Ashley Hamilton had every card stacked against her in achieving financial freedom. She was a single mother with two children, earning just $20,000 per year working as a waitress, living in Detroit, one of the hardest-hit markets following the Great Financial Crisis.
Sixteen years later, she’s making $50,000 per month in pure cash flow (and she has the receipts to prove it)!
In Detroit, foreclosures were running rampant, houses were being repossessed left and right, but what could she do with almost no disposable income? Thanks to a $6,000 tax refund check, Ashley did what everyone told her not to do—buy a house during the crash. Fortune favors the bold, and Ashley was soon making $7,000 per year in cash flow from a single property. It was time to repeat the system and buy more rentals. With each tax refund, a new property was acquired, and get this—without using a mortgage.
Ashley scaled fast thanks to her super-saver mentality, and now makes more passive income in one month than many people do in a year. She’s done it all with fewer rental properties, striving to have more cash flow instead of more doors. She’s walking through her portfolio, breaking down which properties make the most, and how to scale beyond financial freedom, no matter your starting point.
Dave:This investor bought her first property when she was making only 20 grand a year. Now she generates $50,000 in cashflow per month just from her real estate portfolio that is financial freedom. And she achieved it by just buying the same types of properties over and over. And now she’s using that freedom to completely transform her life and her health for the better. Let’s hear exactly how she did it. Hey everyone. I’m Dave Meyer. I’m a housing market analyst and I’ve been an investor myself for the last 15 years. And on this podcast, the BiggerPockets Real Estate podcast, we teach you how to achieve financial freedom through real estate investing. Today’s guest on the show is Investor Ashley Hamilton. She lives and invests in Detroit and is one of the all-time most popular podcast guests we’ve ever had. Ashley started her investing career when she was struggling as a waitress with two kids and slowly grew to 10 properties when she first came onto the podcast back in 2019.
Dave:Today we’re having her back on for an update. She has accomplished a lot. Ashley has grown her portfolio to 40 properties today, but she’s focused on maximizing the cashflow she can get with a relatively manageable number of properties instead of just trying to scale to as many doors as possible. And most importantly, she’s using her real estate and the time freedom it has allowed her to make huge improvements to other areas of her life. Ashley is going to share all about a huge personal health journey that was only possible because she took that first step and bought a property more than a decade ago. This is a super inspiring and fun story of how real estate can change more than just your bank account. Let’s bring on Ashley. Ashley, welcome back to the BiggerPockets Podcast for your third appearance. Thank you so much for being here.
Ashley:Of course, of course. I’m super excited to be here and I cannot believe three times OMG. This one’s going to be the best.
Dave:Yeah, I think we’re going to make it the best. We have big shoes to fill though. You’ve had some great episodes on the BiggerPockets podcast before, but maybe for people who haven’t listened to those first two episodes, fill us in. How did you get into real estate in the first place?
Ashley:Absolutely. Yeah, so at age 23 years old, I found myself as a single mother of two kids under five. In 2009, I was 22 years old and had no financial backing, no business owners in the family, not even a homeowner myself, but I knew I wanted more that I didn’t want to feed into the statistics that had been labeled on me. So basically I went to a webinar or a free live event here locally in Detroit, and I didn’t know anything about real estate, but it was trying to get us to invest in real estate. Long story short, I sat through the whole three hour presentation and out of everything, only two things stuck out to me. Be fearful when others are greedy and be when others are fearful. And the other one was be willing to spend a couple of years of your life living how most people won’t so you could spend the rest of your life living how most people don’t.
Ashley:So that was all I took away from it. And then after I left the presentation, I started to look around me and I seen nothing but foreclosures, auction hood homes, bank foreclosure again, it was 2009. So I took that as a sign. Everybody I cut on the radio and everybody saying, don’t buy in Detroit. It’s a war zone. You’ll lose your shirt. The market’s in the tanker, real estate is bad. And then I see all the foreclosure sign. I was like, well, hey, this is a sign to do the opposite and be greedy when others are fearful.
Dave:A lot of people were fearful in 2009. That’s pretty much everyone.
Ashley:Yeah, for sure. So that’s kind of what started it. But again, at that time I was making less than $20,000 a year as a waitress at Red Lobster against single parent of two. I had no real education or anything like that, so I didn’t have any funds or resources to getting started with real estate. Actually, the only time that I had ever seen a thousand dollars in my bank account was at tax time once a year where the middle class and lower, they’ll get a tax refund. So I knew I was expecting a $6,000 refund and 2009. So I said, Hey, I look to use that to buy my first property.
Dave:And that was enough.
Ashley:Yeah, absolutely.
Dave:How did you buy a first deal with a tax refund? How much was the deal you bought and what did you have to put down?
Ashley:So that’s the caveat, right? Everybody was like, oh, that’s a great down payment, but how did you qualify for a mortgage? Well, the thing is the house was $6,300. That was it.
Dave:Oh my God.
Ashley:That was the purchase price. And obviously when I say that, people were thinking like, well, it had to be a rundown property. It needed a full remodel, it needed to be demolished. But no, actually it was this three bedroom ranch home right on the same street as the park close to eight mile here in Detroit. So a very treeline neighborhood, and it needed about 3000 worth of work like plumbing paint and things like that. And now today, this house is worth $130,000 today. Oh my god.
Dave:Yeah. I can’t do that math in my head, but that’s like 20 times the value, something like that. That’s insane. Maybe the best return on equity I’ve ever heard on any deal. That’s amazing. A very creative, obviously way to get into real estate and use the resources that you have even when they’re limited, like you said. But figuring out a way to get started and take advantage of a time where a lot of people were scared, and I know everyone’s probably thinking, oh man, it must’ve been so easy investing when things were 6,300 bucks to buy a house. And in retrospect it might be, but no one knew at that time that things were going to take off. People thought that the bottom could take years, and actually if you start in 2009, the bottom didn’t come for four more years. So it is practicing what you preach and being greedy when other people are fearful and having the vision to invest even though things weren’t as obvious as they might’ve seemed back in 2009.
Ashley:Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. So that property, like I said, it cost $6,300. And the crazy thing about it is I was getting $7,000 a year in cashflow just on cashflow, right? And then
Ashley:It did take a long time because actually I did not get my first mortgage in Detroit into 2019, so actually 10 years later before banks really felt comfortable to start lending in Detroit and before the values to start going up. So it did take quite a long time, but at the same time I knew, I mean the numbers just made sense. I owned it free and clear, and even at seven grand a year, the expenses were very, very low because obviously if the property is worth 6,300, the taxes aren’t a lot, the insurance isn’t a lot. So it just made sense, and I don’t want to sound, obviously we’re talking about the past, but I don’t want to discourage people that are watching this episode right now that, wow, I can never do that with $6,300. Well, you just have to use it as a down payment. There’s first time home buyer grants all over where they’ll give you up to 25,000 in down payment assistance. And then obviously you can use people like hard money lenders and stuff. I know a lot of the lenders that I use, they’re funding 90% of purchase, 90% of rehab. So you still could get into a property for around that price, but you will be using leverage as well.
Ashley:So don’t want to discourage anybody that’s looking to invest. Now,
Dave:I imagine that probably changed your lifestyle quite a lot. Like you said, you were making less than 20 grand a year waiting tables and your go-to making seven grand a year in cashflow. That’s like I would imagine be a windfall. Did you use that to supplement your lifestyle or did you just use that to buy more property?
Ashley:Right, and thanks for asking that portion, because a lot of investors don’t talk about that. Even to this day, 80% of my income from businesses go directly back into the business. So when I was building from nothing, every dime I got, so for example, my rent was $700 a month, I still didn’t change my lifestyle. I used $600 of that to invest and save up for my next property the following year. So that was the plan. Just buy a property every year using my tax return and then whatever I can save monthly. So that’s what a lot of new investors, I feel like that’s awesome. Don’t understand. They buy a rental property and now they’re like, oh, I can get a new car or I can go get the Tesla or start to use the money for a lifestyle. And you can’t do that when you’re building. To me, my philosophy is the first three years, use all your income, your profit and reinvest into the business to build your solid foundation. And then you can start doing the lifestyle creep where, oh, I can afford a nicer car now. Oh, I can afford to invest or save or do other things.
