MWB Series Episode 12: How I built a $34M Real Estate Portfolio & Danielle Quit Her 9 to 5

Danielle Desir 0:11

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 0:27

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

Danielle Desir 0:34

Secure in the bag.

Acquania Escarne 0:35

Stacking coins, You know what we mean?

Danielle Desir 0:47

This is our finale episode for Millennial Wealth Builders. But don't worry, it's not this is not the end and end all be all. We do have some exciting updates coming coming soon. But Acquania, We did it we were able to highlight 12 women of color and their creative wealth building strategies. So what's life like what you've been what have you been up to? Like? What have you been doing building wealth?

Acquania Escarne 1:15

Oh my gosh, this was a great, great experience and definitely want to shout out to all the listeners who have followed us and supported each episode. We've gotten amazing feedback from individuals who have just appreciated getting insight into how to have so many wealth builders out there. And I have sort of taken a couple of these tips myself, we had some hotel builders and owners on the show. We had real estate investors on the show and I am a real estate investor. And in the last couple of months, I have levelled up my own portfolio.

So when we first started recording this show I had closed on a hotel, probably within the first or second episode because one of our episodes, we went to the hotel location and got some footage on the ground. And then this past July, I finally found a multifamily syndication opportunity and invested in that so multifamily syndications are these huge apartment subdivisions, you know, normally have a couple 100 units, I found one in Orlando, Florida, with 354 apartments, and it's right near Disney World. So I'm super excited because this is a cash flow opportunity. It's a brand new luxury apartment facility. So great place to live high occupancy rate, when we purchased I think it was about 90% occupancy, and now is at 94%. So we can only go up from there. And then since purchasing in July, we've already received our first cash distributions in the month of September. So I am excited to see this grow, and then the monthly cash flow coming in. And it's all passive income I invested once, and I will get passive income every month. So I love it. And that's what I've been up to.

What about you, Danielle, what is your big announcement?

Danielle Desir 3:13

My big announcement is that I left corporate America. So I took the next step, not the leaps. I feel like I've been working on this for many, many years. But I took the leap and I'm officially a creative entrepreneur. And working on freelance writing, podcast marketing coaching, and I have now 17 different income streams and asked me how I keep it all organized. That's another episode because because there's so many, but I definitely see a big shift in me to focus more on passive income streams. Because you know, sometimes you're, you're tired, maybe you want to build a family and you just need to make money while not necessarily actively trading your dollars, your time for dollars. So that's a big focus of mine for 2020 and 2021 and 2022. But losing my nine to five job, leaving that behind has been really refreshing. There's so many benefits of being an entrepreneur, however, I do miss the comfort of the healthy insurance, you know that nice insurance everything was super easy. I enroll once a year and I don't have to worry about certain things. And the benefits of the retirement match also was really something that I missed as well but I'm just learning I'm learning how to manage my time, schedule, and my my variable finances now.

So that's like the big update for me. But I'd love to hear from you. Acquania Like what has been like the biggest impact that millennial wealth builders has had on your life personally.

Acquania Escarne 4:54

Oh man, so one I've just been inspired by your journey to pursue full time entrepreneurship and thinking of more ways in which I can adopt your strategy. Because y'all don't know there's a lot of behind the scenes work that Danielle was doing for six years, including tracking her cash flow and her income from her multiple streams of income, launching a membership site and inspiring women of color podcast. So let's not play that down and glance over that, like it wasn't huge. But also just being able to meet virtually or even via podcast, the women who I've been following always wanted to talk to and know how they did it, having that opportunity was amazing. In fact, like, one of my favorite episodes was with Minda Harts because I'd read the memo. I loved how she talks about securing your seat at the corporate table. But I never imagined that when we emailed her, she would say yes to being on our show. And she did. So even just getting a fresh perspective from the author herself, was one of my favorite experiences in this journey.

Danielle Desir 6:13

You know, I love all the episodes because I learned something new from Sophal Pettit, just learning about the turmoil that was happening over in Cambodia, every episode, there was just something new, and something that I could take away, which I think is so important, by listening to these stories, and just the exposure to different concepts and different ways that women of color are building wealth, which is why we wanted to start this series is because we wanted to hear more of these stories. And you know, my favorite story, even though it's hard to pick, but my favorite has been Jamila Souffrant.

