Do you want to learn about multifamily syndication made simple and how to invest in real estate?

Savannah Arroyo, also known as "The Networth Nurse" didn't have a lot of money to start investing but she didn't let that stop her. She went out, educated herself and took action. Now she's completed three small multifamily syndications with 12, 14, and 18 units respectively. She's now teaming up with two other investors to build a community for nurses to get involved with real estate investing.

Listen to this episode to learn how a W2 nurse found a way to make multifamily real estate investing a reality!

Table of Contents:

• Where To Listen To The Podcast
• A Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by a W2 Nurse
• Multifamily Syndication Made Simple for Those Who Don’t Have Enough Money
• Differences Between Single Family and Multifamily Syndication
• Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by the Networth Nurse
• Multifamily Syndication Made Simple Using the 80-20 Rule
• Multifamily Syndication Made Simple for Doctors and Nurses
• Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by Overcoming the Biggest Barrier
• Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by a Ton of Educational Content
• How to Reach Savannah Arroyo

A Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by a W2 Nurse

Darin: Savannah Arroyo lives in California with her husband and two young children. She's a W2 nurse who was determined to find a way to get started investing in multifamily real estate. She got educated, she joined a mentorship group, and then she took action. Now she's taken the next step. She has a vision for creating a vast network and community of nurses to help them learn how to get involved. Savannah Arroyo, did I get that one right?

Savannah: You nailed it. Thank you for having me.

Darin: I have a long last name and my name gets butchered all the time. So she also goes by The Networth Nurse. We'll talk a little bit more about that, but appreciate you coming on the show. This is actually our first time talking, but I know of Savannah because she is a guest on a lot of podcasts. She's very out there on social media. She has a great web presence. I'm excited to get to know more about her story and have her share with the listeners. Typically, the first question is how many properties, how many units are you currently invested in?

Savannah: I have two single family homes over in Atlanta, Georgia. My husband and I are sole operators on three syndication deals, a 12 unit, 24, and 18 unit.

Darin: So start by The Networth Nurse. Where did that come from? Obviously, you're a nurse. Give us a little background on your job and how you came up with that.

Savannah: I knew from really a young age I wanted to go into nursing. Right out of high school, I went into college pursuing my bachelor's degree in nursing.

Different Processes of Multifamily Syndication Made Simple

Savannah: Once I graduated, I worked in a couple of different specialties and different hospitals. I was always taking on different process improvement projects, just taking on different leadership roles. Really shortly after, I went back to school and I got my master's degree in nursing leadership and administration. Since then, I have transitioned down to Los Angeles, California.

Right now, I oversee multiple departments at a hospital here in LA. And I got started real estate investing in the beginning of 2020. I was on maternity leave with my second daughter. My husband and I were just looking at our growing family. Some of our current investments and really all of our investments were going towards our 401k, 403B for work. It just felt so discouraging and defeating to know that we couldn't even touch this money until we were 65.

We felt like with the growing family, we didn't have the time freedom that we wanted. We're working 40 hours a week. We wanted to be very involved in our daughters' lives in terms of taking them to soccer practice and swim lesson, all the kid things. It didn't fit with our current schedules. So we started looking and researching for ways that we could create multiple streams of income and start growing our wealth.

We stumbled upon real estate for obvious reasons. It's one of the best strategies out there to do that. And we got started in single family homes. Shortly after, we switched into multifamily syndications for the scalability and we really wanted to build a business out of it. I launched The Networth Nurse about November 2020, and we had just raised for our first syndication deal.

Capital Raising in Multifamily Syndication Made Simple

Savannah: Friends and family raised about 250K for that and really tapped out of all our resources for capital raising. We realized that we needed to build a brand, a personal brand, a business brand. My husband and I have no sales background. The syndication route of capital raising was really foreign for us. It was navigating that. I wanted to do it in the most genuine way possible, which was through The Networth Nurse. That was kind of the whole creation of it.

Darin: It's relatively new.  Your presence is so strong in social media and your web presence, I thought you had started it a lot longer than that. So that's fantastic. You started with single family and a lot of people do that because they've owned a home. They understand it and they think it's in their wheelhouse. So a few questions on the single family side. One, you live in California, but you bought two single family homes in Atlanta. Why did you do that and how did you do that?

Savannah: The price point to entry in LA is pretty high. We wanted to make our capital stretch for us. We’re just looking for ways that we could start generating some cash flow and it's hard to start cash flowing in Los Angeles. Looking at different markets, we were all about the BRRRR method when we first started out because we didn't have capital. We had a fixed amount of capital because we took out a second mortgage on our primary residence to get us going in real estate.

A Bunch of Cash To Get Started

Savannah: Otherwise, we didn't have a bunch of cash to get started. That was how we did it. We leveraged some debt on our primary residence and pulled out $60,000. And we started thinking, let's do the BRRRR method, which a lot of people know you're buying a house that needs complete renovation. You're renovating it to really push equity into the property.

You are renting it out, throwing a renter in there to start collecting monthly payments. Then refinancing it to essentially pull all the capital that you put into it back out and repeating it to snowball your wealth. That was really the route we were going down. Then when we were looking at properties in Atlanta that needed a full complete renovation. Talking to real estate brokers about it, it was becoming a little bit stressful for us. Like I said, we work full-time jobs. We have a three-year-old and a one-year-old.

Overseeing a complete renovation across the country just really was out of our comfort zone. I know there's people that do it and make it work. But for us, we didn't want our first experience in real estate to be that stressful. We ended up going with two new build townhomes. We’re able to get in with a company that builds these townhomes. They put their property management in place after. It's a very easy way to get started. They have cash flow. That was our first way to get into it. But then even after that, all our capital was tied up into these properties. We're like, what do we do next? How can we keep growing our portfolio? That's when we switched into multifamily syndications.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple for Those Who Don’t Have Enough Money

Darin: One of the things you said there, and it could be used for single family, or it could be used for multifamily. A lot of people start and they think, I don't have enough money to do this real estate thing. You looked at your situation and you said, how can I get started? Not focused on the negative, but trying to find a solution. Your solution was pulling equity out of your existing home by doing a cash-out refinance. Then buying another two single family townhomes in Atlanta. There's a lot of people that think to themselves, I don't have any cash, so I can't do this.

Savannah: I just created a YouTube video a couple of months ago, overcoming three limiting beliefs to get started in real estate investing. I don't have enough money, I don't have enough time and I don't have enough resources. Because I feel like those are the three biggest barriers for people wanting to get into real estate investing. Like, I don't have the time, I don't have the money. I've been doing this with a full-time job, two kids. I didn't have any real estate resources before I got started doing this.

My husband and I didn't have any money. We didn't have cash sitting in an account ready to go. So we got creative and it wasn't like, well, we can't do it. We don't have what it takes to get started in real estate investing. It was like, how? How can we get creative? What do we need to do to make this work because this is what we're going to do?

How To Get Started in Real Estate

Savannah: For us, it was just going on Google like, how to get started in real estate investing with zero money. Listening to podcasts and listening to other stories about what other people were doing to make it work. That's the biggest motivation behind me going on podcasts and sharing my stories. That is what inspired me and motivated me to get started.

Hearing all these stories from people from different walks of life, different parts of the world. Just getting started, overcoming a lot of limiting beliefs to get there. For us, the money thing was the biggest thing blocking us. It took us talking to a good lender about pulling out a second mortgage. That's something that when you start talking about finances and money with people, you have to be careful about where you're getting the advice from.

We weren't getting that advice from close people in our family circle and our friends circle. Because they weren't real estate savvy. Those are foreign to them. If you were to ask someone else, should I take out a second mortgage to get started in real estate investing? A lot of people would say, that's super risky. You're going to have this extra payment. I wouldn't do that.

For us, it was getting that advice from other people who had done it. We had paid for our coaching mentorship program to get started in our syndication deals. It was talking to people who have pulled from their retirement account to get started in real estate investing. Who have pulled out a second mortgage, who've done hard money loans, that sort of thing. For that first deal, we pulled out a second mortgage.

An Amazing Opportunity

Savannah: Then like I said, all our capital was in that deal and we wanted to keep going. During 2020 under the CARES Act, you could pull from your retirement account penalty free, which was an amazing opportunity. My husband did that with his retirement and then we did our first syndication deal. Then we were ready to do that second one. I was going to pull from my retirement account under the CARES Act. But it was January 2021 already and that ship sailed.

Darin: Window had closed.

Savannah: I didn't realize it was going to close. I'm like, dang it. It was like, here's this roadblock. Well then, how are we going to make it work? So it was calling my retirement account, Fidelity, and saying, can I pull out a loan? What does that look like? I ended up pulling out a loan from my retirement at 4.25, and I'm investing it in our syndication deals. You have to get creative and ask how. How can I make it work and not feel the defeating failure of a roadblock right away?

Darin: I love that. I love figuring out how, and there's so many resources out there; podcasts, books, blogs, websites, et cetera. The other thing you said, which is extremely important, is that you went seeking advice from people that have already done it. Started to really seek counsel from them because a lot of our friends and family, they mean well. They're trying to protect you, but they haven't done what you want to do. Once you start surrounding yourself with all these other people, I'm like if they could do it, I could do it.

Out of My League Type

Darin: But if you don't surround yourself with those people, you think, it's for somebody else. It's out of my league type of thing. I looked at one of your videos. I'd like you to share with the listeners, how would you define syndication? You've put together a great video on your website that answers that question.

Savannah: Syndication, even for me, was a very foreign term when I first heard about it. After I did hear about it, it was like, people like me can go out and buy apartment complexes with other people. In fact, this is how the majority of apartment complexes are bought. When we started researching what syndications were, the concept just made so much sense for me. I oversee operations in healthcare. Just from an operational business mindset, it made so much sense to my husband and I.

But we realized when we started sharing it with other people and especially me with nurses and other healthcare professionals, they had no idea what a syndication was. And it's tricky to explain what it is at first. I know even multiple people in my family, I had started explaining what we were doing and they're like, is this a pyramid scheme? What is this? So I realized I wanted to create a doodle video.