Dave:That is amazing advice. It’s totally up to you. You could invest buy one property and use it for lifestyle, but the math is extremely clear. The longer you reinvest your money, and if you can maximize your reinvestment and do that as long as you can, you will just get richer. And it’s not even close. If you look at a compound interest calculator, for example, and you just Google, it’s one of the most eyeopening things I’ve ever seen in my life is if you just see how the difference is is even if you’re making, let’s say seven grand a year in cashflow, the difference between reinvesting all seven grand and reinvesting two grand of that couldn’t be the difference of hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars by the time you actually retire. And I know that sounds crazy, but it is really, really true. I recommend it if you haven’t done this before, going to Google that. So Ashley, it sounds like a great scaling plan. You are using your tax refunds, you’re saving money. That’s just good fundamental real estate. That’s how most people do it, is just taking what you got and putting it into it. But how did you scale quickly? How did you go from buying one property a year to having a much more sizable portfolio like you do now?
Ashley:Yeah, absolutely. So I have to give credit to the one and only BiggerPockets and my first interview with David Green and Brandon Turner, of course. So at the time of my first interview, I had 10 properties, free and clear. I was semi-retired, all of, I was living way below my means, and I thought that was it for me because that was my original goal. Not having any formal education, not knowing anything about real estate, I kind of just went in blindly. But after the first interview, I got emanated with calls and messages, and then I got David Green’s book about the bird strategy and things like that, and financing was possible in Detroit now in 2019.
Dave:Nice.
Ashley:I basically just said, Hey, I’m going to give this thing another try. I started buying August of 2019. My interview came out May of 2019, and from August, 2019 to August, 2020 in the middle of COVID, I bought 11 doors in just one year.
Dave:Oh my God. Picked a good time to jump back
Ashley:In. It was like a collapsing time. So what essentially took me 10 years to do, I was able to do in one year and even buy it with an extra door. And the biggest difference was using leverage. So previously all of my deals were cash. It was sheer savings, investing all the cashflow and in working and things like that. But the second half was sheer leverage. Now, to be honest and brutally honest, to give you guys something to think about, so my 10 property portfolio was generating probably around four grand a month at that time in cashflow. And then the 11 properties that I refinanced, they were only generating about $2,500 a month. So my free and clear portfolio was still kicking the butt of the leverage, but I was still able to get way more doors, a bigger net worth increase. So just that was to me a great case study that I even used today. How did my portfolio perform with free and clear and how has it affected me negatively or positively when I leveraged it? So I lost a little cashflow in there, but I was still making an additional 2,500 a month off 11 properties versus the four grand off the 10 properties free and clear.
Dave:That’s a really important trade off for everyone to think about because again, there’s no right answer here. To me, it really kind of comes down to where you are in your investing career. If you’re trying to grow, it’s often worth it to give up cashflow to acquire if they’re good units, like great units that you want to hold onto for a long time because 2,500 a month, that’s still a lot of money. It pays for a lot of your life, but that will probably become five grand or 10 grand a month by the time you truly retire and it’s worth it. But of course there are risks and trade-offs to carrying on that debt. My recommendation sounds like you believe the same thing is as long as it’s cash flowing and real cashflow, not just pretend social media cashflow, but if you have real cashflow that allows you to take on debt in a responsible way so that even if, like you said, if there’s a rent freeze or something adverse happens, which does happen, these things do happen. If you can withstand that and use debt at the same time can be a very powerful tool to scale.
Ashley:I definitely agree with that, and especially what you said about real numbers versus social media, that is so important. The BiggerPockets calculator, I’ve had people say, well, I’ve used a bigger calculate s calculator, but I don’t have any cashflow. So I just did the numbers myself and I’m like, wait a second. No, that’s not real cashflow, right? You have to have the real cashflow. And then I’ve also had people say, well, it’s negative cash flowing, but the appreciation and that’s great, but again, just like Dave said, once there’s a rental freeze or just an inevitable happening, whether it’s life or anything like that, you cannot sustain having negative cashflow. So making sure that you use the real numbers for sure and that you’re cash flowing, even if it’s a hundred bucks a month, it has to positively cashflow. I
Dave:Couldn’t agree more. I think people got into the appreciation, no cashflow thing in 2020 or whatever, which is a very unusual time in real
Ashley:Estate.
Dave:That’s probably not going to happen again, maybe in our whole life we don’t know, but it’s very, very unusual from a historical perspective. So I wouldn’t personally count on that.
Ashley:Absolutely.
Dave:I want to catch up though, Ashley, with what you’re doing today, but we got to take a quick ad break. We’ll be right back. They say real estate investing is passive, but if you’ve spent a Sunday night buried in spreadsheets, you know better. We hear it from investors all the time, spending hours every month sorting through receipts and bank transactions, trying to guess if you’re making any money. And when tax season hits, it’s like trying to solve a Rubik’s cube blindfolded. But that is where Baseline comes in. BiggerPockets official banking platform, it tags every rent, payment and expense to the right property and schedule E category as you bank. So you get tax ready financial reports in real time, not at the end of the year. You can instantly see how each unit is performing, where you’re making money and losing money, and you can make changes while it actually still counts. So head over to base lane.com/biggerpockets to start protecting your profits and get a special a hundred dollars bonus when you sign up. Thanks again to our sponsor baseline. Welcome back to the BiggerPockets podcast. I’m here with investor Ashley Hamilton, who is just catching us up on her origin story, if you will, and how she got started in Detroit in 2009, scaled to 10 units, then in 2019, started using leverage, got another 11 units. What is your portfolio look like today?
Ashley:So today I only own 45 properties.
Dave:That’s a lot.
Ashley:That’s a lot, right? But if you’re looking at social media and stuff, I feel like a small girl in this realm of real estate investing for social media. But what’s most important is of that 45 properties, I’m cash flowing $50,000 a month and I’ll break it down and I’m the queen of receipts, so bring me back on and I’ll open up some sheets for you or send some appraisals. But I love to show my receipts, and that’s what kind of spearheaded this next journey that I’m on, being able to maximize cashflow without increasing the doors. So I look at 45 properties after my second interview with BiggerPockets in 2023, I doubled down with Airbnb. So right now I have five properties in the city of Detroit on Airbnb. And I know I say Airbnb because you can say short-term rental, but I’m not going to lie just with all the businesses I have, I’m strictly on Airbnb, so I could probably make more.
Ashley:So right now I’m making $20,000 a month solely from Airbnb, and I show it on my page every month. The beginning of the month, I show what the previous month did and what the new month is expecting to do. So that’s public information and it’s not hidden. And what I would like to say is even though I started in Airbnb in 2023, I started with one unit. I still use the same principles I did in my investment journey. So I have not taken a salary from my Airbnb earnest even to this day. And like I said, I show I made $22,000 last for the month of August, and none of that went to me because I’m literally funding the sixth property strictly off the revenue from the five Airbnbs and about two months though. The good thing about it is I’ll be completely free of all debt from the Airbnb portfolio just because I’m generating so much.
Ashley:And then I have 15 section eight rentals. Obviously I started in 2020 converting all of my new rentals into section eight, and I was strictly because the rental freeze section eight was guaranteed they were given incentives and they were given about $200 more than market rent at that time. Wow. Yeah. So my section eight portfolio, it generates 25,000 a month. And then the reason I say that, because with the Airbnb, even though it’s generating to 20,000, I have cleaning fees and stuff like that and just my regular rental portfolio that’s just normally cash and some section eight, but that’s the portfolio. And out of the 45 properties, I only have four Multifamilies, which are duplexes, so most of ’em are single family
Dave:You’ve invented and succeeded at a totally different approach to real estate investing that I’ve ever even thought about. I think everyone goes through this stage where they are starting and they use leverage to grow, and then later in their career they deleverage and pay down their mortgages so that they can get to free and clear. But just from circumstances or intention, you did it the exact opposite way, which is so awesome because you’ve basically with free and clear property that’s as every, listen, everything is risk, but a free and clear single family rental is about as low risk of an investment in the world as you can probably create. And so you’ve created an income for yourself with almost no risk, and now you’re able to take on a little bit more risk because you have essentially your lifestyle. It’s just paid for on these low risk assets. It’s so cool. I’m
Ashley:So jealous. Don’t be. That’s okay. And I have so much, I mean because obviously it’s all self-taught, but it’s mostly listening to the market, listening to the knowledge and weeding out the smoke and stuff like that, and just figuring it out. One thing, what I noticed about my journey, I didn’t know anything, and that’s what kind of got me to be more brave because if you were in real estate before and you lost everything in oh nine, you would be scared or more cautious to invest or if you had family members that did that. I didn’t have anybody that was a real estate investor, so I really didn’t have those naysayers. So I just took it on. I didn’t know what I was doing was really risky. But that’s exactly right where you were getting at. I am able to take a little more risk now because I do have that nest egg building up.
Dave:That’s honestly super cool. I love it.
Ashley:Really quickly, I just wanted to talk about just some things that I’ve done. This is very new to me. This is the last year. So again, and this is my market. I’m in Detroit obviously, but I’ve seen this across plenty of markets. There’s opportunities. So in Detroit, the most popular asset class is a three bedroom, one bathroom home. But I found out that in section eight, they’re paying $2,000 a month for four bedrooms and they have like 20,000 families that just are in smaller units because there’s not a lot of four bedrooms in Detroit. That was number one. So I studied for my builder’s license, so I’m a certified licensed builder in the state of Michigan. Yes. So that taught me what a legal bedroom in Michigan was, and I said, wait a second, I can convert basements into legal bedrooms. All I have to do is add an egress window, which is about three to $5,000. So long story short to date, I’ve turned five of my three bedroom single family homes into four bedrooms by adding a legal bedroom in the basement. So with the five properties alone, by me adding a fourth bedroom, I’ve been able to generate $1,300 a month in additional cashflow.
Dave:Wow.
Ashley:Additional cashflow just off that. So basically what a three bedroom would rent for about 1500 here, a four bedroom would rent from 18 to 2000 just depending on the demand. So that’s a huge jump, probably costing about 14 grand to install these new basement bedrooms. But that’s the math on it. You have 14 grand and you’re getting about two to $400 more a month in cashflow.
Dave:Okay. So even if you took the average there, you’re making 30, so it takes you like five years to repay that. So that’s like a 20% return on investment. I mean, that’s worth it all day.
Ashley:And your appraisal’s coming back higher because you have a finished basement. They may not include it as a bedroom, but a finished basement. My appraisals have been blowing me away lately. I really want to make sure I talk about the property, the duplex that appraised for 1 35 in May, 2024, that just praise that 360 1 year later.
Dave:Wait, why 200 grand?
Ashley:Yeah, I swear to God. So may of last year, it appraised at 1 35 June of this year. It appraised at 360. Now all I did was I turned it into an Airbnb, so it was furnished when I had the appraisal, but I just literally replaced all the windows and the siding on the exterior and furnished it. Really nothing major inside, and I added a bathroom in the basement. That was one way that I’ve been able to sustain and get more cashflow without buying more properties. I’ve also been converting duplexes. I own four multifamily properties, but they’re two families. They’re not like four or five, and I’ve been converted them into triplexes, but you may can even convert it to fourplexes, and that’s by adding an apartment in the basement, right? Again, legal basement. Now that I know what a legal bedroom is, I’m going crazy with this stuff.
Ashley:But if you’re in a market that don’t have a basement, you can maybe finish an attic on a duplex, an opportunity as well. And basically, so now again, in Michigan, normally if your property is zoned multifamily, they don’t say two, three or four. It’s anything, four units or less is the market two to four units in our zoning. So if it’s already zoned multifamily, you can go up to four units without having to get a variance from the city without having to really go through all the headaches without having to put fire suppression systems. So that’s what I’ve been doing. How do I maximize this without having to break the bank by doing all this variances, waiting time and fire, all that stuff. My duplexes are already in mossy family zone area. So hey, just throw up a third apartment in there, a studio or one bedroom in the basement, and now I’m getting average rent maybe is 1100, but I can charge 900 for a basement apartment, and now I just increase. So if I’m getting 2200 in rent for two units, now I’m getting 31. I added $900 for that basement apartment, still one tax bill, still one insurance bill, still one mortgage payment. But now I have three
Dave:Units. That makes a lot of sense. And when you’re considering these things, do you analyze it the same way you would analyze a different kind of investment? We were kind of doing the back of the envelope, 20% return math, or how are you prioritizing these projects and deciding where to put your money?
Ashley:Absolutely. So number one, when I started, and I think that’s what helped me so much when I started this in real estate investing, I knew it was a long haul. I knew it was for the long haul. I want my wealth to last 10 generations because that’s what I feel like we’ve been missing. We weren’t passed down generational wealth. So I always think of it, Hey, this is going to be my forever home. My kids are going to own this. So I don’t necessarily think, oh, what the appreciation is going to be. I’m looking at the neighborhoods though, and by me being in Detroit, I know that as long as it’s clean, safe, and decent that there’s going to be a big demand for the area. So that’s basically what I’m looking at, which properties are in the best area, or I’m a licensed real estate agent, so I can see if I’m just scrolling on Zillow and I see a home and a zip code that I own that sold for one 60 and I’m like, wait a second, I paid 50,000 for a house that year, then I’ll start researching. I realize, oh, the value has increased significantly. So now let me put another bedroom in there or another apartment in there.
Dave:This is why I hate the idea of door count and people comparing how many units they have because let’s just say you had 20 grand. You could go buy another unit that produces 2% return or 5% return, or you could do what Ashley’s doing and that produces a 20% return. What’s better? The 20% return is better. It is just math. That is just a better way to use your money. And if you just get out of this social media mindset of comparing how many units you have, you can actually just make more money and have less stress, which is exactly what Ashley has accomplished
Ashley:Here. That’s the goal. And I actually learned it because I never, not saying that I never kind of worry about other people’s portfolio and stuff, but I always felt like the little girl in town because I didn’t have as many doors. But when I met, I was in a mastermind with the guy who owned 150 doors and I was making eight grand more a month than him. Exactly. So I’m at this point, it’s like big bank, take a little bank with me. That’s just a game that we were playing, but I’ll match your doors but match my cashflow. And I want to see, I know nobody with 45 doors are doing what I’m doing at 50 grand a month, but for sure, let’s match the cashflow. I guarantee you, I’m competing with these people that have 150 doors that aren’t making this much.
Dave:It’s funny, I wrote this in my book. I have the great privilege of speaking to investors every single day,
Dave:And I don’t have data on this, but anecdotally, I will say that there is no correlation between how happy people are and how many units they own. None. It’s like oftentimes people I know have a lot more units. They’re miserable. People have 10 paid off units, they’re pretty happy. I think that is a really important lesson is that it’s not about unit count, it’s about the quality of life and if it allows you to live the life that you want, which is something I do want to talk to you about actually, because I understand real estate has allowed you to pursue some other interests and go on a new journey other than just real estate, which I want to hear about, but we’ve got to take one more quick break. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to the BiggerPockets podcast. I’m here with investor Ashley Hamilton, who is built an incredible portfolio over the last 16 years here and has now shifted from acquiring new doors to optimizing her existing portfolio. But actually, I understand that you’ve sort of reached this point of financial freedom, and I’m curious how that has changed your life outside of real estate.
Ashley:It has changed my life in many more ways than I can even describe or even know. I’m still finding out new ways to change my life last month. But number one, I was able to break generational curses. So when I first started, I was 22. My parents never owned a home. We didn’t have any college graduates, no business owners, and I’m happy to say that I was 36 years old when my son graduated high school, and I had two first generation college students in my family. We were able to go to college and what’s more important, they had college funds, so they did not have to take out any student loans. They don’t have any student loan debt to this day. So to be able to break generational curses, if that was all that I could have gotten from this, I would’ve been satisfied there because now my family can look forward and actually be able to have an advantage at life versus starting off with a disadvantage, I started.
Ashley:So that was number one. That’s amazing. And at the same time, again, I found myself 37 years old with, I was an empty nester, two kids in college, and I’m just sitting here in this house and I’m like, I’m financially free. I’m a multimillionaire. What’s next for me? I don’t even know who I am. I had never lived alone before because that was a single parent at 17. So I live with my parents, and then I got an apartment with my kids. So I didn’t know who I was. And actually my mom had to call me, and she was like kind of like, Hey, quit the pity. Pick your head up. You’re a 37 years old multimillionaire. I don’t care what you do. Just go live your life. You don’t have any kids. I would’ve loved to do that. And I’m like, you’re right. So obviously the first thing I wanted to do was to be a healthier individual.
Ashley:I was overweight my whole life. I was high blood pressure and things like that. So I decided to adapt a plant-based lifestyle, and I was a hundred percent strict. I was working out six times a week and cooking all of my meals and everything like that. And I just have to say, obviously it’s a great way to live, but everybody can’t do that. But I had the luxury of not having any kids here by myself and already financially free without working a job. So it did take work, but it helped me be able to sustain that lifestyle. So long story short, after about a year of doing that, I’ve lost a hundred pounds over 200 pounds in my whole life, but a hundred pounds for sure. Oh my
Dave:God. Congratulations. That’s unbelievable.
Ashley:Thank you so much. Yeah, 90% of the people did not recognize me at BP Con last year. That’s
Dave:Unreal. Wow. Well, good for you. I mean, being healthy is in a lot of ways a luxury. You need some money and you need time to be able to do it. Having the time freedom and the financial freedom I imagine sort of helped along that journey.
Ashley:Yes, absolutely. For sure. Because it bought me back my time, but I really want to make sure I touch on this, Dave, because I feel like a lot of people don’t talk about this, but so when you’re a real estate investor, now it’s time to figure out how to save money. And we all know taxes and insurance, how to protect yourself, especially with the insurance. So the first thing I did is once I had a million dollar portfolio, I wanted to go out and get life insurance just in case something happens to me while I’m building. The kids will be saved. They won’t have to worry about these mortgages, and I didn’t qualify for life insurance. I was overweight, high blood pressure, and people don’t understand that. I mean, the trashy kind, it’s like 20 50,000, but I needed two or $3 million to cover everything.
Ashley:I couldn’t qualify for that. Wow. So that’s why I saying I’m just learning stuff. Recently, the following year, I was able to go and get an exam, and now I’m happy to say I have term life insurance and whole life insurance that I qualify, and even my heart rate was the same as an athlete. I’m like, what? So less talk about that more as far as health and wealth, it goes hand in hand. But as investors, as entrepreneurs, if you look at the who dies from heart attacks, most it’s CEOs and business owners at a young age, the youngest age. So you are getting the 40 and 50-year-old execs that are dying from heart attacks, even if they look healthy on the surface because of the stress and everything that’s involved. So being able to qualify for our life insurance is a big item that I feel like we take for granted and we don’t speak about it enough.
Dave:It is really cool to hear how this has evolved for you because I think a lot of people, again, focus on unit count and how much money you’re making or even cashflow, but at the end of the day, no one really does this for cashflow. You want the thing that cashflow will get you, whether that’s more time a healthier lifestyle to pursue a hobby that you’re really interested in. That’s the thing that most people want. But unfortunately, it does seem like a lot of people lose sight of that, and you kind of just keep building and keep grinding and then never actually go after the thing that you really wanted in the first place. But it sounds like you have really been able to do both at the same time, which is super impressive.
Ashley:And I would just say it’s because, so I encourage myself to learn every single day, even from a 2-year-old. I always want to learn, but I never stray away what is good for me. So even when I did in 2019 when I decided to start leveraging my portfolio, I didn’t go out and put mortgages on all 10 of my free and clear properties because that wasn’t me. I still wanted to have freedom. So it’s easy to, when you hear podcasts like this or social media say, I’m going to do what Ashley’s doing, which you should, right? It’s smart. No, I’m just joking. But you should still conform it to what your ultimate goals are.
Dave:I love it. I absolutely love it. Well, thank you. It sounds like we share a similar philosophy about approaching real estate. You’ve already accomplished a ton, Ashley, but what’s next for you? Are you going to continue sort of just optimizing the portfolio or what are your goals these days?
Ashley:I’m continuing to optimize my portfolio. I do plan to buy because I always wanted a mixed use apartment building, so I’m going to build it myself. I just haven’t been able to find one. So that’s what I will be able to use my license in Michigan, I would say that’s probably going to be in the next three to five years. But to be honest, I’m just making sure that my investment strategy is bulletproof. So I was literally doing inventory the other day, and I have about 36 TVs, 12 king size beds because all of my Airbnbs,
Dave:Right,
Ashley:26 queen size beds. And I’m thinking like, well, what if short-term rental slowed down? What if we go into a recession? What if Airbnb stops operating in Detroit? Or what if our leaders say it’s not allowed anymore? So what to do? So I’m actually continuing my journey into group homes, and I know my girl on the show, Lynette, I believe her name is, yeah, she’s been on here before talking about that, but that’s just a natural pivot. So I partnered with someone, which is my first time ever, and we’re going to turn one of my rentals into my first group home and everything looks good. She has about 15, so she’s experienced. She’s doing it, and we’re going to just split the revenue 50 50. But even with that, it’s slated to make 35,000 a month, and I’ll be profiting about 7,000 a month. So on a regular rental that I would’ve charged 1800. So I feel like I’m just going to learn everything about it, document everything. We’ll get the one group home up and running, but that’s just my backup plan just in case the short-term rental thing doesn’t work and I don’t want to be stuck with all this inventory. But other than that, just continue to optimize as I do tenant turnovers. Hey, can I add another bedroom? Can I add an addition? Can I add an apartment to what I already have? But that’s literally the goal.
Dave:I love it. Well, good for you. I would love to have you back on soon to hear how it’s evolving. I’m sure, although it’s a great plan, it sounds like you’re always optimizing and finding new ways to improve your portfolio and your lifestyle. So thank you for sharing this update with us. We’re going to have to catch up with you again in another year or so.
Ashley:Absolutely. I cannot wait. But as always, I see you all the time. I come to BiggerPockets BP Con every year, so for sure you can catch up with me there. I probably have 10 more doors by the end. I don’t know.
Dave:That would be pretty impressive because it’s like a month from now, but there are still tickets. If anyone wants to grab one, you can go to biggerpockets.com/vegas. You can see Ashley, me, and a ton of other great guests from the BiggerPockets universe in Vegas this year at BP Con. Ashley, thanks so much for being here.
Ashley:You’re more than welcome. I appreciate it. It’s always an honor to be featured on BiggerPockets. I love it.
Dave:Absolutely. And thank you all so much for listening to this episode of the show. We’ll see you next time.
Help us reach new listeners on iTunes by leaving us a rating and review! It takes just 30 seconds and instructions can be found here. Thanks! We really appreciate it!
Interested in learning more about today’s sponsors or becoming a BiggerPockets partner yourself? Email [email protected].
