MWB Series: How to Achieve Hotel Ownership with Epiq Collective

Davonne Reaves 0:00

Hotels is a great investment it's a great wealth builder. It's something that it's attainable it's something that we can do together. And I also want to prove that African Americans, we could be hotel owners. A lot of people think that we can't own because we don't have access to capital. And that's not true. We do have access to capital. Sometimes we don't have the knowledge in certain areas. So my goal is to provide the knowledge so that people can have the tools. And that way they can diversify their investment portfolio by becoming hotel investors.

Danielle Desir 0:43

Co-hosted by Acquania Escarne, the host of The Purpose of Money. And Danielle Desir, the host of The Thought Card, Millennial Wealth Builder Series is where we share the stories of women of color, building wealth.

Acquania Escarne 0:59

But this isn't your ordinary interview based show. Throughout the series you'll be hearing from women who are creatively

Danielle Desir 1:06

securing the bag,

Acquania Escarne 1:08

stacking coins. You know what we mean?

Davonne Reaves and Jessica Meyers were friends and college roommates at Georgia State University. However, after college, Davonne Reaves pursued her path in the hotel industry, and Jessica Meyers started investing in residential real estate. Over a casual lunch outing, Davonne convinced Jessica that they should combine their expertise and become business partners. That's how their company Epiq Collective was born. At the end of 2020, Epiq Collective partnered with Nassau Investments to purchase a home to Suites by Hilton in El Reno, Oklahoma, making this dynamic duo the youngest black women to own a hotel under a major chain. In the hotel industry, less than 2% of hotel owners are people of color, and even fewer are women. Davonne and Jessica are rocking the real estate market and working with real estate investors to invest in epic projects collectively. This is their story of building wealth.

Davonne Reaves 2:25

I am Davonne Reaves and I create hotel owners. I was born in Philadelphia, raised in the Atlanta suburban area of Clayton County. And money for me growing up was different. Definitely came from humble beginnings. My Mother, she was a single mom, she did a very exceptional job of raising both my sister and I. Fortunately, I don't have any stories of of going hungry or our power ever going out. But I knew that we weren't rich, but I knew that we weren't poor. And she always made sure that we had a roof over our head. And she she always made sure we had food on our table, and that we received the best education possible. She also received a lot of help from her grandmother and her older sister, my late aunt, they made it possible for us to do additional activities that my mother was unable to provide. Meaning we went on trips to Disney World, we went to visit African American historical sites around the country like the Civil- a lot of civil rights attractions in Montgomery and Birmingham and to the mountains. And we were just able to travel to a lot of places and see a lot of things and experience a lot of great things. Because of both my late grandmother and my Aunt. First hotel job I actually started off as a front desk agent, working at the iconic Hyatt Regency Atlanta. I started off with a whopping $10. So as a college student, I thought I was rich. The first job and I actually got that job, I was in the lobby, volunteering for my alma mater, Georgia State University. And the rooms executive director at the time actually came to me "Hey, do you want a job? You smile a lot. I think you'd be perfect here for the front desk." And I was like, "sure, why not?" And took the job. And the rest was history. Working at the front desk, I saw a lot of opportunities. A lot of hotel brands, they have what you call management training programs, and where they actually prepare you to take on executive leadership roles in the hospitality industry or in a specific hotel. And so it was just it was in a more I've always had this go getter type A leadership personality. So I joined a lot of organizations within the hotel I was working at. I joined hospitality organizations when not while I was at school. I was the president of my student chapter of the National Society of Minorities in Hospitality. And from there, I was able to build relationships, professional and personal relationships. And I would travel throughout the-they had NSMH is what it's called. We have conferences around the country. And so going to those conferences, I will meet other people, I will see the different career paths that I can take. And I saw that there was a lot of more of an operational side there was a lot of people of color. My hotel that I started off at the Hyatt Regency Atlanta, Valerie Ferguson was a former general manager, there and she was actually the first black, not only first black female, but the first black, General Manager, like during the 90s of a full service hotel. And she was also the chairwoman, the first African American chair for the American Hotel Lodging Association at the time, which was the largest hotel organization for owners that just period, just the largest hotel organization. So seeing that hearing their stories just gave me that passion. And with I guess, with my personality of being a leader, I saw that there was there was a an opportunity for me to grow and build a career and I just became passionate, I love to help people. I love the benefits of being in the industry. I was able to work with different cultures, I have people from I was working from Bosnia, I was working with people from the Gambia from Nigeria, from Italy. So it was just the culture just working with so many different people working with different generations. And my hotel, the hotel that I started off, it opened in 1967. So with people who were working there since 1967, that they were able to guide me and share their stories and the Hyatt Regency Atlanta. The reason why so iconic for one that was the first atrium Hotel in the world. And then another thing that was so personal to me was the Hyatt Regency Atlanta was the first hotel in in Atlanta to allow African Americans who actually welcomed African Americans not only to stay at the hotel, but to host events there. So Dr. Martin Luther King had events there, Ambassador Andrew Young actually had the suite named after him there. And they were just welcoming the Bronner Brothers had their first convention there. And it's just so many just different stories. And so many just iconic, people just walk through that door. And so just to be able to work at the front desk and experience all the things and able to move up and, and travel the world. I just couldn't see another career that would work for me. So Epiq Collective, we specialize in commercial real estate deals, specifically hotels. We do look at other asset classes, such as multifamily, and maybe some mixed use development, but primarily hotels. And the reason why I primarily hotels, of course, my my background, being in the industry and just my passion for hotels. And so how we create hotel owners or investors, you're actually able to invest with Epiq, and we pull the deal together. And we also pull other investors that together to actually invest. Hotels are capital intensive deals, and you need a lot of upfront capital to put down as a deposit and for renovations you're looking at in the millions of dollars, or multi million dollars just in capital. And a lot of times one single person, they're unable to do that. And that also can be intimidating. And a lot of people don't even realize that you can become a hotel owner. They just don't think that it can happen. Prior to integration, it was a lot of black people who own hotels, because we had no choice but to own hotels. Or we had our Airbnb, black people the first Airbnb because when we travel, we couldn't stay in white owned hotels, we couldn't stay in certain areas. So we had to stay with people who we knew would rent out a room or we had to stay in black owned hotel because that was the only place. That of course times is shifting and has changed. And currently, less than 2% of the hotels in the United States are actually owned by African Americans. 60% of the hotels in the United States are owned by small businesses, and a lot of people don't realize that. And what we do here at Epiq Collective, we give people that opportunity. We give people that opportunity to invest, and then we bring in other investors. So then collectively, we're investing in larger project and you're getting an equity stake in a hotel deal.

