Josh Cantwell: Hey, guys, welcome back. It’s Josh. hey, man, thanks so much for popping on. Listen, I’ve got a great guest today. Her name is Camilla Jeffs. She’s an 18-year real estate investor who started with very meager beginnings, actually living in a very poorly converted garage. And we just have an absolute blast today. She has been investing now for 18 years, specializes in multifamily, specifically in the Phoenix and Tulsa, Oklahoma markets. She loves the impact that she can have on investors, especially investors with families, and she’s going to talk a lot today about her strategy and also some very specifics about raising capital, which I found very valuable.

So, here’s just some of what you’re going to learn today, number one, how to not overpay in a very hot market like Phoenix. Number two, how to make data-based decisions and some different databases that she uses to help her evaluate deals. Number three, how to invest with teams, right? You don’t always have to be the owner-operator or lead sponsor about how to invest with teams and also how to vet out those teams. Number four, the four main roles of a general partnership so that you can decide kind of where you fit, and on the dream team, if you will. Also, number five, how to have patience in multifamily. And she specifically says in this interview why so many people get tripped up by having marathon goals but trying to accomplish them in a sprint. I thought this was very valuable. You’ll love that piece. And finally, number six is the power of the first deal. So, thank you so much for joining me today. I’m so excited to kick off 2022 with a brand-new guest and a brand-new friend. Her name is Camilla Jeffs. Here we go.

[INTERVIEW]

Josh Cantwell: So, hey, Camilla, listen, thanks so much for joining me today on Accelerated Investor. How are you?

Camilla Jeffs: I’m fantastic, Josh. So great to be here.

Josh Cantwell: Absolutely. So, Camilla, New Year, 2022, I’m always excited when I meet somebody new to talk about multifamily and kind of their moneymaking strategies and what they do and how they do it differently. So, I’m curious from your perspective, like what are you working on now that you’re really excited about? Tell us about some of your goals for 2022, and just a tiny bit about the markets that you’re operating in.

Camilla Jeffs: Awesome. So, 2021 was a fantastic year for me and my business. We just did a lot of business. We closed a lot of deals. We raised a lot of money, and it was so fun to get people involved. Like, I just love this group, investing thing is just amazing. So, I do large multifamily and then also some assisted living, so we can talk about that later too. But what I’m working on, 2022, super excited about this coming year, working on again acquiring more large multifamily assets. And my two favorite markets right now are the Phoenix, Arizona market and the Tulsa, Oklahoma market. So, those two markets are just fantastic markets for different reasons, right? So, the Phoenix one, just heavy growth, I mean, explosive growth happening in the Phoenix market, and then Oklahoma is just a really strong cash flowing market. And so, I love both of those. So, really working on those, and then also got some assisted living in the pipeline that we’re going to build. So, we’re building assisted living kind of niche, boutique-style neighborhoods basically, is what they are. And so, we’re building those in different areas around the country. So, I’m excited about all these projects.

Josh Cantwell: Nice. So, let’s peel back the onion real quick on assisted living, just take a couple of seconds here on that. When you say neighborhoods, communities, like obviously, a lot of people are familiar with the big box, big buildings, hundreds of residents, what do you mean when you say communities? And you sound like it’s a different type of product.

Camilla Jeffs: It is. It’s kind of a boutique niche, a smaller niche. We’re just trying to model out the feeling of home for our grandparents, right? And so, they’ll move, it’s an unsettling thing to have to move out of your home into a facility, and we just didn’t like the whole big box hospital theme, just giant with so many residents. And so, we thought, let’s build something different. Let’s really build more neighborhood style, so basically, build five big homes that have 10 to 15 bedrooms per home, and there’s a full kitchen that we have chefs that come, and they make the meals for the residents. And it just feels like home that they’re right there in their homes. It’s also, oddly enough, very COVID-friendly because we only have 10 to 15 residents per building that it was really easy to keep COVID away, keep COVID at bay. And so, it’s a really great model and it’s one that’s in high demand right now. The residents love it, the families love it for their parents to place them in, in these types of environments because it’s just a lot more homey.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, that’s interesting. You said COVID-friendly small homes and 15 beds because my favorite style of an apartment to buy is a garden-style, small buildings on a big campus, 10, 12, 15 doors per building, as opposed to the large buildings that could have 80 or 100 units under one roof. I prefer to buy the whole campus, and part of the reason because of that, our buildings that did best in COVID were the ones where you could contain COVID within a building as opposed to infecting the whole complex. So, I love that strategy. Tell us a little bit more about how did you end up investing in Phoenix and Oklahoma and Tulsa? Was that intentional? Did you fall into it? Did you do a JV deal? Did you just vacation there? How did you pick the markets?