I have been following Jamila, for a really long time. She's another one where we approached her and asked her she said yes, I was like, also Minda, too, I was kind of like oh my gosh, oh my gosh, that's so exciting. Like I see these women on Twitter. And I know that they've built these amazing empires, but being able to have that one on one conversation. And what I really liked about our approach for the series is that we took away our voices. So we really allowed our guests to shine and for them to authentically tell their stories. And I'm hoping that this will be like a keepsake for them so that they can pass this down to, you know, their loved ones and people in their community and tribe. And then it's like literally a timeless piece. So I love that. And I think that the series also pushed us creatively, because when we first had the idea of like an audio docu series, we were I we I had the idea from social dilemma on Netflix. I just liked the documentary style, but I didn't know how to do it for audio. But I think we learned a lot along the way. And I think our storytelling abilities even though we're not literally like on the mic at the the finished product, we still were able to learn a lot. So I loved having this as a creative, creative project. So Jamila Souffrant was my favorite. And I think that that was again, an Aha. fangirl moment for me personally,

Acquania Escarne 8:20

Yes, I love it. She's one of my favorites, too, because she worked in corporate America and really saved aggressively with her husband for two years straight to be able to invest six figures, right. And then she took the leap. So even just hearing different perspectives, and she's a fellow podcaster, woman of color. And she's turned her podcast into a successful business, right? Very transparent about her journey, but also encouraging to those out there who are still in between, you know, entrepreneurship, and a nine to five, and just trying to pursue financial freedom. So shout out to Jamila for that and continuing to share her journey. So I'm excited that we had this opportunity to present this series. You know, I love talking to dynamic women and sharing their stories. But I'm not quite finished with this project. I think there's more that we can do.

Danielle Desir 9:20

Yes. So we decided that we are going to transform the podcast audio docu series into a book, so that more people, even more people can hear these stories. And I think what's going to be unique about this book is that we're going to share our personal perspectives, like we said in the audio series, we weren't chiming in. We weren't sharing our opinions, we weren't giving takeaways. But in the book, we're going to be able to show off a little bit more of our personality, re-highlight these incredible women and share insights and how it has impacted us. And hopefully we'll be able to hear from listeners just like you as well. where we could hear what was your favorite episode, the things that you took away? And we can maybe incorporate that into the book as well. So are you ready to write a book Acquania.

Acquania Escarne 10:09

One thing Danielle has done is challenged me our whole relationship, it would started in 2018. And so now we move to the next journey of writing my first book, I don't have any published books out there. But I'm so excited to be doing this with you.

Danielle Desir 10:26

We're going to have one of many, there's going to be one of many.

Acquania Escarne 10:29

Yes, so

Danielle Desir 10:30

And I love how books are timeless, right. And not everyone is going to listen to a podcast, they might not even know what a podcast is. But we can still be able to reach people through the spoken word. So I'm really excited about about that. So

Acquania Escarne 10:47

Look out for the book, early 2022. We're shooting for the first quarter of the year. And we definitely hope that you will support us read it, share it and get it as a gift for others. I mean, again, just like the podcast has inspired women wealth builders, we want the book to do the same.

Danielle Desir 11:07

Exactly. And with the book, we're also going to have a private audio feed, where you can listen to the entire 12 part audio docu series right there, as well. So I'm really excited. So you can just binge listen to just those episodes, which would be really, really cool.

So as we wrap up this episode, I wanted to say a special thank you to our supporters and our grant funders, including Plutus Foundation, the Caress Dreams to Reality Funds, and the Black and Brown Podcast Collective, we were able to secure three grants for this audio project, and it was such an honor. And these grants really helped us to bring this project to life. And now we're expanding into different different areas as well. So a big thank you to all of our supporters.

Acquania Escarne 11:59

Absolutely, we couldn't have done it without you. And we want to encourage other women out there, if you are a woman of color podcaster. And you are thinking that you have a great idea you want to share, please take our life as an example. Go out there, pitch your idea to sponsors and grant providers and see if you can win. I mean, we just went out on faith that this was a good idea that other people would support. And we were really, really pleased with the response not only with the three grants, but then also listeners supporting us in our efforts to also do a book. So the possibilities are limitless. You just have to try so let's do it. I'm excited.

Danielle Desir 12:42

So I think that wraps it up very nicely. But you know, I'm sure we're gonna do other projects together other audio projects together, you know, more than likely. So this is not the end. This is just farewell for now.

But thanks again for tuning in.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai