Violeta 0:00

I've been pivoting a lot, like my whole life. I've been pivoting, and I just want to like come on here and say, like, yeah, be okay with switching it up. I mean, we get stuck with wanting to stick to something and all that, because there's a difference between like giving up completely on something and not even giving it a chance to work, and then realizing, like, you know what, this isn't for me after all, or it's run its course. Learn to let things go when it's no longer serving you or serving its purpose, or it's just not working out how you want it to. Apparently, I am the queen of pivoting, and I guess I just didn't really realize it about myself. I just finished an interview and they pointed it out like, Oh, you just have no problem pivoting. And I was like, you know what? Like, yeah, you're right. And so I kind of want to talk about that here in this episode, because sometimes we hold on to things, especially with our finances. And for me, it was with the real estate, some of my properties that I will talk about in a minute, and it was because I am okay with just letting go of letting things and being okay with like a loss, and it doesn't necessarily mean like a financial loss, it could be kind of just a loss in general. So let me kind of bring it back on I was sharing my real estate investing journey on this podcast, and I made a lot of changes, and even against some people's advice, especially with real estate, they say, like, hey, keep your properties if even if they don't cash flow right now, they might cash flow in the future, or depreciation. Think about the appreciation. And so when I began my real estate investing journey, like I didn't plan on doing that, right? I kind of like fell upon it. I just bought my first house. That's all I wanted to do. I wanted to buy my first house. It was the American dream. I had the opportunity. The VA home loan allowed me to buy a house in 2014. So I did. I ended up house hacking because somebody needed a place to stay. One of my friends, so rented it out, and I was like, hey, like extra cash flow for me, so that way I could pay some of these bills, and that's what like basically kicked it off. And then I went and bought my second and third house and didn't know anything about real estate investing, but I kept hearing about hey, about this real estate investing, and so my first house I ended up be turning it into a rental because someone told me to, and so like I pivoted there because I was like, I guess, right? So I went for it, and then with my second house, I turned it into a rental too, but I was negative $200 in cash flow, like it became a bill to me to uphold that that rental property, even though I house hacked it, and yes, appreciation. I held it, and then when I bought my house in California, it was not going to cash flow either. I was going to be like either breaking even, like it was too much of a risk, and so I ended up selling all three of those houses. And I started over with my real estate and wiped the slate clean and switched my strategy to multifamily properties. And so I pivoted my strategy right there, and I went against the grain because I had some people telling me, like, no, just keep them. And I was like, No, it's too high risk for me. Like, I am doing this to make money, I don't want to have to have extra bills, right? To uphold these properties. So I ended up selling them, and it was during the time when like houses were flying off the shelves or whatever, and so you might think, like, okay, well, you got lucky, which is another thing that I guess I'll I'll talk about it here. This episode is just gonna be all over the place because I'm kind of like, I'm one, I'm on a high on this interview, and two, so I've been reflecting after this interview, so I have a lot of thoughts, and a lot of it, you know, applies to like your finances and stuff, so that's why it all comes together, right, with the pivoting, but also a little bit with the luck because I know outside looking in, you may think, like, okay, you just got lucky, right? Because I sold my houses during the time that houses were flying off the shelves, and then also it was during the time when we had very low interest rates, right? And it's not necessarily luck, it is I would say like strategic luck, right? At best, let's call it strategic luck. Because if I hadn't taken those steps when I birth but bought my first house in 2014 and so on, they wouldn't be lucky, right? I would it would I would have just been in 2021, 2022, not the wiser, just not doing anything with that opportunity that came up. So it's a little bit more strategies, more intention than just luck because I had to make those decisions, and even though they weren't perfect, which is another thing, like I didn't make perfect investments, I didn't make perfect decisions, but putting myself in that position allowed me to have these opportunities come my way, right? Like I wouldn't have been able to take advantage of those opportunities or that luck if I wasn't in the game, right? And even though I had negative cash flow or whatever, I was able to have the opportunity, I had those houses available, and I was like, you know what, I'm gonna take advantage of this market, this opportunity that came up, and yeah, and so I was able to use the equity to of course become a mom that I talk about here, but I was able to sell that house so that way, bam, slight because I had taken out a second mortgage on that house, so I was able to sell it, wipe the slate clean, no more debt, and I came off with still some money left over enough to buy another rental property. Same thing with my first and second house. I was able to, and I did hold them for a while too. It wasn't like I held each one for at least three to four years, and so it wasn't like all luck, is what I'm trying to say. I was able to take advantage of those opportunities that came up, and I continue to position myself by just being in the space to say yes to these opportunities, and so yeah, make yourself available. I talk about it and we get into it with like real estate cheese mail of people who are waiting, especially right now that the housing market is crazy. Interest rates, a lot of people don't want to get into real estate investing right now because the prices and interest rates as mentioned, but there's still deals out there that you can find, and I know I'm gonna be shopping around because it's less competition right now, it's more of a buyer's market, so I have more leeway where I can negotiate, even though the interest rates I just closed on in September, and once again, matter of fact, that just triggered another thing of like having yourself available for opportunities, is because I had bought a rental in that market, that same seller then came back and gave me another opportunity. And actually, I've had a few sellers call me directly and see if I wanted to buy their property, so opportunities start coming your way, so that luck starts finding you because you set yourself up to become available to those lucky opportunities, right? And so, what I'm saying is like take the steps. I know we want perfectionism, we want to know everything about whatever, whether it's starting a business, whether it's learning how to invest in like 401ks or stocks or whatever, like you want to have the perfect stock, like that one that's gonna grow the most or whatever, is like no, because you're missing out on that luck, right? Again, that luck of when stocks rise or whatever, because you are sitting on the sidelines waiting for this perfect thing or wanting to know everything. And I find a lot of people that get stuck in that that mode of just waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. And meanwhile, like luck opportunity is just flying by you, right? And so, yeah, like that's what I want to say about this whole luck and opportunity. Same thing with like business, and I will say from my experience, I have set myself like me voy a regagnar, like I'm not just uh it sounds like, but like I'm also regagnando myself because this interview is one of my dream interviews, and let me tell you how many times I passed up this opportunity, even one time I had submitted for it. I got to the pre-interview stage, and then I just never followed up because we had to reschedule it because something ended up happening that they needed to reschedule. Then I never followed up, and so that fell through because I held myself back, right? I prevented that opportunity for myself because in my mindset I saw it like, okay, maybe I'm just not ready for it. I maybe need more deals under my belt, maybe I need more experience, blah blah blah. And so I held myself back, and then my friend Lindsay, she said that opportunity, she sent it my way again, right? By referring me and saying, hey, like check her out and everything. And this time I was like, okay, I'm going to do it this time. And then now we recorded it today. And so obviously, we we hold ourselves back, we prevent ourselves from having that luck, that opportunity come our way, whether it's because we are in that mindset of like, no, I need more, I need to have more experience, I need to know more or whatever. So, like, I've held myself back, even with the money cheese and the real estate investing community that I'm building in school. Let me tell you how long that's been in my brain. I wouldn't take action because I felt that I needed to be a super expert, that I needed a larger portfolio to make it worthwhile. And I finally I was like, you know what? Let's, yeah, yeah, that's that. Like, I need to do it. I need to do it. Like, as imperfect, I was like, the goal is that I want to make myself available, I want to create this community where we come together, learn about real estate investing and all that and support. And finally set up a call, it set it up, and it went well. Like for our first call, I'm super excited, and like people are liking it that I'm setting up this space for you to come and learn. Even if you're at the very beginning, you're just thinking about it, seeing if it's something that's possible for you, or we have investors that already have maybe ones, two Zs, three Z rental properties, but we're learning from each other because not everyone's doing the same thing. Like I'm doing multifamilies out of state. Lindsay, my friend, is doing ADUs and also doing single family out of state, and then another one was doing condos and house hacking, and then another one that's a newbie to real estate. A house out of the country fell on her lap, and so now she's learning not only real estate investing, but in a whole different country. So, like real estate and again, opportunity came her way, and she is saying yes, and she is making herself available for that opportunity of fixing that property over there in another country and trying to rent it out and stuff like that. So, yeah, we have to make ourselves available, and we have to be okay with not having it all like figured out, and that's one of the things that held me back was like this perfectionism and being able to pivot because with money cheese me, I still love doing money cheese, and then that's why I started real estate cheese me because originally I wanted to do kind of like be this finance expert and blah blah blah, but I ended up pivoting because actually, no, I know more about real estate investing, and so like I've pivoted that way. I'm still keeping money cheese because I'm learning, I want to bring more experts and people to like teach about different things, a business. I'm setting up these businesses, so I'll be talking about that here because let me tell you, I it's been such a learning process, not only setting up money cheesement as a business, and now we're having a community, and then I have a co-host, and so like then I have to do all the logistics and figure out okay, how do I want to pay, like bringing in sponsorships, all of that. So I'll be covering that here as well. So y'all can follow the journey and see like what all I'm doing, because it might help y'all in your journey if you decide to start a business, influencer, whatever, or just finances in general, of how to use investing to become work optional, financial free, or