It literally draws out in five minutes what a syndication looks like, how the returns work, how the deal works. That's something that I use now. When I have people who are interested in looking into real estate investments or passive investing through a syndication, I first send them this Google video. Or have him check it out on my website because it is only five minutes.

A Broad Understanding of Multifamily Syndication Made Simple

Savannah: Then they get a broad understanding of how it works. I can have the conversation moving forward from there, more specific on the returns and that sort of stuff.

So a syndication is really people pulling together their resources, whether it's capital, experience, relationships. Different things that they're willing to bring to a deal, and then using those resources to take down an apartment deal. From the limited partner side of bringing capital to the deal, these are the passive investors that are bringing the capital. On the general partner side, which is what my husband and I do, we run the deal.

This is acquisitions, finding the deal, getting the financing for the deal, purchasing the deal, doing the due diligence and inspections, all of that. Making sure that underwriting and the numbers vet out. Asset management, which is also what my husband does, continues to oversee the investment throughout the lifetime. For syndication, value-add syndication, we're doing about five years. So overseeing the property management team and anything that needs to go on in that.

Now I've kind of switched into capital raising, investor relations and the marketing aspect of our business. In these deals, it's communicating to your passive investors what's going on with the deal, regular updates. We have an investor portal where we send quarterly distributions from. That's how we really engage our investors through that. It's really a team sport in terms of handling these types of deals because there's a lot of moving pieces. But that just goes to show how powerful relationships are in the real estate space.

Differences Between Single Family and Multifamily Syndication

Savannah: That's one of the biggest differences from single family homes over into these multifamily syndications. Those single family homes, people can knock out by themselves. They can do it on their own, get their financing. It's pretty easy in that sense. But when you switch over to the syndications, you realize how important your team is in really acquiring and running these investment deals.

Darin: For listeners, if you still have questions about what a syndication is, it's just a group of people coming together to buy an asset that they couldn't buy on their own. Check out Savannah's video because it was very well done. Her website is thenetworthnurse.com. There's that doodle video and it's a great video. If you're just getting started, it's a great way to learn. The other thing you mentioned is that it's a team sport and there's a couple of factors there. One is I never invested in single family.

I went right into large-scale multifamily, but I've talked to a bunch of investors that started there. They said that that world was a little bit cutthroat and you're a little bit of an island. My experience on the multifamily side is that because it is a team sport, everybody is so open and is so sharing and just helps the next guy. Somebody that is doing, like you did a 12, 14, 18 unit deals, there are people that have done a hundred unit, 200, 300 unit deals. You could call them up and they'll share how they did it and be open. They're not trying to trick you.

Different From Most Industries

Darin: It’s so different from most industries that I've been in where the top guys don't want to share their secrets because they want to stay on top. That's one thing. Then two is when you talk about having to be a team sport. Talk about the mindset that has to change because you're having to rely on other team members. That could be vendors that you hire, it could be property management companies that you hire. You also have to believe in yourself that you can raise the capital.

Savannah: Definitely first of being able to give up control in terms of building the business, realizing that you can't do all of it. Even through that first syndication deal, my husband and I were in a coaching program. We went through every aspect of that first deal together. We’re on all the calls with the lawyers together, with the brokers. We did the inspection with the lenders, with the limited partners. We’re on every single call together, learning from start to finish what it takes to take down one of these syndication deals.

After we did that first deal, that was when we started splitting up different pieces of the business. We either had stronger skill sets or we just liked better. It naturally fit our personality, and that is difficult. To give up a portion of your business or operations to someone else and trust that they're going to run it effectively, but that's in all businesses. If you're coming from a leader standpoint and delegation is something that I learned really early on in my nursing career because you have to do it.

Open Communication Is Key to Multifamily Syndication Made Simple

Savannah: So really having open communication is the biggest thing that makes that work effectively. Obviously running it with my husband, it's a whole different dynamic doing it with your spouse. But we have great communication skills because we do have two young daughters. So we have our business down when it comes to that kind of stuff. But you also touched on overcoming limiting beliefs to get started in it. I think of what you said about someone not wanting to share all their secrets.

You can come into the space with a scarcity mindset, especially when you're raising capital. For me, when I even launched my brand, The Networth Nurse, and trying to get creative of how I'm going to have an online presence and a platform and a room in this space for me. I started looking around, seeing what other people were doing and there's already doctors kind of doing what I'm doing. There's a few of them. Seeing that, I'm like, they're already doing it. There's no room for me in this space.

You can easily fall into the scarcity mindset, especially if you follow a lot of multifamily syndicators on Instagram or on social media. You're seeing everyone's doing deals. People are buying apartment complexes right and left. It can feel like I got to catch up, or they're doing this, there's not going to be any left for me. But that's the totally wrong mindset to come into it with. There is so much abundance in real estate.

Do Deals and Build Relationships

Savannah: As you continue to do deals and build relationships with people, you realize just how true that is in terms of raising capital. Just having conversations with people or having a great broker who continues to send you deal after deal. Shows you like, there's good deals out there to be had, you gotta make it work. Those two things, the abundance versus scarcity mindset is really big when you come into this space.

Darin: When I thought about 200, 300 unit deals, it seems so far out. I know some people that just did one deal, it was over a thousand units. But what they did was they partnered with a bunch of different people. It could have been each one of those guys going out and buying a hundred unit deal. They had the investors to do that, but instead they all came together and they bought this thousand unit property. It's because they were willing to partner with each other.

There has to be good communication, just like you and your husband, kind of segment who's going to do what, that still has to happen in partnerships. But that's how people grow. They go on to bigger deals, but they partner with people that they know, like and trust.

Savannah: I'm actually doing that with my brand, The Networth Nurse, too. It's just, I've had this huge vision for what I want to do with The Networth Nurse. The community I want to build and what information I want to provide with nurses. It was super overwhelming. Like, I want to do courses, a book, and coaching, and all this stuff.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by the Networth Nurse

Savannah: I ended up connecting with a couple of other nurses in the space who saw what I was doing. They reached out to me and were like, how can I provide value to you? I love what you're doing, I have similar visions. It took building a relationship and having a couple of calls with these guys over the last four months. I just brought them on to The Networth Nurse.

This Friday, we're going to do a whole new rebrand of it. It's going to be Networth Nurse and I'm going to have these two guys on with me helping me build it. I've realized that was a hard decision for me to make because The Networth Nurse is my baby. But it was like, if I want to grow and have these two guys with me with similar vision, mission, passion, we can go three times as far, three times as fast. It makes it more fun.

We get to hop on business calls a couple of times a week and collaborate together and run ideas by each other. It's been such a cool experience, but it took me reading a book, was it Everyone Should Be Millionaires? She was talking about the power of partnering and getting over that fear of having to have all the control in your business. Creating partnerships that are aligned with what you want to do. Once I heard that, I was like, I got to do that with The Networth Nurse. That was a big decision, but it's already paid off.

The Negative Mindset

Darin: You said something early that you could have had the negative mindset that, there's some doctors out there that are already doing this. People like to work with people that they resonate with, that they have some kind of connection with. Sure, there's plenty of doctors out there that would connect with other doctors. But there's some people that are like, that's the doctor making crazy money and that's how they're able to do that.

For you, being able to say, I'm a nurse and me and my husband didn't have the money in the beginning. We're growing our wealth now, but you can do it too. For me, my why is two-fold. One, looking to grow wealth for my family. Two, for me it feels like serving, to give back to others, to let other people know that they can do it. To inspire people, to get educated, and actually take a risk.

Because there's no guarantee on any of these deals. There's no guarantee in the stock market and there's no guarantee in any of these real estate transactions. But I've seen a lot of people do very well. Talk about fear. Mindset and fear could go hand in hand, but fear can stop you from doing a lot of things.

Savannah: Definitely. I want to touch on it based on what you were saying. Even so, when I saw some of those doctors in the space doing it and getting nervous, is there room in the space for me? Instead of being scared about it, I reached out to them. I DM’d these guys, I emailed them. I'm like, I love what you're doing. I have a similar vision. This is what I'm trying to do. How'd you get started?

Tips for Multifamily Syndication Made Simple

Savannah: Do you have any tips? I see one of them had a super good TikTok presence. I'm like, I'm not on TikTok. How do you see that's paid off for you, your return on investment at the time you're putting into that? Are you getting investors from that? So just having those open conversations with people and like you said, they're just so willing to help. I've talked to these doctors and other people that are similar to what I'm doing in terms of The Networth Nurse.

They're totally open about sharing their tips. That's exactly how I am too. I have other healthcare professionals that reach out to me. They’re like, I want to do exactly what you do. I'm like, all right, this is what I did. This is how I did it. I went on a hundred podcasts in the first year after I launched my brand, The Networth Nurse. This is how I've connected with hosts who are out there in the multifamily space, doing big things and building those relationships with them.

Also appealing to their listeners and inspiring them and connecting with them. I'm totally open in terms of sharing everything I've done as well. But that fear space, another component in that was us hiring a mentor and a coach when we got started. When we switched from single family into multifamily, it's a big switch. Now, we're going to be handling hundreds of thousands, eventually millions of dollars of other people's money, starting with our friends and family, which can be very scary. There's a lot of legalities to it. There are major renovations that are being done with these value ideals.

Multifamily Syndication Done the Right Way

Savannah: We wanted to make sure everything was done the right way. Pairing up with a coach and a mentor and paying for it, which is what we did. Some people do it for the accountability piece. They need to be held accountable because they're not taking the action. My husband and I are action takers. We were grinding this out. There was no way we were not going to be going forward towards this.

So we didn't necessarily need it for the accountability piece, but for the confidence in terms of overlooking all of our underwriting. Catching things that we didn't necessarily see because we're newbies at this. That was worth it for us. That took away so much fear at the beginning in order to be submitting offers on deals. To oversee a major renovation, to start having those conversations with investors with zero experience. That was what we needed in order to build our confidence to get over that fear of just getting started in this space.

Darin: I like that you brought up the mentor coach. It sounds like you had a positive experience.

Savannah: It was definitely positive.

