Investing in Real Estate From Scratch – Interview with Ola Dantis | 410

Chris Miles (00:09):
Hello, my fellow Ripplers! This is Chris Miles. Your Cash Flow Expert and Anti-Financial Advisor. Welcome you out for another wonderful show. A show that’s for you and about you. Those of you that work so hard for your money and you want your money to start working harder for you now! You want that freedom. That prosperity. That cash flow. Today! So you work because you want to, not because you have to, because you want to live that life of freedom, that life of joy, and not just a life of luxury necessarily, right? But you want to have comfort for yourself, but more importantly, you want to create a ripple effect as a Rippler for the lives of those around you. Through your family, creating a legacy that lasts well beyond you, not a legacy of scarcity and lack. The legacy of abundance and prosperity, and it leaks out to your community and the country across the world.

Chris Miles (00:53):
And how amazing would it be if all of us would prosper this way? So I’m excited to have you guys on here today, because again, this show has done amazing things. Thanks to you guys. You guys have been bingeing on this show. You’ve been sharing it. You’ve been applying the things we talk about, which I appreciate so much. So again, thank you so much for following us and being a part of this movement.

Chris Miles (01:12):
Here’s a reminder, check out our website, MoneyRipples.com. You know, you’re going to get the ebook Beyond Rice & Beans. You can download there to find more resource, more cash. And also too, you know, if you’ve got questions for me, shoot me an email through there. So anyways, check it out guys.

Chris Miles (01:25):
All right today. So I’ve got a special guest here, Ola Dantis. Now I actually first met Ola because I was on his show. He’s actually got the Dwellynn Show that he’s got going on as well. That’s really cool. And we’ll talk about that a little bit too. But the thing is like, this guy is so impressive, right? Because you know, some of us have been born and raised in the United States for our whole lives, you know. And I meet a lot of people that feel like they don’t have opportunity or they hope and pray that something will come along that’ll work. And I’ll tell you like, Ola, gets rid of all of those excuses. Right? And so that’s why I’m excited to bring him on. Now a little bit about Ola here. Like, as I mentioned, like he has the show, of course, but he’s also the founder CEO of Dwellynn.com. He’s a multifamily investment syndication firm. Should I say that 10 times fast? Right? He’s successfully sourced deals of over $40 million by working with closely with sellers and with other apartment syndicators cross country.

Chris Miles (02:18):
Now, although he’s only lived in the U S for about six or seven years, he has successfully completed rehab projects in excess of $1 million. Now not only has he exceeded his investors returns, right? But he also has this great success in the multifamily space. In fact, he just closed on a 160 unit apartment deal in Houston, Texas, and another 104 unit deal in another place in Texas as well. And again, he does huge value adds across the country, mostly in strong Metro areas across the U S. Now he loves working with new investors, both here and abroad, even those that are international. Which is kind of where Ola’s background comes from as well. Now, one cool thing too, is that his firm also aims to give back. So they have, what’s a one house pledge where by every Christmas they donate a house to a family for Christmas. So starting in Baltimore, for example. So in fact, he just did a recent trip to the Philippines and Bali. And he’s visited the slums and now working on a local initiative to help people in need. So huge guy like big heart, welcome to our show, Ola, how are you doing?

Ola Dantis (03:17):
Doing fantastic, Chris. I really wish I had just put that on full blast. Called my wife i here so she can hear the introduction. Thank you so much!

Chris Miles (03:24):
I totally get it. People introduce me way better than my wife will. You know, it’s awesome. That’s how you keep it real. So tell us, like, you know, where’d you come from and why did you come to the U.S.?

Ola Dantis (03:34):
Yeah. I, you know, obviously you got to have a fantastic podcast. Thanks for having me. Really appreciate you for bringing me on. I’m going to be, I’m going to try to be as stutter free as I can be. So I was born in a place called Nigeria. Many people probably know that country for several interesting reasons, but we’re not going to go into that. But I actually grew up in London. That’s probably where my interest in also, I call it hybrid accent comes from. And it’s still coming from that I live in the US so obviously grew up in the UK where, you know, got my degree and my master’s degree there shortly after that went back home to Nigeria. I’ve set up firm doing pretty okay. But my wife, who is Filipino. She’s born in the Philippines, but also American, but she was born in a military base in America because dad stuff in the military.

