Over the past couple years I became interested in housing, and how to re-think the traditional “get a J.O.B., buy a house, work til you die to pay off the mortgage” narrative for my life. Maybe many of us are questioning that too, given the current state of the world?
As an educator, I also saw the increasing tension between public “charter” and “district” schools fighting over enrollment and students. I dug a little deeper and saw that while Southern California’s overall population is growing, Los Angeles is losing population while the Inland Empire (San Bernardino and Riverside counties) and other outlying areas are increasing in population.
Families who would otherwise send their kids to school in LA are moving away, resulting in a net loss of school-age children. So schools are fighting (bitterly) over fewer and fewer students overall! This — among the intersections of race and class inequity — is primarily a housing affordability issue, not only a charter vs. district issue.
I also felt personally confronted by the idea of “climbing the ladder” into my 70’s, and having to save my way into retirement. It honestly didn’t seem feasible that people of my generation would have any sort of security in our old age.
I learned about passive income, the FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) movement, and how strategies like buying rental properties or house hacking (buy a duplex, live in one unit and rent out the other, or rent out rooms in your house), could help people achieve financial freedom.
I’m not averse to working — in fact I’m a workaholic, which is another issue for another post — but trading my time for dollars for the rest of my life didn’t feel like a full expression of my humanity and my contribution to the world.
So I checked out every book on real estate at the library, listened to hours and hours of podcasts, and dove headlong into a brand new field that I knew nothing about. I was hooked. I judged myself for a while and felt a lot of guilt — I had never worked anywhere but in schools and non-profits, and now I was into real estate?! Of all things… Who was I becoming??
In that time, I purchased my first investment property — a little $46,000 house in Ohio — which was scary and exciting. Now I run a social impact real estate project across my rental portfolio, giving 5% of rents as down payment assistance to my tenants through rent-to-own agreements.
I also got a certificate in construction management, because I figured the only way to address housing affordability in LA was to build things, or at least know how it works. Working for a general contractor I’ve helped build 6 units of new construction for mothers in transition and a 37-unit historic renovation project for homeless veterans.
Finally, I became a licensed realtor in CA to help more people become homeowners and build generational wealth. I work with clients to think creatively about earning income from real estate, from house hacking to investing to just buying their first home as a step toward closing the wealth gap. 5% of my real estate income goes to racial and social justice work.
I talk more about my career change from education to real estate in this podcast episode.
So really, this post is just an update on what I’m up to. If you follow me already you’ve probably attended one of my workshops or we’ve worked together in education.
Now I’ll be sharing some different kinds of things, primarily about how to earn passive income, building generational wealth, and how real estate can be a vehicle for social justice.
If you’ve worked with me before, I would really, really appreciate your feedback on Google! You know…that algorithm that runs the internet. 🙂
http://bit.ly/leave-me-feedback
I hope you are staying safe, and thriving, or doing the best you can these days. I’ve personally enjoyed being at home, taking walks, cooking, and taking care of this new cat that showed up on our doorstep last week.
Wishing you health and prosperity for 2021!
Sammy
PS: Did you know there are down payment assistance programs for teachers, school staff & administrators, EMT’s, nurses, firefighters and other first responders?
On Thu, March 4, 2021 @ 7PM PST I’ll be doing a live Q&A on Zoomalicious with lender Fiona Bryan from Academy Mortgage on how to take advantage of these grants for your primary home purchase. It’s free, and anyone is welcome!
Sign up here: https://lyonideas.com/down-payment