My personal goal is actually to create 221 hotel owners in 2021. That is my personal goal. It can be done. And it can be done in four ways. You can one- you can invest with Epiq Collective, that's the first way you can invest with us. And that's probably the fastest way to hotel ownership. You can also invest in REITs real estate investment trust. I'm gonna give a shout out to both a good friend of ours, Andre Albritton. He has a podcast and a network called Millennials Next Door so he shares a lot of good tips on how you can invest in REITs. So when you look into lodging REITs, that's another way that you can become a hotel investor. Crowdfund, there are some crowdfunding platforms that you can invest, to become a hotel investor. Those may be a little bit complicated because you have to be accredited investors. So it can be a little tricky. And then also you can, you can actually become hotel owner on your own meaning you are the lead sponsor, you're the general partner, you're the syndicator. So you're actually essentially doing what we do with Epiq, you're putting the deal together, you're sourcing the funnel, you're working with the brands, you're working with the architect, you're just, you're doing the making the hotel deal possible. So those are the four different ways that you can actually invest in a hotel or become a hotel owner. And so my personal goal for 2021 is to get a 221 hotel owners in 2021.

Acquania Escarne 10:44

Speaking of hotel owners, I also had a chance to talk to Mia Branch, another one of the investors in this hotel deal. How does it feel to actually be a hotel owner?

Mia Branch 10:55

Very exciting. It's not anything I ever thought I would do. But I'm learning as I get older, I need to have my money work for me instead of working harder for more money.

Acquania Escarne 11:07

I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. Tell me a little bit more about your first reaction when I introduced you to the idea of investing in a hotel.

Mia Branch 11:17

Chest pain. Literally chest pain, I'm like, "I don't know anything about the hotel industry other than being a guest. I don't know anything about investing in this market." So it was very daunting at first.

Acquania Escarne 11:32

So what are the some of the things that you did to feel comfortable in making the investment?

Mia Branch 11:38

Speaking to Davonne from Epiq Collective. Both reading the information that she presented, getting in on the group phone calls, and then speaking to her later individually.

Jessica Myers 11:52

Hi, I'm Jessica Meyers, of Epiq Collective, and I create hotel owners. Money was always-I grew up in a very religious family. So it was always money is the root of all evil. And then thankfully, by the time I was teens, my parents finally transitioning and like the love of money. Because at that time, you think that money is evil, Jesus was poor, you need to suffer like he did. And so I internalized as a child, we were going through the same sufferings that Jesus had to go through. Jesus was persecuted and poor. So if I'm persecuted and poor, that's fine. But it wasn't until really college and adulting that I understood that currency is more of an energy flow. And it's more of I'm collecting coins to do, and live out the vision and the life of my dreams. And when I had that paradigm shift, that's what helped me to look at money as a resource. And not "Oh, I don't have to be wealthy. Oh, I don't want to be one of those people who get rich and turn away from God." But we can co create. It can be a world where both exists. And it doesn't have to be the everything I learned. And I have no hate, because that's just unfortunately, the agreements that they set up. That's the life that they live in, they knew. So they taught me the best they knew how. So now understanding that, I don't have any, you know, bad will towards anybody what they taught me about money growing up, I just chose to look at it differently. And the more I looked at it differently in collecting assets, and understanding what capital allows you to do, as far as the freedom of life you decide to live, I changed my dynamic. And that's where I've been on a roll of acquiring assets. By using whatever liquid capital I have to acquire assets, then those assets bring healing. My first asset I acquired was a property it was a little shack behind a gas station. Because I just purchased it, I was so excited not even thinking "Wait, is this the property somebody else will want?" But I purchased it. And ironically enough, I had a good credit score at the time. And so I was able to get a credit card. And I asked the owner, "Can I send you PayPal payments?" And when he said yes, I purchased the home, I literally sent PayPal payments. And that's how I acquired my first asset by leveraging my credit. That's why I say because it was behind a gas station and literally the so you can tell the gas station came later. Because they the wall, they have a wall of obviously behind the gas station, and the house front door is facing that wall. Now I'll build a structure and keep it moving. But at the time, that was my first property. I didn't understand you could just flip the door around and change the landscape of the house. So it ultimately became too much and I sold it to another investor. So I purchased it at $16,000. And I sold it to another investor at $27,000. When I brought my lender in who was because he was like because I was able to pay for it. When I brought my lender in to cover the construction loan and the scope of one contractors I call it something like $30-40,000 and the lender was like that was a lot more than $30,000 because you don't have experience. So with that it just became hard to continue.

I actually did have a nine to five, I don't like to call it nine to five because I was in sales. I used to work in media sales at CBS. So that took me from New York working at the Nick Cannon Morning Show, coming back down to Atlanta to working for the 103. And then ultimately landing in out of home with CBS. I felt like it's like I knew it in 2010. But when you go to quit, life hits your responsibilities. You're like, "Oh, wait, like, as much as the things you don't like about corporate there is necessary things about corporate, that stabilizes your life, things you don't have to think about." I don't think about HR, and payroll and ADP when I was at CBS. So wanting to go especially when I moved back down here to Atlanta from New York, that was my thing, who I'm gonna do me in 2010, I'm not going to do corporate any longer. But when I realized, "Wait, I don't have my stuff set up," I went on a journey to set stuff up. I had a consulting business, I had helped my Aunt run her daycare. I had several ventures that I tried, even while still working at CBS, just to try to see where I can go. And it was not until I connected with real estate in 2015, that I got a clear path of this is how you do it. All of the other things that I was doing, it wasn't allowing me to get the lifestyle I wanted to live, it was creating another job for myself. And I was like, my goal is I envision traveling, having a great time, doing what I do, helping others, and still being able to stay in my own life. And when I was very clear in 2015, that real estate is the way to do it. I've been on that path ever since and have not looked at any other venture.

So one of the things that Davonne always purchase is having an investor thesis. And part of my investor thesis is three buckets. I have a short term bucket, a mid term bucket, and a long term bucket. So those are the three buckets that I plan for. And also another thing that people probably heard a lot growing up is having multiple streams of income, that's fine, have multiple streams of income, but make sure they are streams. And a stream if you notice anything about water is in constant flow. So if you're only focused as a real estate person on one deal, two deals or anything like that, or any one genre of real estate, then you're doing yourself a disservice because when the market does fail, there are people who win in down markets. And that's honestly what I started to study from. I don't want to know about the winners. I want to know about the people who made it when it was hard. Not the people who made it when cool you popped up $6,000 deal you renovated and you sold it for $120. And you made $60,000. I want to know about that person who bought the property 60,000 sold it for $80 and barely made anything like how did you operate? What did you do? And so those questions led me to having multiple projects, finding out a way out of no way. And I have multiple streams of income. So all my income doesn't rely upon this house selling. It doesn't rely upon any one thing. It relies upon multiple streams. So I have a book that I'm writing about my process. I have courses that I teach about my process. All while going through the process, all while we're doing podcasts, we're doing other elements that are creating streams of income, so that I'm not dependent upon this one property. If I'm multiple layers to generate income from that one thing, so that if, if the economy crashes, I still have six, five, or maybe three of my streams are impacted. But I still have four more. So that's the point. I'm making sure that you have multiple layers. In whatever it is that you do.

Acquania Escarne 18:46

I want to know how does it feel to be a hotel owner?

Jessica Myers 18:49

It still feels surreal. I never thought money that would be me. So it's still even standing in the building. It's "Wait, we own this." And it just it means so much. And you know what I actually went to my room and cried, because I realized that everything for Black Wall Street that happened in the beauty of what we did and what we were connected to, is what empowers me to own and create the avenues that we are able to for our investors, and things like that and really think about "Wow, this is a couple miles away from Tulsa." So that really led me to really think and connect with opportunity and impact. And also too- just looking at the staff being able to meet them, seeing what it means to their life. It's wow. It's like the difference that I longed for that I wanted to create. I realized I was not doing corporate. That's what I'm able to do in real estate, not just from the investor side of, "Oh investors get to make money and build a legacy." But the staff that we get to come in and employ and hire and now they have ways of feeding their family. So all of those elements really congeal to let me know that we're onto something. And we made the right decision by purchase sample before with this hotel.

Acquania Escarne 20:10

It's such a pleasure to actually be in the hotel right now, where we can see guests enjoying the services and the facilities and the staff. And as you said, just speaking with some of the people here, being a owner is just amazing to see the investment on the ground and making the time to come here with my family is very important and hopefully will impact our children's lives. So let's keep playing Monopoly in real life, changing lives and making hotel ownership possible.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai