Making Money in Real Estate While Making a Difference

 

There are many myths out there when it comes to making money in business and real estate as well as how you need to operate your business to be successful. I’m sure most of you have been told or at least have heard that it is a “dog eat dog world”. Or maybe that in order for you to win, someone has to lose. My personal favorite is that the climb to the top is on the backs of others less fortunate.

While all of the above may be Wall Street’s attitude towards successful investing, there are more enlightened ways. The truth is that we are all agents of change and with a little thought towards others we can successfully invest in this world while creating all win and no lose opportunities. In fact I believe that we can change the face of this world and wrestle control from the evils of corporate and Wall Street greed that have placed our financial system in peril and hurt millions of people around this world.

In practice this is called socially responsible investing and it is simple to understand. Don’t invest in something in which someone stands lose when you profit. Also think about the impact of your investment on our environment. Not only can we all profit and create meaningful change with these two simple rules, we can create more profitable transactions than the “dog eat dog world” Wall Street would have us believe.

Urban Detroit Wholesalers is a great example of how you can actually be more profitable by creating “no lose” transactions. We buy houses from banks for cash quickly so they can lend money that money again and get a bad asset off their books.

We rehab our houses using a local nonprofit, Motor City Blight Busters. They hire formerly incarcerated individuals and teach them new skills and provide employment so the revolving door in our corrections system is significantly reduced. The profit from the rehab goes back to the nonprofit and is investing in communities that don’t necessarily make sense for an investor to invest in. Many of the materials from the rehab projects are recycled and reused on later projects, reducing the cost of future rehabs for us and our investors while reducing the need for new resources from our planet.

Through another nonprofit we work with, National Faith Home Buyers, we then provide the high quality housing we just rehabbed to disadvantaged economic classes who are trying to break the cycle of poverty. This means less money paid out from social welfare programs and less taxes out of all of our pockets. The city of Detroit and Wayne County benefit by having a house put back on the tax roll. And finally the investor (you) and Urban Detroit Wholesalers profits from the sale or rental of the newly rehabbed house.

There are many different companies who subscribe to the above principals and even right now socially responsible investing is a trillion dollar industry. After watching corporate and Wall Street greed destroy millions of retirements and jobs, it is up to us to break the cycle and start helping ourselves and others. We can vote with our money and the way we invest. We must start doing this NOW because I doubt that greedy Wall Street, which has a choke hold on our government, will see fit to change it. It is up to us.