Darin: I've had people reach out to me on Instagram. They're like, I would sign up for one of these coaching programs if they would guarantee me a deal. I'm like, don't sign up. Look, I'm part of a mentorship group also. For me, it shortened the time frame dramatically because of some of the things that you said. Like having a tried and true process that all these other people have been successful with and then mimicking that, that is going to shorten the time frame.

Relationships You Can Start

Darin: Secondly, giving you access to their network, whether it be attorneys or property management companies or the inspection folks. All of those relationships, you could start on your own and Google and try to research it on your own. But one mistake in these larger deals could cost you thousands and thousands of dollars that could have been saved had you hired a coach. I'm a believer, but I also do believe you can do it without it. But it'll take longer and you probably will have more questions in your mind as to whether you're doing the right thing.

Savannah: Yes, definitely. I have people ask me all the time about just coaching and mentorship. Because there's so many different programs out there, it takes really understanding like what their goals are. Some people do hop in these coaching mentorship programs. Expect the coaches and mentors to really do all the work for them and give them all their resources.

Darin: That's not going to happen.

Savannah: No, it doesn't. You hear about people who've been in these coaching programs for a year or two years and still haven't done their first deal. When you really start to have the conversations of, how many deals are you underwriting a week? How many investors are you talking to? What kind of relationships are you building? When you start prying with those questions, it becomes really clear. Like, you're not putting in the work. It's not going to happen automatically overnight on itself. There’s a good amount of work that goes into doing these deals.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple Using the 80-20 Rule

Darin: Nobody's going to come knock on your door and just hand you a big multifamily property. I liken it to the 80/20 rule. In most businesses, 20% of the people rise up and make 80% of the money whether you're looking at sales organizations or whatever. My experience is I watch all these new people come into the group and 20% figure it out and 80%.

Maybe that number is not right, but in my eyeballs, it looks that way. So I'm like, look at your past. Are you an action taker? Are you somebody that rises up? If you are, then you know what? You're going to be persistent and determined and you're going to figure it out. If you just want somebody to hand it to you, then it's going to be a waste of money.

Savannah: It is not for the faint of heart. Even after our third capital raise, I was still like when investors drop out or they tell you they can't invest for whatever reason. I was like, when does it stop hurting as much? At what point does this get easier? You hear about the capital raisers who, they’re like, we raised $4 million in 48 hours. Then you see that on Instagram and you're just like, I'm not even close to that level.

You got to take a step back and realize those people have put in so much work to get to that point. It was not easy for them in the beginning. I feel the struggles, but to me, it's like I feel it. Then it reminds me of, one day it won't. This is just growing pains.

The Grit and Persistence Required in Multifamily Syndications

Savannah: This is the grit and the persistence that's building my character to keep me moving forward in these deals. To give me the persistence and the motivation to keep moving forward because it weeds people out.

Some people just don't have what it takes to continue to pursue through all these struggles. There's stuff that happens in our deals, not regularly, but stuff that comes up where it's just so discouraging and defeating. Instead of focusing on the problem and being like, it's never going to work. We can't get over this, we can't get through it. It's like, how are we going to overcome this?

It is like immediately my husband and I are looking for solutions. We focus on the problem maybe for a second just to realize what's going on with it. It's like, boom, what do we need to do to overcome this and move on and keep moving forward. It is a struggle for people who get started in it to continue to pursue. But I guarantee, if you continue to put in the work for it, you will do your first deal.

Darin: Because it never ends. So you get your first single family deal. You were nervous about that. You're buying in Atlanta, you do it, and then you get your first syndication deal, multifamily 12 unit. Then it's the next one. You're typically pushing yourself to do something a little different than you did on the last one. But that uncomfortable feeling, that's where you learn. It's uncomfortable. But when you look back, you're like, I'm so glad I went through that because I learned from that.

Advantages of Networking

Darin: Then you all of a sudden have another one of those. You're on this other deal and you're like, I remember how we solved that problem over on this deal. Or another one of the advantages of networking, you call up somebody that you know and that very well likes you. Or somebody that you like that has a bunch of different properties and you ask them, have you ever run into this?

That one conversation may provide a solution. Yes, that's happened to us on plenty of properties. Here's what you got to do. You could have been trying to figure it out on your own, but you make one phone call all of a sudden it is solved. Talk about freedom because that word is thrown around a lot in this space. Freedom, freedom of money, freedom of time, financial freedom. What does freedom mean to you and how do you see getting there?

Savannah: I love that you brought this up because it is so different for everyone and it looks different for everyone.

Darin: It can change over time.

Savannah: If you hop on social media and you see people talking about financial freedom and time freedom, you think that there's a one-size-fits-all for this. But it's absolutely not true. Different things work for different people. Even when I use the word passive investing, I like to say that what I'm doing right now is not passive at all. I’m a very active investor. I work with passive investors and the goal is to have passive investments down the road.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple While Working Full-Time

Savannah: But my role right now is very active. I'm doing that while working full-time for a job to gain that time freedom down the road. It seems a little crazy. Sometimes, people want to have all this time-freedom, yet, you're putting in work for a 40 hour week job. You’re doing real estate for maybe 20 hours a week and you have kids. Where's your time freedom? What are you doing this for?