Ola Dantis (04:22):
So she’s like, she was working in the US even though we both went to school in the UK, it’s like, Hey, you should come check Disney out. Cause she was interning at Disney. This was years ago now. And so I, you know, I jumped on the plane, you know, I was about to touch down in Florida. I was just looking at I’m a, windows seat guy. So I was looking out and looking at Florida and it’s just beautiful. The aerial view. I mean, you can see all these, you know, the suburbia America, you know, the code is acts on, you know, it was just, I was like, this place is gorgeous! You know, why didn’t anybody tell me about this place? You know, obviously go to Florida, you know, go to Disneyland. It was happy place. Amazing! Fantastic! Anyway, fast forward, my wife and I moved to the US I think two, three years later, after that very first trip, you know, to try the American gym.

Ola Dantis (05:09):
And here we are the American gym. We’re loving it. We had a nice fancy apartment. We didn’t move to Florida. You’d assume we did. We actually chose Baltimore, Maryland. Well it was actually Columbia, Maryland. We started in, you know, in Maryland, we had great jobs. We had a fancy apartment. You know at the time, I didn’t know anything about real estate. And then a friend of mine called me and said, Hey Ola, do you want to, you know, fly and meet me in Dubai? I need you to help me with my business. So come to Dubai! I was like, Oh, okay. So I did well, you know, smart man does a wise man. I prayed a body, obviously and then ask my wife, like, Hey, you know, my friend whose got this real estate business wants me to come and help him with his business. But he wants me to meet him in Dubai. She’s like, well, have you guys heard of, I mean, this was years ago, this is all pre COVID. Just what to put that out it was years ago.

Ola Dantis (05:59):
So it’s just like, have you guys ever heard of Zoom? You know, Skype or whatever? I was like, well, maybe if I go on this trip, maybe I’ll learn something, you know, really good or cool. I mean, I can use it. We can use it. The reason I’m, you know, having these anecdote accounts is people really get a context, right? It’s not like this guy just fell out of the sky. What does he think he is? He think that America is the greatest place on the planet. I really do think that. And I’ll come back to that later. Anyway, the reason I’m telling this story is, success never comes to you as a golden box with a ribbon on it. It could come as a phone call. So be opened, right? Be receptive to things that might maybe might seem outlandish or out of the box, but that could be the beginning of your success.

Ola Dantis (06:44):
So that’s why I’m bringing up this story. Anyway, I was on my way to Dubai. Met with my friend, you know, just standard hotel. I were way like in the desert court biking, none of that, it was just three days, you know, with my friend and his business, which was real estate. Back home in the UK. So I was like, Oh my goodness! If he’s doing this in the UK, certainly I can do this in the US! By the way, you know, I didn’t mention this. I was living the American dream. Go to work. Come home. Go to work. Traffic. Come home. Go to work. It was just like, Oh my God, is this it? I’m just going to do this and die? So I was kind of having that…

Chris Miles (07:19):
The dream we all have, right? We all hope we get stuck in traffic and work all day!

Ola Dantis (07:24):
You know, I was like, this, there’s gotta be something else. I mean, this is great. You know, we had great jobs, but it was just. So anyway, so I was like, I think this is what I’ve been looking for. Right? Great entrepreneurial excitement, go back to the US really just went hard on, I didn’t know anything about real estate. So I just asked my best friend, you know, Google. And I started learning, you know, a website kept coming up Bigger Pockets. So watched that website, that podcast. This book kept coming up, Rich Dad Poor Dad. So I’m talking about pattern recognition yet, right? So every guest was saying, you know, read this book. So I read the book and literally what happened to me was an uppercut in my brain like, Oh my goodness! Whoever this guy is, stole my idea. Whatever this guy is saying is what I’ve been trying to say to myself.

