if you were one of the kids. There was preferential treatment. You had at a very young age, you had to experience a lack of control and the pain that comes from not really having control over the outcome of your own life.
Yamundow:
Yes, basically.
David:
So I mean, you were thrown into a situation, you had very little control. Sounds like there was a lot of pain. Did you have your own room? Were you sharing a room with other people? What was that like?
Yamundow:
No. So sometimes I would come, and as a child just playing with other kids outside and I just run in to go drink water and there’s a meeting about us, about me and my brother being returned. So I always thought, “Oh, so we don’t belong here.” And it really hurts as a child.
I saw this meme on, saying on TikTok the other day and he clicked to me, I was like, “This is how it feels like.” “You don’t know what pain is until you live in somebody’s house who doesn’t really want you there.” And I was like, “That was me.” That clearly explained my life.
So I wasn’t allowed to sleep on the bed. So I would lay on the floor and when I say floor, I mean sand floor, not like cement, not like carpet or anything. So me sleeping on the floor, an eight-year-old, nine-year-old girl, I will have bedbugs. Sometimes ones will come and they will touch me and I’ll just wake up. So my brother made me this touch light, flashlight, you guys call it here. And I’ll just use batteries there, that night I’ll just wake up and I’ll kill the bedbugs on the wall.
So I guess, from there I was always obsessed with houses, because I never really had, my father’s house sometimes when I visit for holidays we would not eat sometimes. Sometimes we eat once a day and sometimes when I go one time it was a rainy season, the summer holidays and we would have to get up because the water was coming inside the house. That’s how poor we were. So even though the family that I lived with are not risked, still a village, but it’s a better nature where my, it’s better than my dad’s condition.
Rob:
Yeah, yeah.
Yamundow:
Yeah. So me laying down there as a girl, I always say, I’m obsessed with houses. So when I see friends from houses after school, I like to go to the houses and I always wondered, “One day I’m going to get this house.” “One day I’m going to buy a house.” But how did they buy multiple houses? I was just say, just the idea of having a house.
Rob:
Yeah. Yeah. You mentioned in that TikTok, well first of all, thank you so much Yaamu for sharing.
Yamundow:
I’m sorry.
Rob:
No, no, no. You mentioned in that TikTok that when you’re not wanted in the home, I think that’s when you experience the pain. Right? So I’m wanting to know, was that really the moment, that inspiration where you’re like, “I am going to find my own place one day. I’m going to have my own bed.” Was that sort of the beginning of your real estate dreams or did it come later on in life?
Yamundow:
Yes. That’s where it started. I always knew one day I’m going to make it and one day I’m going to buy home. That was my dream to say, “One day I also have a home and a bed.” So I’m like a house of my own.
Rob:
Is that your why? Is that today your why is the reason you do all this is basically to fulfill that dream?
Yamundow:
I have multiple why’s, but that’s one of them.
Rob:
What else you got? I want to know.
Yamundow:
Poverty. I don’t want my child to go through any of those things that I went through. Ever.
David:
That’s something as you were talking Yaamu, that I thought of the stereotype that wealth and money is the root of all evil. The people that say, it’s the wealthy people that are the problem. And I was thinking about for you growing up in a house, I’m sure the genesis of why people felt like they didn’t want you guys there.
They talked about you leaving. There was not enough money to go around. There was not. If you were not eating maybe one time a day, they were incredibly financially stressed. And so you’re a burden in a financial sense. You and your brother on this other family and they’re thinking from their flesh is, “What’s the easiest way to lighten my own load?” And the emotional pain that has on someone else as you experienced was intense.
Now, fast forwarding to where you are now, you have 90 units that you own and more under contract. You’re making $80,000 a month. You’ve come a long way from sleeping on a floor, having to wake up to kill bedbugs that were looking to crawl into where you were.
I know, I just kind of gave a spoiler alert to everybody listening to this, but it is a fantastic story. This is something right out of a comic book. Do you know that you’re a superhero?
Yamundow:
[foreign language 00:07:43] Thank you.
David:
Okay. Well, we’re going to find out how you did this. Right? What happened? You went from just wanting a bed to owning multiple, multiple, almost a hundred units at this point.
So let’s go back a little bit again. We understand that life was challenging in other ways other than just financial, especially as a woman in a male dominated society. Can you list some of the things that you were not supposed to accomplish?
Yamundow:
Yes. So this is not how the life of a girl from my village supposed to be. I’m the only one that went to college in my village, where growing up a girl is supposed to just go to all the way to maybe middle school and then you’re supposed to get married.
For me, it was hard for my auntie to push and my sister to push for my uncles because the male have more say in the woman’s life. And so when you’re getting married your uncles take care of it. So by the time I’m 16, 17, they already thinking of arranged marriage. They’re already thinking of who you’re going to get married to. It’s already arranged for you.
So for me, for them to even let me to go to high school, to college was a big deal. Talk less of coming to America by myself, had not been married. So by the time I was in high school, most of my friends, friends that I grew up, they already had two kids already married and everything.
Rob:
Yaamu, did you have to fight to go to high school? Was that a really big battle with sort of, I guess your family or your extended family in the household? I mean, I got to imagine that probably didn’t come easy.
Yamundow:
Oh no, I didn’t have to fight. My aunties, I had to go through my aunties. I don’t have the audacity to stand up to my uncles. So my aunties will say, “I think she’s smart at school. The principal says she’s really good, she has a scholarship. We’re not spending any money. Just let her go.” The same thing with college, it was like, “She has a scholarship, let her go.” They begged. Okay.
They already had the person I’m going to get married too. I already knew who I was going to get married since I was a young girl. So it’s pre-arranged marriage. So I already knew. They were like, “Okay. She knew she, she’s going to marry this guy when she’s done.” So it was like, I’d go to my auntie, my mother’s sister, my mother’s elder sister, who’s passed now rest in peace. But she was fighting for me a lot and my sister.
Rob:
Wow. Yeah. So you mentioned that obviously your why, was the ability to eventually go on and have your own bed and own your home and you said you don’t want to go back to poverty and that was a big motivation for you.
Was that the same with school? Because you mentioned you’re very good at school. This was something that you worked hard at. Did you work hard, with school, in your mind at your ticket out at that moment? Did you know, “Okay, if I really crush it in school, if I study and I get good grades, this could be my ticket out of this life”?
Yamundow:
So for me, I was like, “Okay. If I do so great and every exam I’m on top of my school, I will always have scholarships.” So where I’m from is nepotism. For you to get scholarship, you have to be have connection to the government or something. I have none of those connections. So the only way to get through is be the best. The best from my school, the best outstanding one.
So I was hoping if I can get to that top, they will not say, “Oh, we don’t have money for her to go.” Or, “We don’t have this.” It will just be, “Oh, she has a scholarship, what are you losing? It’s nothing. She’s just going to go.” And that’s how it happened.
Rob:
Wow. Okay. This is an amazing story. Again, I thank you for the vulnerability here. Tell us a little bit about your first entry point into real estate. Was that here in the States? Was that back in Africa?
Yamundow:
No. So it started in the States, here.
Rob:
Okay.
Yamundow:
With Africa, I just knew that I was going to, one day I’m going to make it and buy a house. But at some point I just wanted to get out because the more I go on my education, the more I know this is not what I want. I want more.
So from high school, I know I want to go to college. I was like, “This is going to be a big deal for me to beg them to go to. So I have to do really good for me to get a scholarship to get it.” So I made it to college, because they eventually let me go to college. It was more like, “Okay, you have to be a doctor.” African families, they dictate your life. Especially if you’re a woman. So it’s like, “You’re going to be a doctor.”
I have good grades in chemistry, but I don’t like biology and chemistry at all. And I don’t like blood. So I was like, “I have to figure a way away.” So there was this program, computer science that was introduced because I was good at math. It kind of clicked for me and I was like, “This is what I want to do.” And they’re like, “You don’t want to be a doctor?” I said, “No, I don’t want to be a doctor.” So it clicked for me because I love programming and that’s how it is.
So me being in the college, but the girls that I started with, all of them dropped out. So I did a bachelor’s in computer science and a minor in mathematics. So during my final semester, at this point, there was just few girls or maybe two of us, I think two or one of us in the computer science class. So I’ll go to some classes, all boys. So I was like, “You know what? Let me start a nonprofit organization that’s going to teach girls how to program, how to code, just basic IT skills.”
So I started this nonprofit organization. At that time I ordered to have an internship at the software company in the country there. So I will use their computers and we will travel with my colleagues in the organization and teach girls basic IT skills, like how to create a calculator, how to create folders and stuff like that. So it kind of took off and then different regions were doing it.
So at that time there was this program called Mandela Washington Fellowship. And this time President Obama, this is 2016. President Obama was the president. So he started a fellowship, named it after Mandela in honors of Nelson Mandela. May his soul rest in peace. [foreign language 00:13:23] And it’s for young African leaders that are doing amazing things in their communities. Like fighting wars, helping women, violence, crime, all that stuff.
So a lot of people will send me this link and say, “You need to apply because you’re doing amazing things.” I’m like, “I can’t compare to what these people are doing, but okay, I’ll just apply.” And I applied and I keep going. First interview at the US Embassy, I was selected. Second one, and then moved on to the third one. And then they emailed me from DC and say, “You got it. You’re going to come to the US. You’re going to come to the US and we’re going to place you at Northwestern. And after your fellowship you meet President Obama in DC.” So that’s how I came to the US.
Rob:
Wow. That is amazing. I mean, was that a dream come true or was that so far out, because for me, I imagine you, your dream was to go to college, but maybe I’m sure you never imagined this. Right? So what did that feel like?
Yamundow:
I was celebrating. My auntie was so happy. So that was also a ticket that now she has to push. They have to push with my sister for me to come because my uncle would not let she. They were like, “She did not even, she got picked by the US government. Just let her go. She’s going to come back. She’s not go anywhere.” So I was like, at that time, I was like “I’m not coming back to marry this guy.” I mean, there’s so many other things for me. There’s more for to accomplish than just come back and get married and that’s it. And that’s what had happened.
But then I was already applying for other scholarship at that time. So by the time the US embassy was processing and doing the orientation of how it’s going to be when I meet the president, all that stuff, I was already applying for schools here in the US and I got a full scholarship to study at University of Illinois. And I was like, “When I come back, I’m not going back.”
Rob:
That’s amazing. So you were studying, I guess, computer science in Africa and then you come to Northwestern and what are you studying? At this point?
Yamundow:
It was business. Business and entrepreneurship. Yep.
Rob:
Okay. And so obviously you crush it. You make it. You finished the program and you go into these respective careers, or is this when your real estate journey begins?
Yamundow:
Yes. So when I left for the presidential test, came back in with a student visa to study for my master’s degree at University of Illinois. I was, because I was a student fellow, I was given a stipend of a thousand dollars. And I work for the university as a data analyst. So I analyze their data and they waved my tuition fee and they give me a thousand dollars stipend and a debit card, of course a bank account.
So I had to find roommates just to, because I only have a thousand, I have to pay insurances. All of that influence to their insurances is very expensive. So 500 goes there, the other 500 has to be rent of utilities and bus fair and all of that because I couldn’t drive or I don’t have a car. So with that 500, I have to find roommates to be able to get a place.
So I have multiple roommates. So what happened was my whole class, mostly what their parents will do is get them a place and then they will rent out the rooms. More like rent out the space is in the room. So in one room you can have, they can, so let’s say the rent is $800 or a thousand dollars.
They will rent out each room. They will rent out international students to sleep on there. So the whole concept of renting a room is more like renting a space. So you get your mattress and you share the one room with three other girls. So we were paying rent to them while they take the money, make profit, and take them money and pay their mortgage.
David:
We call that arbitrage.
Rob:
I was going to say it’s the ultimate house hack. House hack arbitrage.
Yamundow:
Yeah.
David:
Okay. So it sounds like, when you saw that happening and instead of thinking, “Well, I’m being ripped off.” Or, “That’s not fair, they’re charging more than they have to.” You thought, “Oh, I want to be in that person’s position. I want to own the asset and I want to be renting out some people.” Right?
Yamundow:
Oh, yeah. I was like, “This is amazing idea.” I was like, “I’m going to do this one day.” So I always had, even when I was starting searching for my first property, I was looking for a property that has more than one unit. So that way I can do more rooms too.