For me, it's the vision of knowing that in five years, I'm going to be in a way different place than I am right now. Even three years from now, I'm going to be in a completely different place. Even when my husband and I first started, the goal was five years, transitioning out of our W2 jobs. It's been a year and a half, almost two years and I'm already about to step down.

Work into a more per diem role at the hospital just because depending on your goals with the business and what you want to do. If you want to have three apartment buildings and run those and collect that cash flow and continue to work a W2 job, cool. That's fine. For me, I love this stuff so much. It juices me. I'd rather do this than work in a hospital eight hours a day.

It took me over the last year and a half, two years of grinding at two jobs, pretty much full-time. Managing my household of having two young kids and my marriage of being, okay, I'm kind of getting to a breaking point, like, something has to give. Over the last couple of months, it's really been to a point as the business has started growing.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple and Don’t Require Pulling More Time

Savannah: Now that's pulling more time for me, I have to step back and realize, something has to give at this point. I have my family, I have my nursing career, and my real estate business. One of them has to give. Instinctually, you think, it's going to be the real estate business because that's the last one that sat at the table. That was the newest thing. Immediately, my husband was like, we got to back off the real estate business. Then it took sitting down and being like, no, this has the potential to make us more money.

If we put in the hours here and start building this stuff, we could be bringing in this much more. So, no, my nursing career kind of has to back off. That was a hard pill to swallow because I love working, but I didn't even realize I was going to get here as quickly as it was. Again, different people would rather stay at their full-time job. It takes coming to yourself and getting really honest with yourself of what you truly do vision for your life. Realizing, does your lifestyle right now cater to that? Are you really living out the mission that you want? And are you doing it right now? It takes a lot of self-reflection to get there for sure.

Darin: Thank you for sharing that. Picking out your destination, for each person, that could look different. But if you don't know where you want to go, it's very hard to put a plan together to get there. Now you are very determined, you have a lot of passion, and you have a vision for where you want to be in the future.

Some Sacrifices for the Future

Darin: Because you have that vision, you're willing to make some sacrifices today for the future. I saw an Instagram post this morning from a guy, he and his brother have made bookoo bucks in real estate. He posted a picture of a bedroom with just a mattress on the floor and it’s just a very plain rundown room. He's like, this guy lived here for five years so he can live in the second picture for the rest of his life. The second picture is like this MacDaddy room. There's some truth to that.

In the beginning, there is some blood, sweat, and tears and learning and grinding and persistence. You mentioned the capital raisers that raised four million in 48 hours. People think that they're an overnight success. But 5, 10 years ago, they were grinding and trying to raise their first 250,000 or 500,000. So it builds on itself and you have to have that vision and that persistence to get there. Sacrifices, you talk about time. You're a W2 employee, so you're having to do a lot of this stuff probably at nights or weekends.

Savannah: It's Monday morning, I'm taking this whole week off work on PTO to work on courses in this book that I'm writing, the whole week. I'm telling my manager, I'm taking the week off. People at work, they're like, where are you going? What are you doing? I'm going to be home working on my real estate business. That's what I got to do. You can see them looking at me like, you're taking a week off to do that? But this is what I have to do.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple for Doctors and Nurses

Darin: Then five years from now, people are like, how'd you do that? How are you living in that house? You had some sacrifices along the way. In the healthcare world, do you hear a lot of doctors, nurses, and other professionals involved in real estate investing?

Savannah: Crypto has been a huge buzzword for the last six months or whatever, whenever Dogecoin got brought up. I felt like all my surgeons and doctors and nurses were constantly talking about that stuff. They'll still talk about crypto and Bitcoin, but it's not as prevalent, which is shocking. I immediately saw a huge gap after I started getting into real estate investing and doing it. Then I come to work and people will be, what'd you do this weekend? I flew up to Oregon to visit my 12 unit. Oh, you're buying an apartment complex.

I see that look of interest and engagement. But they just had no resources or basic understanding or education to even get to the point of wanting to invest because they don't know what they don't know. As I started having conversations with people, I realized how prevalent this was in the medical world where you're dealing with high-income earners. The nurses in California are making good money. The doctors as well, and other healthcare professionals, and they're not doing anything with it.

They're still living paycheck to paycheck with how much money they're making. Surgeons making $800,000 and still living paycheck to paycheck because they're not investing their money. It took me realizing this huge gap, which was a huge motivation in me launching The Networth Nurse. Providing these courses and education material for people in the healthcare community, because there's such a disadvantage.

Our School System Did Not Teach Multifamily Syndication Made Simple

Savannah: It goes back into our school system of why we're not taught this stuff. Going back onto your question of is it prevalent? Surprisingly no, but there is a huge interest in it. When you do start having conversations with people, because they're smart, they understand it pretty quickly. They're like, I get this. These numbers make sense. How do I get started? So the crossover is pretty quick, but it is a big gap in terms of filling it with education and resources.

Darin: People that are very successful, that have beautiful homes, and beautiful cars, and go on beautiful vacations, there's a piece of that for me within social media that is a little bit of a put off. Like you're trying to use that to get people to admire you. But the flip side of that is really, sometimes that's real. People are like, how can they afford that? I want to learn how versus somebody else that doesn't have any ability to buy nice things or go on nice travel.

They may not be attracting those people because they're busting their butt and they never seem to get ahead. There's kind of that catch 22 of, I don't really love people that just show money in your face. But there's some people that are drawn to that because that person's successful. How did they do that? And how can I do that? Talk about social media. You said you did a hundred podcasts your first year. That's a lot. Doing podcasts, having The Networth Nurse on Instagram and the website, how has that helped attract other people to you?

A Huge Disadvantage

Savannah: It's 2021. If you don't have any social media presence, you're at a huge disadvantage. I can't tell you how many people have reached out to me through social media and what I put out. If you're a private person, it is very difficult to go on social media and show people, and tell people what you're doing. It's a big hurdle. My husband is very private. When we realized we're going to do this capital raising thing, we've got to create a brand. He was very much like, you can go out there and can go and do that.

Darin: I love the idea of The Networth Nurse. Go for it.

Savannah: Yes. Even for me, this does not come easy. I was super, super shy growing up. People hear me or see me on podcasts and think, she really knows what she's talking about. But it took me practicing for that first podcast. I was in the car going on a road trip with my husband. Knowing I was going to do my first podcast, I’m freaking out, so scared and making him practice questions with me. I was just so nervous about it.

Or when I did my first webinar, my first presentation, my first investor call, I'm still pushing down those butterflies because it's hard. It doesn't come naturally, but it takes practice of doing it. I remember when I was doing my first presentation. I'm literally trying to go through the PowerPoint, and I created the PowerPoint in probably 45 minutes. Nailed it, super easy. Then when I went to present it, I was just practicing it on my husband, I was stuck on the first slide for 20 minutes.

All the Flashy Stuff

Savannah: I'm like, I can't even move forward. I was stuttering, rolling over my words, people have to practice with this stuff. It's the same thing with social media. People get scared of putting out a post because then they only get 10 likes on it. But it's like Gary Vaynerchuk, he does a really good job of saying this. If you have one post out of 10, if you do 10 posts a day and one of them is good, you're still winning. Keep going, keep pursuing.

So social media for me, yes. All the flashy stuff is super appealing, but then there's those people who live in a tiny home. They're in their thirties and don't have to work for the rest of their life because they're lowering their standards of living. In terms of, they're okay with having a smaller home, but now they don't have to work. It looks differently for everyone and I love that social media has started to show that. But for me, my angle has always been, I'm going to hop on there, be genuine, share my story, what I'm doing.

This is me when I started real estate investing. I'm launching The Networth Nurse. This is my goal and my vision to build this community of nurses. You can follow me and watch me do it. I'm going to put out posts of what I do in my real estate business. I do posts of what I do in the healthcare world. If I'm nursing and doing a stress test, I'll post it on my Instagram and people like seeing that. It gives them a glance of who you are as a person. What your life looks like, how you're doing these deals.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by Overcoming the Biggest Barrier

Savannah: When you're raising capital, the biggest barrier between someone handing over their money to you for an investment is trust. They need to know that they can trust you. The biggest way to get over that is to build a relationship with them, show them who you are. I've leveraged social media and just showed people what I'm doing and who I am. Different personalities appeal to different people. Either they like that and want to invest with me or they'll choose a different operator, which is totally fine.

You don't want to attract people who you won't work well with anyway. It's good to be out there and be the most genuine person you can be. You'll attract the right people to your deals.

Darin: I love that. I was afraid to hit post on Instagram when I first started doing it. Like, what are people going to think? Then, all of a sudden you have people that reach out to you that you wouldn't have talked to otherwise. That's what gave me the confidence to keep pushing on. This guy from Chicago called me or from Vegas called me or DM’d me and I never would have talked to that person.

Maybe they invest alongside on another deal or maybe we just inspired them to go after something locally. We don't ever do business together. Either way, I feel like that was worth putting it out there because of getting that relationship. So that's huge. Talk about capital raising. We tiptoed around it, but that part can be a little scary. Going to friends and family and going to other contacts, how does that feel and what's the mindset. All of that related to the capital raise portion.

When You Have Zero Experience

Savannah: It is so hard at first when you have zero experience. At that point, if you're trying to raise capital or you're new in this space, you're wondering where to begin. It's good to start with what deals you anticipate doing, what you plan the returns to look like, what markets you're looking at. Create some sort of presentation or a sample deal in terms of, this is what we're looking at to start investing in. Are you interested in something like this?

We did a sample deal and we were presenting it to family and friends, just sent out an email. We started real estate investing. This is what we're doing. We're super excited about it. If you're interested or you know anyone else who's interested, reach out to us. We want to talk. So we started doing some practice calls and it was super scary at first. Even if it's with your aunt, it can still be really intimidating to have those conversations.

But at that point, we were really just leveraging our skill sets, my husband and I. Our skill sets are current W2's, what we do, how we've progressed, and how we live our lives. How we are as parents, just how we are. Then our family members who know us, trust us, and have faith in us are like, yes, it seems like you know what you're doing. Trust you guys, love you guys. Here's some money to get invested. That's how you go about it for those first couple raises. But then, as you start getting deals done, the social media presence is huge, getting your name out there.

Attract the Right People

Savannah: It's like telling people about what you're doing all the time. Even at work, I'm not going out and telling people, I invest in real estate. Do you want to invest with me? When people are like, what'd you do this weekend? It's like, I was looking at some apartment deals. I recorded a couple of podcasts, or, I had to record a podcast before I came into work today.

Or just sharing what you're doing to everyone, especially social media, it attracts the right people to you. Like you said, someone who wouldn't have ever reach out to you is now reaching out to you like, I'm interested in this. It was crazy. When I first started posting real estate stuff on my Instagram over a year ago, I had a nurse reach out to me who was like, I'm kind of interested in this. What are you looking at? Where are you going with it?

I was so new, it was like, this is what we're trying to do. I've had her invest in three deals with me and she came on to my last deal as a GP. It's so crazy the relationships that you now create by just going out and telling people what you're doing. It is powerful when it comes to capital raising.

Darin: That was one example that you wouldn't have talked to that person. They reached out to you, they were interested. You helped coach them along the way and then she invested in three of your deals and then became a GP. That's a powerful relationship. Most of the syndicators that I've talked to over the years, how they've built their investor database have been getting the first deal done, performing, and providing strong returns.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple if You Do the Right Thing

Darin: Those investors then reinvest, not all, but like a good portion, reinvest with you. Then they bring other people. The next deal happens and that's bigger. Then they bring more people because they had a positive experience. It takes time to build it, but if you do the right thing and focus on providing the results, then good things happen.

Savannah: The timepiece is key because I can be a very impatient person in that I want to keep growing. I want to keep doing it and you do have to step back. This is why my husband's the perfect balance of stepping back and being like, it does take time. We need to wait a little bit for this deal to keep going. Prove to our investors what we're doing so that they do come back and reinvest and bring us referrals.

You have to realize that it does take consistency in putting out social media posts. Like, you might have to post on social media every day for six months before you do start getting that traction, but you just have to do it. The time passes anyways. You keep being consistent and the money does come for the deals. It does.

Darin: Another thing I would say about capital raising for a lot of people who are doing their first one or even their second. It’s the mindset of, I need people's money for my deal versus I'm presenting an opportunity to provide substantial returns to this limited partner.

Like a Dead End Road

Savannah: Something I learned very early on in my capital raising was that my husband and I were hitting people who didn't have the money to invest. It was just a dead-end road, now we're both discouraged because I'm presenting this investment opportunity. You want to invest, you don't have the money, I need money for the investment and you don't have it. It was like a dead-end road in that it just wasn't going to work.

But we felt like we were hitting these roadblocks over and over. Then we realized, why are we talking to people and pursuing those who don't have the money to get invested? There are people out there who have the money to invest and they just don't even know where to put it. Now, you're not chasing it as much when you show people, these are the investments we have. These are the returns you can get. Are you ready to jump in?

Now when I have conversations with investors, it is nurses or doctors who are, I have these Airbnbs up in North Cal, I cannot deal with tenants anymore. I can't do it, I want to put that money in a passive investment. Can you help me? I'm helping them and then they're helping me. It's such a mutually beneficial relationship.

Darin: It's a win-win for both parties, and that's the way it should be. What's the next big stretch goal for you?

Savannah: We keep doing deals. We're continuing to put out offers on deals and because we're consistently raising capital, we have investors ready to invest. So continuing to look in that smaller mid-range point, like 50 to a hundred units.

Multifamily Syndication Made Simple by a Ton of Educational Content

Savannah: We have a sweet spot with our broker there in terms of how much capital we can raise. We're looking to continue doing that. I've just been really motivated and pushing to build out Networth Nurse. So rebranding that this Friday. Bringing on a couple of guys to my team. We're going to build a community, courses, some mentorship. Just push out a ton of educational content for nurses wanting to start investing, and that's really where we're headed right now.

Darin: What do you like to do outside of work besides real estate?

Savannah: I have two kids. My three-year-old and one-year-old, it's hitting the beach with them, doing fun activities with them on the weekend. I love doing yoga, exercising. We live in sunny LA so we're usually doing outdoorsy stuff every weekend and that's what I love.

Darin: If people want to reach out to you, what's the best way for them to get a hold of you?

Savannah: You can find me under The Networth Nurse on all social media handles. That's LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram and Facebook. My website's The Networth Nurse. I love connecting with people. If you're even remotely interested, please reach out. I would love to connect.

Darin: I would highly suggest you take a look at that video that she put out on syndication. She's got a lot of great resources. Our listeners are broken up into some that are just looking to get started. Some are looking to scale their business. For the ones that are looking to get in, she's showing you a way to get in. So I hope you enjoyed that one. Until next week, signing off.

How to Reach Savannah Arroyo

• Website
• Instagram
• LinkedIn