Ola Dantis (08:14):
You know, it’s just that Eureka moment. Right? And anyway, fast forward. Put our first building, our first piece of real estate, and by the way, we were just in the US probably by then maybe two or three years also. But our first building, it was a duplex in Baltimore, Maryland, in the class A area of Baltimore. Because when folks hear Baltimore, you know, anyway, whatever, and you know, we did that, right. This was three, four months probably after my trip back. And my wife and I were having our home one night, you know, kind of doing what lovers do. Cooking! We’re having a conversation. And I was like, Hey, like my account just keeps growing, growing and growing and growing. And she’s like, me too actually! So we think about like, Hey, what did we do different? We bought real estate. And we had tenants in the top floor paying for most of our mortgage. So now we have the new problem, which is just money accumulating.

Chris Miles (09:14):
Now what?

Ola Dantis (09:14):
Now what. Right. And I say this because there might be folks out there thinking, well, I don’t know what to do. I go to work. All my money is gone. I don’t know where it goes. I kind of come for it, but you could house hack. Right. Which is what we did. You could buy a piece of property. It doesn’t matter where you are in the United States. You know, it could be two doors or three or four. So a duplex or triplex or fourplex. You live in one and you rent the others. Right. So if you’re thinking I don’t have money, I don’t know where to start. You could start there. Now.

Chris Miles (09:48):
True.

Ola Dantis (09:48):
Just to throw that in there. If you have kids and you have your wives, I mean, you know, it might be a little bit tricky because my wife and I did this when it was just me and her. We could live in a one bedroom. We didn’t care about parking. You know, even though you’ve never find parking in city. That’s the things that we sacrificed in the beginning. Right. So that’s how I got into the game. And I realized we were making all this money. I was like, Whoa, maybe we can do this. If we did this 10 times more, we wouldn’t have to go to any Ruby board. We wouldn’t have to go to a job. Right. So that’s what started. That was the impetus for Dwellynn, our company. Dwellynn.com. And I found a mentor, were kind of, you know, he was buying apartments and I was like, Oh, that’s really what I want to do. I mean, I’d have to buy 10 of these things. I could just buy a building and maybe I’ll retire. Right. That’s how it works. Anyway, I got a mentor and then we started Dwellynn. And, you know, as they say, the rest is still history in the making, I guess.

Chris Miles (10:48):
Yeah. The rest is history, right? That’s awesome! Kind of take us back again. Like what, cause I know with a lot of listeners on this show, like sometimes they have a fear. I mean, one, they have a fear right now what’s going on in the world. Right. So they’re kind of, someone we’re kind of scared of getting real estate anyways. But even before this, there were still people like, yeah, but isn’t it risky? What if I do it wrong? What would you say to them?

Ola Dantis (11:12):
So a couple of things, right? It, you know, is it risky? I don’t think so. But living in the house every single day is risky. Stepping out of your door is risky. Living life is risky. Right? So that’s, let’s have that. The back of our mind, as I continue, I don’t think it’s risky because that’s my opinion. I’m just one out of 7 billion people on this planet. But another way to mitigate risk is knowledge. Right? So try to go learn, you know, it’s like if I talked to a friend of mine who maybe is a developer, right. I mean like programmer right in I.T. He’s not going to learn about real estate cause he doesn’t have the knowledge. Right. So if you’ll speak into people who don’t know about real estate, the natural thing. They’re not bad people. They just said, Oh, he’s in a risky. It’s just a, I don’t know. And he’s, you know, risky. It’s not a, you know, they’re not technical people. So, so for you to be able to mitigate those risks is you need to understand and educate yourself about the subject matter. It doesn’t matter if it’s real estate or if you want to start buying stocks or whatever. So I think that’s what I did. I may have skipped that in my story. But when I got back, I divulge and just binged podcasts, I read a lot of books and I had a big library of books and I continue to be, and that’s why I said, Google is my best friend. Right. So, cause that’s what I do. So Hey, when you do that, that would help you to mitigate that risk.

Chris Miles (12:40):
What was one book that you really enjoyed? Like what really helped you a lot?

Ola Dantis (12:43):
So at that time, it was definitely, definitely Rich Dad Poor Dad, that got me started. It’s not much of a real estate book as such. You would think it is. Yeah. Yeah. And it’s more life philosophy. But another book that really helped me was this book. Right? So this is like free, just free knowledge, Investing in Duplexes, Triplexes & Quads by a guy called Larry Loftis. Well you still see, it’s like, arms length to me, right. I’ve always got a book around that. I got another book I’m reading right here. The reason I’m doing this is people will say stuff like, is it risky? Or can I do this? There are things that you can do to get successful.

Chris Miles (13:25):
Yes.

Ola Dantis (13:26):
One thing is this, you have to be a reader. And I’m going to throw something COVID-19 related. You know, Bill Gates knew that we could have a pandemic that we’re having today. Now people might say, how did this guy know? Cause he’s a reader, right? Of course there’s crazy conspiracy theories out there. But just put that aside. The way Bill Gates could predict this is cause he read. He just reads. So if you’re out there, you can hear the sound of my voice and you want to be exceptional and excellent in anything you do. Be a reader! But more importantly, be a divergent reader. Don’t just read one topic. Be broad as much as you can.

Chris Miles (14:12):
Interesting. I love that. I love what you’re saying about risks too. Cause there’s lots of different types of risks, right? There’s market risk. Like a lot of people worry about, but you mentioned about like education is key, right? Because you want a lower risk. The best thing you can do is try to figure out how you can get risk within your control. How can you manage the risk? How can you reduce it yourself? And education is a key piece of that, right? Like you mentioned a little bit of these different books and things like that and podcasts, you know, not saying that we’re we got two podcasts you might want to listen to, to help with that. You know, between Ola’s show and mine. Right. But self serving of course, but it’s true. That education is critical. Like without it, you’re right. You know, cause that’s where, I remember people would ask me all the time like, well isn’t that risky? I said for you, it probably would be. For me, not so much because I’ve got the education and training behind it. And that’s why a lot of people will end up coming to me because they’re like, okay, how do we get trained and educated to know what to do or how to do it? You know, or that sort of thing or what to know, like what questions to ask even. Right. And I’ll tell you if you think real estate is risky. I mean, if you’ve been investing in a 401k, an IRA or any kind of mutual fund where you have zero control of any markets and it gets you mediocre returns with lots of high risk and volatility, trust me, you’re already taking more risks than any risk that Ola or I are taking right now.

Chris Miles (15:34):
You know, if you’re putting money in every single month, you are essentially losing money every month, putting money into something that you won’t be able to get back out without asking for permission and sometimes waiting weeks to get that money. You know, like that’s what happens when you put money in mutual funds or especially IRAs and 401ks, right. You know, real estate. It’s like, Hey, you know, if you apply the same thing, you said, well, this is how it reduce risks with my mutual funds. I just hold onto it forever. Right? Like it’s okay. Because in the long haul it goes up, well guess what happens to the real estate in the long haul? It always goes up, you know, like it’s no different. The only difference is that you don’t have to keep putting money into it all the time.

Ola Dantis (16:09):
Right. And then with mutual funds and kind of some of this intangible assets, one they not had, you can’t touch and feel them. But to the beauty that a lot of people don’t really get with real estate is leverage. If you want to buy a mutual fund for a thousand dollars, you have to actually exchange a thousand dollars in cash.

Chris Miles (16:33):
So true.

Ola Dantis (16:35):
For that value of that mutual fund or stocks or whatever. But for real estate, if you were to buy a piece of real estate for $1,000, you only have to put down 200 bucks, 20%, like it’s genius, it’s gold. So that the power, the leverage piece is a lot of people don’t really get that. They don’t really understand that.

Chris Miles (16:53):
Yeah. When I was, securities licensed back in the mid 2000s, right. I remember, you know, we’d have to have people sign waivers saying, I am not borrowing money to put in the stock market. Right. Like I am not borrowing money. This is not coming from a bank. You know, why they having to sign that because banks won’t put their own money in, why would they want you to put their money in? Right. So, you know, with the real estate probably different. Real estate banks were like, Oh, you want some money? Here. Here you go. I’ll pay for most of it. You know, you put your little down payment, I’ll pay the rest. You know, like if obviously banks thinks it’s less risky, why you keep putting money in the place where banks won’t put money? Right. It’s a good point. So let’s, let’s talk about like your syndication. Cause you have a syndication that you have as well where you, you buy into multifamily stuff. First. Like, do you still see deals out there or are you being very cautious and holding back saying, Hey, I know the deals are coming, but I’m not jumping right now. What’s your viewpoint on it currently?

Ola Dantis (17:46):
Yeah. So, definitely. Transactional value has gone down and I don’t want to get overly technical, but essentially what syndication means is, you know, pulling together a group of investors to buy an asset that you cannot buy by yourself.So, If I were to go out on the streets and buy home. Yeah. I probably could double myself. Why you want to buy a 200 unit, 150. You’d definitely need a couple of partners, at least a ton of investors. Anyway. So that’s what syndication is. So in terms of, do you feel definitely a lot of us in the syndication space are kind of taking a wait and see approach of the fascinating thing is what we’re doing at Dwellynn is we’re not waiting, you know, for the whole country. I mean, as we know, as you know, we record this in May. Early May.

Ola Dantis (18:34):
Now some parts of the country I opened for business or at least partially opened and it’s been phased out, but we don’t want to wait for a time when the flood gates open and it’s too late to get to. So we’ve taken the present approach and kind of looking at the daily numbers of new cases, not only in the United States, but we checked in Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom. So just to make sure that we’re going into the market at the right time, a little folks that talking about that wants to see, you know, kind of to quotas of, you know, positive GDP growth. I think that’s too late because you know, then confidence goes up and you just backed away. You were pre COVID. So what exactly. So we really try to time the market. And to be honest with you, now more than ever is when multifamily, which apartment buildings, the space we’re in is doing pretty well. You know, not so much from an economic perspective, but really from an asset class perspective. People have to stay in place. They have to, you know, shelter in place. You have to stay in a place. So yeah.

Chris Miles (19:37):
Very, very true. So if people wanted to like follow you more right. Or learn more about the deals that you have going on and stay up to speed on that. Because obviously like things are changing at the speed of a tweet and nowadays, you know, like Trump tweets something and all of a sudden people go crazy. You know? So health organization says something or CDC, or heck anybody the fed say something, the world keeps constantly changing. So if people want to follow you Ola, and they want to be able to follow your deals or even your show, what would it be the best way for them to do so.

Ola Dantis (20:08):
Yeah, sure. Thanks for that, Chris. So best way is InvestWithOla. So that’s InvestWithOla.com and that would kind of take you to our website. And then also if you want to check out the Dwellynn show, feel free to do that. You know, on iTunes where pretty much everywhere. So for those folks out there, Instagram, you know, folks I’m on Instagram, I’m ubiquitous. You wouldn’t be able to miss me. So just go on Instagram, @OlaDantis or just Google OlaDantis all over the place. Linkedin, if you’re into LinkedIn too, I’m right there.

Chris Miles (20:40):
Awesome! I love it. Well, cool. Happy to have you on today, man. Cause this is such good information. It’s so good to hear a perspective of someone who won. I mean, you really kind of kill a lot of the excuses we have, right? I mean, you come to a brand new country, you know, you work nine to nine grind almost, you know, if include traffic, right. Or, you know, seven to seven, you know, and you’ve done all this stuff. And then you built from the bottom up. I mean, you start with individual houses all the way to buying a hundred, 200 type unit apartment buildings. I mean, that’s incredible. I mean, that really is. So I really appreciate you sharing experience and we’ll put your information in the show notes that people can have see, InvestWithOla.com as well as your show there. So again, thank you so much for your time, Ola.

Ola Dantis (21:21):
Thank you Chris. I really appreciate.

Chris Miles (21:23):
Hey everybody else, like thanks for joining us today. Again, check out Ola’s stuff, you know, and remember like everything, almost everything starts with your brain first. Educate yourself, empower yourself, reduce the risk and do something that actually will create great wealth now because now is as good of opportunity as any trade amazing wealth. And so, and Ola is a perfect example of that. So everybody, I appreciate you guys coming on, have a wonderful and prosperous week. We’ll see you later.