David:
I love that. See, your data scientist’s brain. Okay. The pattern that I need to catch on is a property with more than one unit, more than one bedroom, a lot of spaces that can be rented as opposed to a pretty kitchen or a nice backyard or, the things that everybody else is, “Oh, I love the oak tree in the front yard.” You’re like, “No, no, no. There’s no space in an Excel spreadsheet for an oak tree. I need to see the place that I can get the most beds into this unit.” I love that. When did you start trying to invest in real estate yourself?
Yamundow:
Yes. So after I graduated, of course, I don’t have any savings, but I don’t have student debt. And of course, coming as an international student and you get a social security, but I never knew anything about credit because I live in a school setting. I work for the school, I go home, study. Come back, work for school. Go home, study. Come back, go to class. That’s all I knew. So there was no introduction to credit or anything, credit score.
So I have a debit card that the bank gave me that I gave my thousand dollars from. That’s it. So I don’t have any credit. But again, when I graduated, I had a job to work for the CDC in Atlanta. So I moved from Illinois to Atlanta, Georgia to work for the CDC as a data scientist.
First couple of months I started September 2019, just a few months later COVID happened. But before COVID happened, I’ve already started doing my research because I was like, “I’ve never made that much money that I had.” At that time I have saved up 8,000. I’m like, “I’m ready by then.” Because I love reading. So I went and said, “Okay. My first paycheck…” Of course, I have to send money back home. And as an immigrant, and you can ask any immigrant, especially from Africa.
If you travel to the US or travel abroad, you are like the ticket. So everybody depends on you. Everyone. You have a ticket of your family and stuff. I’m like, “This is not going to work out where I just work and send money and that’s it. But when does it stop and how when do I save?” So I said, “This what I’m here to do. Going to take all what I save and then start investing in real estate.” And of course before thinking of, I already knew I would do real estate, but I don’t have the knowledge. So what I did was I googled, went on YouTube and I see BiggerPockets coming up a lot.
Rob:
Oh, yeah.
Yamundow:
Of course, David and Brandon, every Wednesday you guys have this event that you do. That’s me in there every day listening at work. I’m listening to the podcast. I’m cooking, I’m listening to the podcast. I’m in the train, going to work, I’m listening to the podcast. So by the time I was already had so much information, I said, “Okay. They said the best way to get funding,” Of course funding was number one, “is to go and work with local banks.” I was like, “Okay, I cannot afford Georgia.” Of course, at the time it’s like, “Let me start with where I saw what I wanted to do.” Which is Illinois.
So I looked at properties in that area. The same city that I went to college in Springfield and didn’t, I wasn’t finding properties. So I called different cities. Different banks in the city, made a list and I call each of them. Every day, I’ll make different calls and I get a lot of no, but I’m used to getting nos. I didn’t let that stop me.
So I finally got one bank to listen to me and I said, “I just started working at CDC, this is how much I make. This is just my best salary, but I’m going to get more as I go. And this is how much 8,000 is what I saved up. I’m ready. I’m buying, looking for properties and describe her that.” So I already have my document and my speech ready for when I call what I save.
Rob:
And how many banks did you call Yaamu?
Yamundow:
It’s a lot of banks. I think I listed all of that. I just went on Google and I listed all the banks. I called a lot of banks. I cannot, I couldn’t even tell the number. I call every bank in the city and in around the area.
Rob:
And then finally you got one that would hear your story.
Yamundow:
Yeah. So she wasn’t, well she’s the vice president of the bank now, but before she wasn’t. So she was like, “Well I know you got all these great things and you know how to analyze properties and you know what you want, what aspect you want to go to. However, you don’t have any credit score. What you can do is, go get a Discover credit card, Capital One credit card and build your credit score and then you can come back in six months or in one year.”
So I say, “Okay, at least she get to listen to me.” And then I was like, “You know what?” Because every day I’m analyzing this. I was listening to BiggerPockets, analyzing this every day. I was like, “I got this. This to be a chance.” So what I did was I was like, “This is what I would do.” I found a property that was listed for 52,000.
It was, the owners were going through a divorce and they were desperate to sell. They wanted to get rid of it. They wanted to separate and do all of that stuff. So I was like, “Okay, found this property.” I went under contract even before approaching the lady. So I approach her back and say, “I found this property, it’s 52,000. It’s three units, two bedrooms at least are rented for 750. 1 bedrooms are rented for this month.” Even if for one, only one unit is rented, my mortgage would not be, I’d still cash flow.
So I wrote the numbers down because I ran it and the calculator and everything makes sense. So I submitted to her and then I called her. I submitted via emailed first, and then I called her. She was like, “You know what? We’ll give you a chance.” And they were like, “We’ll finance it.” And that’s how it happened.
Rob:
Okay. So you call, you go down a list of basically every bank in the city. You keep hearing, no, no, no. But not a big deal because you’re used to hearing nos. So you just keep going.
Finally, someone is willing to hear you out and before you actually get the pre-approval or the approval from them, you find this house and you say, “I’m just going to make an offer. I’m going to get it under contract and I’ll figure out the financing later.” And so you get it under contract and then you go to your banker, you’re like, “Hey, I got it. Hello, can you approve me?” And they’re like, “All right, we’re going to make an exception for you.” And then they basically fund the loan?
Yamundow:
Yeah. They funded it. They were like, “Well, the reason why we did this, because it’s not like your credit score is bad. You just don’t have history.”
Rob:
Right.
Yamundow:
So because my credit is fresh, so it doesn’t have history, but it’s not bad. And I don’t have any other debt. I don’t have any other expenses. I don’t own a car that time. I’m not paying anything except those two credit cards she told me. And I was already paying those off for two months before she was like, “Okay, we’ll do it.”
Rob:
Wow, that’s amazing. So you buy this property and you said, “All right, even if I just rent one, I’m going to cash flow.” What ended up happening? Did that property end up filling up more than that? How many units was it?
Yamundow:
It’s three units and it’s a two bedroom. It’s a mix of two bedroom, one bedroom. Everything that could go wrong in a deal went wrong in the property. Turned out the property manager, the numbers that the agents sent me were wrong. The tenants were not actually paying because it’s a COVID at this time. I closed on that property April 17th. It was already shut down already. This is COVID time.
The one tenant that was about to leave. And there’s another tenant that hasn’t paid for one year. And then there was one unit that was vacant. So them telling me they fully occupied and was bringing this much was all a lie. So what I did was the unit that was the tenant was about to leave, was in a better shape. So I just painted that, just basic cleaning and painting and then rented that out.
So while that was rented, the rent was coming in. After there was a announcement that the government is going to, the city were giving out to people that were behind on rent. So remember that the landlord and everyone has lied to me already at that point. So the tenant that was supposed to get that amount of money, about eight months worth of rent was sent to me directly because it was supposed to be an application between the landlord and the tenant.
So we applied together and she got 8,000. So I took that 8,000 and I put it to renovate the other units. And now, it’s cash flow for 2000 a month, and my mortgage is only $300.
Rob:
Wow, that’s amazing. Okay, so a bit of a rocky start, but then you’re able to work it out. And out of curiosity, because you said at this time you were working for the CDC. Right?
Yamundow:
Uh-huh.
Rob:
Okay. So was this particularly a difficult time? Because obviously you’re working for the CDC, COVID is happening. I’m sure you’re busy doing your actual job and then you’re also getting into real estate. Everything is going wrong. So you’re trying to have it, obviously you have to balance everything. Was that overwhelming or was it like no big deal?
Yamundow:
It was overwhelming, but it taught me so much. So at that time in my team, everyone in my team is a lab scientist. So I work in the lab. I’m the data scientist. So every time a lab scientist go into the lab, let’s say they go at 2:00 AM I have to be up by 4:00 AM to run the data so they can run it. They can get the report to send it to a particular state. So imagine all the data that’s coming on all 50 states about COVID.
Rob:
Yeah. A lot.
Yamundow:
Yeah. It was a lot. So I will be up at 4:00 AM. I’ll have my laptop waiting to analyze data, while I’m also checking my real estate and trying to figure out what the numbers and everything. So it was not easy at all. But I was still listening to podcasts. I was already in. I had to figure it out, but it was not an easy time. Yep. It wasn’t.
Rob:
Right. And so you go on to buy more properties, but you said that you were sort of struggling, you were kind of saving and maybe you had to send a little money to your family back home and then you had to renovate this property.
So how did you keep saving money or how did you save money to keep buying more property? Was there a specific skill or strategy that you developed?
Yamundow:
Yeah. So when I got that first property stabilized, I was like, “Okay. What next thing I need to do is move out.” Because I’m not having any much cash flow coming in at that time. So the property was actually cash flowing a lot 2000 a month, but however, I’m not getting the money. It’s going back to the property manager.
So I was like, “The property manager was stealing from me.” Every time I talked to him. He said he uses his card to pay his contractor because most property managers come with their own team. So he said he paid his contractor, for example, he said, “I paid the contractor 5,000 to do the flooring and pay for this unit.” And I will just do my calculation. The numbers are not making sense, but I know that it’s cash flowing because the tenants are paying at this point.
And my property manager always say, “Oh, Chester this.” Or, “Chester that.” So I know the contractors name is Chester. Of course, I’m a data scientist. If I want to sign data anyway, I would find it. So I went and researched on him. It’s a small town. I researched on him, I found him, and I was like, “Hey, my name is Yaamu. I know that you don’t have to answer these questions, but I have this property in this place and this is the address and I know you walked on it.”
So he up responded back and said, “Yes, I will.” I was like, “Can we jump on a call?” And he was like, “Yeah, sure.” So I asked him, I was like, “Does this receipt make sense? Did you charge me this much?” He said, “Well, I don’t know.” He’s an honest guy, older guy. He was like, “I don’t know how much you guys talked about, about your contract, but I will never charge these prices. And this other receipt is not even for your property. This is for another property.” So it turns out that he was charging me, sending me receipts because I’m out-of-state investor.
He was sending me receipts off other properties that he was working on. And I was just paying for that. So I fired him. And of course, I stayed with the contractor and he’s a full-time contractor for me now. We have an amazing relationship. So even though everything went wrong, I got my team from there and he’s made me millions.
Rob:
Wow.
Yamundow:
I learned, I learned, and I have been with him ever since. Walked all my properties.
Rob:
It must have been actually great though that he ended up being a lot cheaper than you thought. Right? So whenever you used him again, it was actually more affordable. So how was it working with him, I mean? Because you said you worked with him to this day. Was he a large part of a lot of the projects that you went on to go and work on?
Yamundow:
Oh, yeah. He worked with all my properties in Illinois. So I invested to and meet with Illinois, Cleveland, Ohio, Illinois, and Georgia here. So all my properties, majority of my properties are in Illinois. He walked on all of them, but that’s how I scaled and then… So scaling from that property, after finding him, I was like, “Okay. I’m not going to find a deal. That’s as amazing as the 52 unit, $52,000 property. That’s three units that are placed for almost 90,000 after few months of fixing it.”
So I went, I was like, “Okay, where else could I invest in?” Of course, I went back to BiggerPockets and this time I’m so active. So I was like, “What do I do next?” So a lot of investors were talking about, especially California investors talking about buying Cleveland. They have properties, their cash flow is great. I was like, “Okay, maybe I should look into Cleveland.” So I went on BiggerPockets and I went and search Cleveland investors. So of course, you have segments of if you want to invest in a city, it was fine. Those investors there.
So I reach out to them, “Hey, my name is Yaamu, I’m a new investor. I’m looking to invest in Cleveland.” So I get a lot of responses. Some will say, “Don’t invest here. This is the A area. This is B area. This is C area.” But the area that they’re recommending for me to invest is I can’t afford that. So I was like, “I’ll stay with a C, D area and then grow up from there.” And that’s what I did.
So I found this duplex in Cleveland that’s listed for 68,000. So the owner has listed two of them actually. So I wanted both of them because at this time, my cash flow at my property is Section 8. All three units cash flow is coming in. The bank is impressed with that. So again, I did the documentation, put all the numbers together and I sent it to them. They were like, “Yeah, we’ll finance it.”
Rob:
And this was your second deal. Right? Your second and third deal-
Yamundow:
Second deal.
Rob:
… of two duplex?
Yamundow:
Yes.
Rob:
Okay, cool.
Yamundow:
Yep. Yep, yep. So the bank was like, “Yeah, we’ll finance it even if it’s out-of-state. The numbers look great.” 68,000 mortgage was 250 something. It’s two units. One, it was seven something. So when the other one was six something. So I was getting 1345 or 1350 or something like that. And the tenant paid all the utilities. I only pay water, sewer.
Rob:
Okay. So, walk us through this really fast. Your first property, you said you bought it for like 55,000. You fixed it up, it appraises for 90,000. So you’ve built in $40,000 of equity. You’re like, “Okay. I think I experienced probably the worst part of it. I’m going to do it again.” And then you go and buy two duplexes and the bank finances those. And then just for reference, how many units did you actually end up adding to your whole portfolio in year one?
Yamundow:
In year one, I think about maybe at least seven.
Rob:
Wow.
Yamundow:
I think seven or eight.
Rob:
First year of real estate investing with no foundation other than listening to BiggerPockets and doing research and everything like that. Listening to the great David Greene and Brandon Turner, and you’re like, “Okay, I’m going to do this.” And then you go out and you buy seven properties. So you get that first one, two duplexes. Tell us about the next four really fast.
Yamundow:
Yeah. So the next one, I was like, “Okay. At this point I’m getting cash flow.” I’m getting a lot of cash flow, and I just got promoted by my job. So I was like, “Okay. From this, I want to scale more. What can I do?” So at this point I’m looking at, I was like, “How about I take the cash flow, wait few months and buy a really cheap house?” So I already build a relationship with that contractor.
So what I did was I found this property for 15,000. It was also a foreclosed property, so I got it for cheap. They probably got it for less than that, but I got it for cheap and it was a five bedroom, two bath. So my contractor charged me 9,000 to fix it up. Even at that point, I don’t have 9,000, I think I have 3000 at that point that I have in my savings. And the rest, I was expecting it to come from the cash flow because I’m getting 2000 here and 1300 over there. So I was going to pay him in installing. So that’s how I got that.
Once I fixed it up, I rented on Section 8 as well, and then I had equity in that property. So the bank was like, “You can pull out equity from your property if you want to scale.” That’s how I did that.
Rob:
David, there’s a term for doing that. Right? When you picks up a property and then you take the money out.
David:
Yeah. And there’s also a method to scaling, both of which can be found @biggerpockets.com/store by checking for the BRRRR book or the scale book. Yaamu, I wanted to ask, did you get these ideas, because you’re kind of tinkering with different real estate investing strategies. You’ve got the arbitrage thing you talked about. Rent by the room, Section 8, a little bit of long distance investing as well. You’ve been working into this. Right? Did all of this come from BiggerPockets?
Yamundow:
Yes, it did. I know you’re going to ask me in the end what’s my favorite book and I have it here. So this made sense to me because I live in Atlanta. At the time, there’s no way I can afford properties in Atlanta at that time, access with the credit score. So I could only afford outside. It does have to be your background.
And me learning that from BiggerPockets I was like, “Whoa.” A light went, I was like, “Of course, I can do it out of state.” But a lot of people that I talked to, even at work, my colleagues, they were like, “There’s no way you can, being a landlord’s hard, you cannot fix a toilet while you out of state.” And I’m like, there it is a method. I’ve already read and I’ve listened to multiple people do it. Why can’t I do it?
David:
Well, when you mentioned that you found the better property manager that allowed you to scale. That’s what I thought of was sometimes we just kick around trying to figure out, this is going wrong, that’s going wrong, and it affects your emotions. You just don’t, you’re not excited about buying more real estate because it feels like just nothing but problems. You got ripped off by the first contractor if that would make anybody want to quit.
Once you get your heart broke, you don’t want to love again. You don’t want to put yourself out there and find somebody else. So you just quit. But when you found the right person, it changed your process to be emotionally excited instead of emotionally discouraged. And so the Core 4 I’m sure really helped. Can you remind me where were you at with passive income at the end of year two?
Yamundow:
By year two. Year two by 80,000, because this April. This last April is my third I’ve invested. So by 2022 I was making like 80,000.
David:
That’s gross rents, correct? That’s not your profit?
Yamundow:
No, no. That’s, no, that’s profit.
Rob:
Wow.
David:
You’re making 80,000 profit after your second year?
Yamundow:
Yeah. That’s profit.
Rob:
Wow. After your second year, what was your first year? Do you know of the top of your head?
Yamundow:
I think the first year I was close to like six, 7,000. But then what happened was I got a package deal. So it escalated fast. With that package deal. Some of the units turnover was two weeks, three weeks. So my contractors would actually go into the unit and live there, to the property and live there. So they would stay there for that two weeks while they fixed it. So I was renovating houses faster.
So what happened was the reason why I scaled faster is with the cash flow. So everything I was getting, my expenses did not increase. Nothing. My lifestyle not increased. It was just the same. So it’s a matter of how much can I buy. So I do have a team that’s willing to do the work. So what happened was, and my LinkedIn, I was getting a lot of messages from other companies in the pharmaceutical companies to work for them. I said, “Well, I have a job. Why? How can I work two jobs?” Because me as an international person, I didn’t know you could have two jobs in the US.
So one of my friends that I met from BiggerPockets, we got credited from BiggerPockets and we find our own mastermind and every Sunday we talk and we hold each other accountable. I can say accountability group. They were like, “We have two jobs, why can’t you do it?” I was like, “Okay.” So I took that second job as a statistical programmer for Labcorp. It’s a six figure job. I did the interview. I didn’t think I was going to get it.
The next day they called me, they were like, “You’re amazing. You can start on one day.” I was like, “Okay.” So I got six figure job. So I was dumping all that money into buying more real estate. So I was buying packages at this point and just turning them at six unit.
Rob:
You’re working a full-time job for the CDC. You have a mastermind with people from the BiggerPockets community. They’re like, “We all have two jobs. You should have one too.” And you’re like, “All right, sure.” You go, you apply, you get a six figure job. And then they’re like, “Yeah.” So now you’re making really good W-2 income and instead of spending it, going out and just having fun, you’re like, “I’m just going to put it all into houses.”
Yamundow:
Everything. Everything into houses. So I’ll buy package to five units package deal, six unit here, five single property. So I was just doing and flipping them.
Rob:
Okay. All right. So you said your first year, passive income, six, 7,000 or something like that. Year two, it goes from six, $7,000 of passive income a year. And the year two it’s $80,000 of passive income. Are those numbers right?
Yamundow:
Yes.
Rob:
Okay.
Yamundow:
The reason why it got to 80,000 is because at this time, COVID had happened, 2021. Everybody’s talking about 2021, 2022. Everybody’s talking about Airbnb, short-term rental, so did in Atlanta, everybody was talking about in social media. So my social media page, what I did was I created a new page and I followed just real estate. Everything that has to do with real estate.
So I get a lot of people advertising about, “You know, you can get a property. You can do Airbnb without owning a property.” I was like, “Okay.” So I looked into the, buy a few courses here and there, a hundred dollars here, 150 here, and I joined these masterminds. I was like, “I’m just going to jump in and do it.” I created a LLC just like the courses would say, and I approach apartment complex here. So I was like, “How about I get these in my LLC name and I can arbitrage it?” So I got one unit, I arbitrage it and two weeks, three weeks into it, or three months into it, I got a booking for $40,000.
So the company booked for this guy, the company booked for him from New York. He’s going to be working in Atlanta for a whole year. So it’s $44,000. And I was like, “This is a double brainer.” So I got multiple. Now I have eight units in Atlanta.
Rob:
That’s really cool. So let me just clarify something. When you said your year two, your passive income was 80,000, was that 80,000 per month or per year?
Yamundow:
It’s per month.
Rob:
Oh my gosh.
Yamundow:
Yeah. So my section is, we’re bringing in about 15, 16,000, and then I was making about 40 something thousand on Airbnb with the multiple properties.
Rob:
Wow. Okay. So year two is 80,000 per month. I thought it was per year. And I was like, “Oh, 8,000 bucks a month.” I mean, most people work for 10 years to get to that level, just $8,000 a month. So you’re getting $80,000 per month. And so you get into the Section 8 game, you get into medium-term rentals and you do arbitrage. Were any of those your favorite, or were they all just fun because it’s all just new?
Yamundow:
Section 8 was more of a dream to give a family a home. The midterm rentals were more of me buying and scaling. So in 2021, when I was buying, when I was doing the arbitrage, I was like, “Okay. I already have a background real estate where I own my own properties. How about I take this money instead of renting from apartment complex here? How about I buy my own apartment complex?” That’s how the 80,000 came about for month.
So what I did was, I was like, “Okay, I’m going to take this method.” And I landed the arbitrage, but used the money to buy my own apartment complex. There’s a single-family went on Section 8. So I found this property that’s listed for in the same city that I invest in my Section 8. I found this property that was listed for 145. It was abandoned for two years, and the landlord just want to sell and get rid of it.
So there was a fire incident that happened and he was going through a lot of violations. So he had the city remove most of the violations, but it was always at the end. So when I came in, I offered 120 and he took 120 and he accepted. At closing, I got about 5,000. Again, I approached the bank and I told them the method that I’m doing.
So I always had this relationship with the bank already. I always make sure they know what I’m doing. So I told them about the short-term rental, big term rental, and they were like, “That’s not going to work in a small city like this.” What they don’t know is that property works for me because at this point I have experience with travel nurses. So that property was between two hospital, 1.6 miles from another one hospital and 1.2 mile from another hospital, so it’s perfect for me. I did the analysis, the market research, and most of the people that were renting to travel nurses did, were a month have passed.
So let’s say a family has a basement and they were renting it to travel rooms or a shared room or something. I was say, “Well, if I have this property with eight units and multiple mixture of single one bedrooms have studios, I could do that too.” So that’s how I did. The bank was like, “We thought you were crazy, but this is amazing number.” So with that property, that helped me scale to 20,000, because when I had my contractor go in there and he leaves one hour from that city, he came in there, he gave me a quote for 85,000.
So I gave it to the bank. They were like, “Okay, we’ll finance it.” So of course, I put 20% down and my contractors, they gave me, they were like, “It’s a lot of work that it needs. What you can do, what we can do is to give you a grace period of three months, so you don’t pay, only pay interest.” That’s amazing.
So my contractor was like, “We will move it. I will fix it from up and move our way down.” So while they were fixing, so let’s say they fixed two units, I’ll furnish it and have nurses already. I listed to have nurses already coming in. So by the time it was almost complete, I wasn’t paying in. I was only paying interest, no mortgage. That property alone brings me 22,000. That’s how I scaled to the 80.
Rob:
Wow. 22,000 a month.
Yamundow:
A month. 22, 23, 24, here.
Rob:
Just 22 to 24,000. No big deal.
David:
Be conservative.
Yamundow:
So I got mortgage was just 1200, and then each unit I pay utilities for a hundred, 1,200 work with my mortgage, and each unit utilities is a hundred dollars, 110, 120, something like that.
David:
Okay. I got two questions I want to ask. The first is, do you have one person managing all these assets in different locations or are you doing that yourself?
Yamundow:
No. So Cleveland, I have a property manager. Cleveland properties, remember they came in with tenant occupied already. So I was managing for a while, but when I was scaling with midterm rentals here, I have to find somebody to manage it. So I have a property manager in Cleveland, and of course in each of the cities, the closest cities will have one property manager.
David:
Yeah. You really are following the long-distance real estate. And then you manage those individual property managers. Right?
Yamundow:
Oh, yes.
David:
Okay. Next question. How are you running your numbers? You’ve got a different approach to this, and I’m curious if your data scientist background led to you looking at things differently, but can you share what your system looks like when a property comes your way and a bank thinks, “Well, this is all the income it would generate.” You’re able to generate more than that. What are you doing differently?
Yamundow:
Yes. So this is how I run my numbers. If the numbers don’t make sense, I’m not going to push it just to say, I have this unit. For Section 8, I want to get at least 800 to a thousand profit because it comes with more work, more attention and everything. With short-term rentals, I was just looking to scale. So it depends on how much I furnish it.
If I’m going to put 2000, $3,000 off up to $5,000 per unit, I want to get at least a thousand dollars. So with Atlanta, I could get all the way profit to 2000, especially at the peak season, per profit, per door. So that’s how I run it, depending on how the property was, with Section 8, I’m looking at, at least a thousand because it needs more work and I have to have pay the property manager, maintenance of course. So I include all of that. So that’s how I run the numbers.
David:
Okay. And I’m going to assume you’re also factoring in they need the cash flow more because in some of these areas you’re buying in, you mentioned C to D areas, they’re not going to appreciate as much, and the headache factor is higher.
So you have to make up for that by getting more cash flow to make the juice worth the squeeze, so to speak. And that’s where you came up with these numbers. Right?
Yamundow:
Yes.
David:
For people who hear this and they think, “I want to do what she’s doing.” Which I’m sure everybody’s going to be thinking. What are some of the challenges that people need to be aware of if you want to grow a portfolio, the way you grew yours?
Yamundow:
There’s so many challenges. You’re going to go through crappy contractors. There’s no investor that’s going to tell you, “Oh yeah, Mike, I have one contractor from day, one never stole from me, nothing.” I went through crappy contractors to get there.
Property managers, even though you have a property manager, doesn’t mean you don’t manage. You still have to run the numbers to make sure this makes sense. Because if I didn’t do that, I wouldn’t know that a property manager was stealing from me or even sending me receipts of other properties. Right?
It’s not that easy day, easy way out. You have to figure it out. You have to run the numbers, and of course, you have to always analyze deals for it to make sense. If it doesn’t make sense, you can’t force it.
David:
There’s also, I’m hearing you mention there’s a lot of management that goes into the properties. Once you have them, you have to look very close, which I think you learned at a relatively early stage, because in one of your first deals or the first deal you were taken advantage of. That separated you from this idea of passive income that you just bought it, forgot it, and there’s nothing more to it. That rhyme. Maybe we need to start saying that.
But you have to pay attention to your investments, that it’s not a thing that runs itself. It’s often described that you buy a property, it’s turnkey, it makes money, and you just go have fun on the beach or vacation everywhere, and your real estate pays for all of it. You don’t have to still work. Has that been your experience or has it been more like it’s a second job?
Rob:
Or a third job for a Yaamu?
David:
Yeah. Yeah.
Yamundow:
Yeah. Well, now that I’ve, well not mastered it, but now that I’ve learned, I’ve gone through so much mistakes and I’ve learned, I can say I could go chill at the beach now. So I got everything in place. I have a property manager’s place, I have systems in place, I’ve automated things.
But the beginning, no, you have to actually work the business to actually make it work. You can’t just buy and just forget it. There’s so many things that is involved with it. So now I do day-to-day stuff, I have a VA that go through my funds finder messages. I have property managers that do. All I do now is sign leases and analyze this.
Rob:
So Yaamu, obviously you came from Africa. I got to imagine that the tax code is very different there than it is here. So you come here, you’re crushing it, you’re making $80,000 a month. You have two full-time jobs, you’re making six figures on the W-2 side of things.
Tell me a little bit about your tax situation once you actually started really making money. Was this a big shake up for you where you’re like, “Oh my gosh, I have to pay the government money?” What was that whole situation like?
Yamundow:
That’s a really good question. It’s a shock coming from Africa where we don’t pay taxes like that. So the beginning, I had already had my son, and because I wasn’t making that much, I actually get to get a tax reform. And I was like, “This is America. This is amazing. America is nice.” At the end of the time that you get money.
And then I started investing real estate. And then when CPA tells me, “You’re going to be paying the added $30,000.” I was like, “What?” I was like, “No. But in real estate, when you invest, you get to save.” It was like, “No, but not when you make millions.” And I was like, “What?” That’s when I realized like, “Oh.” What my tax bracket was. And then he said, “And also your W-2 is not helping because you have two, double two that are paying you six figure now.”
And I was like, “Oh my God.” He said, “If it wasn’t for real estate, you would be paying way more to added than what your, so the real estate is actually saving you.” And then I was like, “Yeah, this can’t continue. I can’t pay the others this much.” So of course I let the, four months ago, I let the Labcorp job go and I just stick with the CDC one because now it doesn’t really make sense having the kind of cash flow. As soon as when I added my Savannah properties here that are bringing me about 15, 16,000 a month in just Savannah, Georgia. I was like, “It doesn’t make sense for me to get two jobs now.” So I let it go.
Rob:
Well, it’s also probably really hard to achieve real estate professional status with two full-time jobs and being the real estate thing. I know that there’s always conflicting stuff on that. So this always reminds me of that. There’s a meme out there that’s like, it’s the US government. They’re like, “All right, you have to pay us taxes.” And then you’re like, “How much?” And they’re like, “We don’t know.” And it’s like, “Okay, what happens if I pay you too little?” And they’re like, “Oh, you owe us a lot of money. If you do, we’ll find you.” And it’s like, “What if I pay too much?” And it’s like, “We won’t tell you. You have to figure that out for yourself.” And that really is exactly what the tax system is.
It’s you don’t know until your CPA’s like, “Here you go. You owe 30, $40,000.” So you quit your job. And did you figure out tax strategies or anything that was saving you money in the long run? Were you doing any kind of cost segregation or any depreciation to knock down your tax bill?
Yamundow:
Yeah. So my CPA did I hire does all of that for me. And then we have meetings every quarter. So he tells me and project how much I’m going to be have that. I remember one time it was like, “You have about 60, 40, $60,000 that you need to spend before November.” And I was like, “Oh, okay.” So I just dumped it on a property. I bought a property for 40,000 more house and I fixed it up, appraise for 200,000.
David:
It sounds like Rob’s tax strategy. He’s just like that. “I owe how much?” I’m going to go buy something right now.
Rob:
Yeah, exactly. I’m like, “All right, let’s write it off baby.” It’s a write-off. You guys ever seen that Schitt’s Creek where he is buying everything and they’re like, “You can’t just keep buying it and saying it’s a write-off.” I’m like, “It’s a write-off.”
Yamundow:
Okay, so write-off. Who pays for it? The government.
Rob:
The government. The write-off people.
Yamundow:
The write-off people.
Rob:
I don’t know.
Yamundow:
Yeah.
David:
So let me get a recap of your overall portfolio, Yaamu. You have Cleveland properties, and those are mostly Section 8? Correct?
Yamundow:
Uh-huh.
David:
Okay. You have Savannah, Georgia properties. How are those being operated?
Yamundow:
So those are midterm rentals.
David:
And then, where else other than Savannah and Cleveland?
Yamundow:
So I have Illinois, I have Springfield, I have Champaign, Urbana Champaign, all that sub areas in Illinois. So I have eight units here and there, five units, those are all. So since I got the eight unit, it makes sense because I was getting so many inquiries, so travel nurses and I’m not able to get the report because it’s all booked out. I was like, I need another one. So I got another apartment complex then I got another one. I got another one. It kept going.
Rob:
That’s so cool.
Yamundow:
So I have a mix of short-term rentals. I have mix of midterm rentals Section 8.
Rob:
Okay. And how many units total are we at now?
Yamundow:
So I have 33 doors including the one that I just bought here. So that’s 34.
Rob:
Wow. So you have about 34 doors now. 34 I think, is what you said. When you were a kid, sleeping on the floor, all you wanted was a bed of your own in a house.
Yamundow:
Yes.
Rob:
How does it feel to achieve what you’ve achieved?
Yamundow:
It’s unreal. It’s sometimes like, “This is me?” And sometimes, and this is why I give a lot, especially when it comes to my team. So I know where I started. It’s just so real for me. But I always knew that I wanted just one house. I wanted a nice bed. I wanted to experience what other kids experience that I didn’t.
But I never knew beyond my imagination. This is all God’s work. God put me in this place to actually buy houses, fix them up and give it to families. That’s why I said earlier I mention was Section 8 is more of me housing kids like me or someone who could not buy their own home. And then the short-term rentals just came into play. But it’s so fulfilling for me.
Rob:
That’s really cool. Is eight-year old you proud of Yaamu?
Yamundow:
Yes. I am very proud of myself. I’m so grateful to God.
Rob:
Well, you mentioned the tips with keeping your contractor happy. I’d love to end with that. If you have anything you can share with the audience about strengthening that relationship with your contractor and keeping them happy, I’d love to hear it.
Yamundow:
Just to say this, my husband says, when my contractor calls, my phone ring, I’m so eager to take the call than anyone else, including him, I was like, “Well, he made me millions, he did it.”
When they’re walking, I buy lunch. When they send me pictures and I’m so happy with the work and I’m like, “That’s on me.” So they’re staying there. And also I stock their fridges, buy groceries and send it because they stay there when they’re fixing the properties with his guys. So those are nice things. And I upgrade his phone. He’s an older guy, doesn’t like technology. They feel that. And just little things like that.
Rob:
That’s really cool. Yeah, you got to take care of your contractors. I mean, finding a contractor that you click with, is hard already, but finding a contractor that you can click with for five years is even harder. And I think, yeah, got to keep them happy, so that you can keep a lifelong of home building and home renovation going.
David:
Well, Yaamu, I think that we’re all floored after listening to what you’ve done. I mean, you talk about it so nonchalant that you’re doing this well. I mean, the collective jaws of the BiggerPockets sphere have dropped as they were listening to this.
We will definitely need to have you back to dive deeper into some of this because there’s so many elements from the power of your story to the way that you’ve scaled, to the passive income you’re making, to the systems that you’ve set up, to how BiggerPockets helped you learn all this.
I think, so many of us listened to this and we only see the reasons that it can’t work. And you came in and said, “Wait, you’re going to give me all this information for free?” And you went and put it to play. And what do you know, you’re one of the most successful investors that we have ever interviewed. And how many years has it been?
Yamundow:
It’s going to be three years. April 17.
David:
Yeah. There’s people that take three years and can’t finish one of the books. I just think, I don’t even know how to put into words what this has been like. It’s just fantastic and I really appreciate you sharing your story. Are there any last tips that you’d like to leave with our audience who are struggling to get started?
Yamundow:
It’s just to start, and BiggerPockets said analysis, analysis, if you stay there, you don’t actually jump and do execution. It’s not going to work out. You can listen to all the podcasts, you can read all the books, you can go to all the networking effects, you can do all of that, but it’s easier actually execute. It’s not going to happen. And I know it’s scary, but you have to do it.
David:
Well when you grow up without a bed, I don’t think you’re as scared of failure as somebody who has never faced that level of adversity and the littlest amount of rejection seems overwhelming. So I mean, who would’ve thought that those bedbugs would someday be a blessing? But maybe that could be the title of your book, How Bedbugs Become Blessings, when you write it, because you definitely need to.
Rob any last minute thoughts from you?
Rob:
No. Just wanted to thank you, Yaamu. I appreciate the vulnerability and the openness that you had with this. I know it’s probably hard to talk about sometimes, especially coming onto BiggerPockets, but I think there will be hundreds of thousands of people that listen to this podcast and their life will change because of your story. So I just want to thank you.
Yamundow:
Thank you so much. It’s a pleasure.
David:
Yep. It was a pleasure to have you. Where can people find out more about you if they want to get in touch?
Yamundow:
So my Instagram is buildingwealthfromrentals. I actually got that name from, I think Ashley has something like that. So when I was creating my own page, I was like, “This is for me.” And I started as me just doing it to hold myself accountable.
So I started to document miles. So I was like, “What name can I get?” And I was like, “Building wealth from rentals.” So I started with that. So you can find me at Instagram buildingwealthfromrentals and TikTok, buildingwealthfromrentals.
David:
There you go. Send her a message. Rob, where can people find you?
Rob:
Well, I mean it, listen, it’s not a big deal. All right, so I don’t want everybody there. Everybody that’s listening to his be like, “Whoa, that’s crazy. That’s a big deal.” But your friend Rob here is now verified on Instagram.
So if you look up robuilt, R-O-B-U-I-L-T, I’ll have a little beautiful blue check mark next to my name and you’ll never have to worry about me asking you randomly for crypto or to send me Forex. So find me on Instagram, look for the blue check and I will never message you first. What about you, David?
David:
You could find me @davidgreene24.com. And you can also find me on all the social medias @davidgreene24, including YouTube. Yeah, I’m still, my brain’s still trying to wrap itself, Yaamu, around how you did this in three years. It seems like it should have been full of holes, but as you’ve talked, we’ve seen very few holes in your entire strategy. It was like you were born to do this. I mean, it almost just seems like you had divine intervention.
Yamundow:
Thank you. Thank you.
David:
That you are a real life superhero and I hope that your husband knows that. You should go tell him as well as your kid.
Yamundow:
Thank you.
David:
And you have another one on the way. Right? Any day now you’re going to be.
Yamundow:
Yes. Any day now. Any day now should be here.
Rob:
Oh, congratulations. That’s amazing. Congrats.
Yamundow:
Any day now.
David:
There you go. Yeah. Make sure that when you’re listening to the podcast, you put your headphones around that so that she can hear all the things that you’re learning.
Yamundow:
I think she’s going to go come to the world being an investor.
David:
Yes, exactly.
Yamundow:
She has listened to so many podcasts.
David:
She’s got no choice. That’s awesome. All right, we’ll let you get out of here.
This is David Greene for Rob, quick, I need to buy a house so I don’t pay taxes Abasolo. Signing off.
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