whatever your goal may be, right? So, yeah, I've been pivoting my whole life from joining the military, like I just ended up joining out of nowhere just because I felt like I wasn't doing anything with my life. I did the same thing even with my degree. Like, I started off wanting to be a veterinarian, then it became a nurse because I found out about nursing. Then during that, I learned about microbiology, then I thought I was gonna be a microbiologist, and then because of the military of my job there, I was like, well, maybe I'll just get a degree in I was kind of like human resources, so I was thinking, like, okay, maybe an accounting, hated it, and so switched back over to some basic science degree, I forget what it was, and then somebody told me, like, hey, want to be an industrial hygienist? So you could become an officer in the Navy, blah blah blah, and I said, sure. Then I went down that path. They sent me to school in in Houston to get my degree in that the Navy paid for it, got my degree, became an officer, so then I pivoted completely different of what I was doing and opportunities again, made myself available to these opportunities because now I became an officer, meaning like a bigger paycheck, meaning I could invest more money to invest and stability and all that, so I was able to do that, and then after 14 and a half years, I left the military because I felt the need to pivot again, I wasn't enjoying it, and everybody thought I was crazy because I didn't go the full 20 years where I would get like retirement, get my pension. But to me, at this time I already had some rental properties and all that stuff. Like, to me, I didn't want to lose the opportunity to watch my daughter grow. Like, it took so much effort and money and stuff and all that to have her that I did not want to miss out anything because I was set to next duty station, I was gonna go back on a ship, deploy, and then I'd miss out on some key milestones of my daughter, and I that wasn't something that I was willing to give up. So I made the decision that I was gonna pivot out of the military, and then yeah, I left. It was scary because after 14 years of stable, steady paychecks and then coming out, like and both my husband and I, we both got out, so yeah, and originally I was just gonna take a break from working, I was gonna go back to my career, and then I ended up like not needing to. So we ended up being okay financially for me to just like completely stop working, and now I'm back in school, but this one's just to use my GI Bill and learn something that I want to learn. So now I'm again pivoted to sociology, and now like I'm thinking maybe I'll get a master's degree in it. I don't know yet, like I don't want to commit myself because I've been doing school a very, very long time. I'm a professional student, and but yeah, I pivoted again, I've been learning a lot, and I got out, decided like, you know what, I'm gonna just do real estate investing and really take like more, I guess more seriously money achievement and real estate achievement, and so far it's been working out and growing and stuff, and really taking advantage of opportunities that are coming up, and so I ended up doing that, and now the ability to manage my own properties that's coming and I pivoted, I hired a property manager the whole time, and now I'm pivoting to doing it myself because there's some tax benefits to it. Also, I want some control, and and I needed to fire my property manager because I feel like what happened was that they were scaling and not getting more people, so a lot of communication and a lot of balls dropped throughout that time. So I was like, you know what, I'll just take it back over. I have the time and all that. So I'm learning a lot, and so yeah, I've been pivoting a lot, like my whole life. I've been pivoting, and I just want to like come on here and say, like, yeah, be okay with switching it up. I was as we get stuck with wanting to stick to something, and I think this is where it takes a little bit of reflection and understanding what your goals are and all that, because there's a difference between like giving up completely on something and not even giving it a chance to work, and then realizing, like, you know what, this isn't for me after all, or it's run its course, like, for example, the military it ran its course, it did what it needed to do, right? It gave me the financial stability, I got my citizenship through there. My parents, I was able to get their citizenship and all this other stuff, and even helped me with becoming a mom because they have their own like IVF that's more affordable, so that helped as well. And same thing with my properties, maybe your business you need a pivot on it. It really depends, of course. Take that with a grain of salt because even if it's not like you're kind of like burnt out or whatever, but it's what's paying your bills. I mean, maybe not pivot right this second, but maybe you could start figuring out how to make that pivot. Maybe like stepping away, selling the business, or just maybe you just need to like add some things, take some things away. I don't know, depends on your type of business. So, yeah, that's basically what I wanted to share with y'all of how making yourself available to this luck, right? So that way opportunities when they show up, you're able to take advantage of them. And the other one is of course the pivoting, learning when to let go, when to shift, and all that, and being okay with that. And people are going to say you're crazy. They told me I was crazy for leaving the navy, they told me I was crazy for selling these properties and so on, and they told me I was crazy for buying properties out of state that I haven't even seen. But like, I trust myself, I know what I want, I know what my goals are, and I am okay with letting go of things that aren't no longer serving me. So, yeah, let me know what your thoughts are. Like, have you pivoted? What is something that like maybe you've been thinking about, like maybe it's no longer serving you? But yeah, other than that, I will see you in the next episode. Bye.