Camilla Jeffs: So, Phoenix was simple because I lived there. So, I lived in Phoenix, and when I decided it was time to level up into apartments, then I was living in Phoenix at the time. I’m like, okay, what can I do? How can I get involved? So, I started going to lots of meetups, meeting all the players, trying to figure out and navigate to figure out myself. How could I bring value to teams? And how could I actually get involved? So, Phoenix was simple because it was my backyard. Now, Tulsa is different, but it’s also a little bit simple because I have a brother who is a dentist in that area. And he kept telling me, he’s like, “You should invest here. It’s cheap.”

Now, we know that’s not a great reason to invest, but I started navigating that market and really trying to get to know that market and get to know the players in that market. And I just love that I could have diverse markets that weren’t exactly the same. They didn’t follow the same thing because I’m a big fan of diversification and offering diverse opportunities to investors. And so, that’s kind of how Tulsa and Phoenix came about. It was pretty simple.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, I love it. So, tell us a bit more about your moneymaking strategy. Like specifically, what types of buildings do you like to buy? How big? And what are you looking for in those buildings, and maybe describe Phoenix again versus Tulsa? Is there a style of building, an age of the building? And what are you looking to get out of that? Like, what’s the end goal? I have a feeling you’re going to say Phoenix is about appreciation and tell us about cash flow. But tell us, from your perspective, a little bit more about how do you structure deals? How do you make money so that our audience can get a sense of, okay, well, maybe I can invest with Camilla, or maybe I can use some of her feedback to do it on my own?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah. So, let’s talk about Phoenix first. So, Phoenix is an explosive growth market. It’s been in the top 10 growth markets for years and years and years. And if you study all the charts in Phoenix, it’s just we’re going to continue to grow, so many businesses keep moving in. Population growth just keeps coming. It’s always on the top 10 list for the U-Haul, people buying a new house and going one way to Phoenix. So, it’s an amazing market for that. Last year, when we picked up our last asset in December, we closed in December in Phoenix, the year-over-year rent growth was close to 25%. Crazy rent growth.

So, how do we make money in that market? Well, it’s kind of easy because it can be as simple as burning off the loss to lease. Now, you have listeners who understand what that means. It just means that because we set a lease last year at a certain rate, this year’s rate is much higher than last year’s rate. And so, we want to renew leases at this year’s rate at the fair market value. And it’s not that we’re just trying to increase rents, I don’t follow that philosophy at all. We want to do it intentionally and carefully and thoughtfully about how we increase rents in markets.

So, in Phoenix, we look for B-class assets, like the B-class because the people that live in Phoenix have quite a bit of money. They’re well-educated, they have really great jobs. And so, they need this B-class asset. And we like to look for them in the path of progress too. And path of progress just simply means, is it located in an area where maybe they are building brand-new class A assets around it? And if you build, if you buy the class B asset in a class A area, it just will naturally appreciate. So, we get the advantage of natural appreciation, forced depreciation, and then just the windfalls. The supply and the demand are so off there that it’s just a really great place to buy.

Now, as far as Oklahoma, in Oklahoma, we look for something different. We’re still looking for large assets. We still like the 100-plus style just because management is much easier, and I like having more doors under one roof. But like you said, we follow a similar model in Oklahoma in that more of the garden style. So, one of the last assets we picked up, for example, has two buildings that have about 30 units in each building, but then there’s a whole bunch of fourplexes, they are kind of smothered around. And the fourplex style is in very high demand because you don’t have that many neighbors, you’re not sharing that many walls with people. And so, that’s a really great asset for us.

And so, we’re kind of looking for a little bit more expansive areas in Oklahoma. And the other reason we like Oklahoma is because it’s just really strong cash flow. The cost of living there is very low. And also, another thing I love about it is that tenants are typically only paying 25% of their income towards rent, whereas in other markets, like Phoenix, it’s at least 30%. So, it’s really a lot more affordable for the tenants to live there and it cash flows really well. So, there’s no need to go crazy on increasing rents. And we can do other things, like we can charge for premium parking spots, right? And in those communities, people like that, they want to be able to reserve a parking spot that’s close to their door so they can just take their groceries in a little bit, not have to walk for forever.

Josh Cantwell: Got it. So, help us, let me peel this back a little bit further, Camilla. Phoenix, I imagine because– I guess here’s the question, how do you avoid overpaying? Like it almost seems like it’s just a carte blanche check to just buy everything at any price and just wait for all this explosive growth to continue. And no doubt that the growth in Phoenix is going to continue, all the flights coming out of California and the job growth and the weather and just all the amazing things that’s going on in Arizona. But how do you keep things in check? Like how do you manage risk when so much of this is not speculation? This is definitely there’s a planning process to it, but at the end of the day, there is a bet, every investment is a bet, and you’re betting that this growth continues. So much proof that it’s going to continue that a lot of people just keep raising prices and probably selling at really low cap rates. So, how do you manage that risk? And how do you underwrite deals to really make sure that you’re not just, hey, another property for sale? Hey, that growth is just going to continue, what’s the price? Great, we’ll buy it. How do you avoid that because I think a lot of people can fall into that temptation?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah. Well, and you have to be careful, too, that you’re not buying a property that will be a negative return in the first year or two because if the prices are too high, and then the debt is too high as well, and the money doesn’t support it, like it takes time. For any value-add project, it takes time. And so, you have to really be careful that you are not overpaying. And I think one of the strategies that we use is just because my partners and I have been entrenched in Phoenix for a long time, it’s a lot easier for us to get the deals and get the ones that will make sense and get them first. I mean, it’s really like the Phoenix market, you’ve got to be first at the table. If you’re 10^th or 50^th to the table, prices are going to be so high that it doesn’t make sense. And you may think that you’re going to be okay and you’re like, kind of high, but I’ll probably be okay just because Phoenix is growing so much, but you have to make sure you’re making data-based decisions. And that’s what we do. We’re heavy data-based decisions.

So, yes, cap rates are extremely low. I mean, sometimes we’re in the low threes, high twos in the Phoenix area. Now, that scares a lot of people with cap rates being that low. But we always underwrite, like our last one, we underwrote on, we set an exit cap of 4.8 and we were buying it at 2.9. So, huge difference in the exit cap, and because we wanted to make sure that it would make sense that if cap rates did start to decompress that we would be okay in the end. And so, we’re underwriting using a huge spread in the cap rates. The other thing to keep in mind for the risks is that you have to look at the past performance of the teams that you’re investing with and what has been their past performance.

And so, one of my favorite teams that we’re investing with now, they’ve been like doing the same thing over and over again, just rinse and repeat. This is the type of asset we buy. We go in and we buy it and then we assess it and then we sell it. And they’re just kind of repeating over and over and over again and they’ve got such a fantastic model going that they can, that it does reduce the amount of risks in what you’re doing because you’re investing with experienced people who know what they’re doing.

Josh Cantwell: Got it. Love it. So, you mentioned data-based decisions, like what is your database made of? Everybody’s valuation and underwriting are a little different. So, what are some of the different reports that you pull, kind of this is really in the dirt, right? Just what type of reports? Why did you mention the U-Haul one-way trip report? That’s a great one. But data-based decisions kind of define that, and what kind of makes that up for you?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah. So, I mean, obviously, we use CoStar. CoStar is a classic one that you can use. And then, also, I actually love going to the Arizona Real Estate Investors Association. They are the number one real estate investor association in the nation. So much activity going on there, and every single month, they have these amazing reports that they give out and they give out tons and tons of data. And it’s for any type of real estate investor. They have fix and flip data that you can rely on all the way to multifamily, large multifamily data. And it was interesting because several years ago when I was just starting on this journey and I joined that association, they said, invest in multifamily, like you’ve got to invest in multifamily. You’re going to kick yourself if you don’t invest in multifamily now. And look what has happened, they’ve been studying the market for 50 years, just the Arizona market. So, I think having hyperlocal data from local people who’ve been in the intricacies of the market makes a really big difference. And that’s been kind of one of our secrets.

Josh Cantwell: Nice. Yeah, I love it, the ground information, the anecdotal feedback from people who are actually on the ground saying, this is what we’re seeing, not just something in a report, which that report is hard to get very real time, use of that stuff is 30, 60, 90, 180 days old. The real stuff that you’re seeing on the ground, it’s tough to start to get it disseminated. Like what did he mean by that? Or what did she mean by that? Is that real? But then going on the ground and vetting it out yourself is hugely important, I find that to be super valuable as well. You mentioned, Camilla, investing with teams. So, are you doing owner operation stuff? Are you raising capital, cosponsoring, co-syndicating with other owners-operators? Help me understand what you mean by invest with teams.

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah. So, my business model is a cosponsor-type model, and so, which is why I can be diversified in multiple markets and multiple asset classes. So, that’s what I do. So, part of the value that I bring is I go out and I’m out there vetting teams, I’m vetting other operators and vetting lead sponsors and figuring out who has the best model. And then, I bring that back and I go through like a huge vetting process for them, the market, the deal, and all those things. And then once I decide that, okay, yes, this is going to be a good opportunity, I feel good about it, at that point, I will release it to passive investors or give them the opportunity to invest in one of these deals.

Josh Cantwell: Got it. Love it. Let’s back up a little bit, Camilla, and talk about your start. I know that you come from very meager, like so many of us beginnings, I mean, so much so that you and your husband were living in a very poorly converted garage. I’m interested to know about how this all started and some of the early challenges. You seemed just very confident and very kind of at peace with your style and your underwriting and your markets, but it probably wasn’t always this way. It was probably very unnerving, crazy. So, tell us about the early start and some early challenges that you faced, and how you overcame those.

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah. So, yes, I was young and married and dumb. And we got married young. We were still going to college and had no money, yeah, really young. And we had literally no money. And so, the only thing we could afford was somebody’s garage apartment that was like a detached garage and didn’t even have a proper heater. Everything was bad news. But hey, you do what you can, and that’s all we could do at the time. And the person who owned it, she came to collect rent because she was old fashioned and she would stop by, and we’d put our rents, cash in an envelope, and tape it on the door. She’d come and grab it, like that style.

But anyway, she came one day, and I just took a minute because I was curious. I just said, “Listen, I know you own a lot of properties. As you have multiple properties you go and collect rent from, how did you do it? How did you get started? I was just curious.” And she turned to me and she’s like, “Well, you should buy a house.” “Well, wait, wait. No, like, we’re living in your converted crappy garage. Do you really think we have money to buy a house?” She said, “No. Listen, listen. You can buy a house that has a basement apartment. You could rent that out and you should be paid like very little in your rent for the month.” And I was like, “I don’t know.” I was skeptical, but yeah, sure enough, that’s exactly what we did. We decided to, we’re like, okay, well, we’ll scrape together some funds because if you buy something owner-occupied, you can get it for very little down. And there were like all these first-time homeowner programs at the time that we utilized. So, we actually bought a house.

Josh Cantwell: Financing, all this stuff.

Camilla Jeffs: Oh, yeah, like very little down, really low-interest rates. Well, low at the time, I guess. Today is way lower than what we got. But anyway, so we bought a six-bedroom home, like this gigantic 3000 square foot place. We were living in a 200 square foot thing, gigantic home, and rented out the basement. And sure enough, we were paying like $150 a month to live there. And it had a pool in the backyard. Like, how cool was that? We totally upgraded our living arrangement but paid less than what we were paying in this crappy garage apartment. So, that was the kind of impetus where, okay, there’s something to real estate, I really need to figure this out. So, a lot of books and self-educating, and then we did a bunch of live-in flips. We did some small multis.

So, fast forward 15 years, I was kind of a burnt-out landlord, decided I need to do something different. I want to really get into multifamily. And so, that’s when I started getting into figuring out how to get into multifamily, had to go through some mindset shifts about– because I was a DIYer, we just did everything ourselves. And so, now I’ve got to shift to being a team player rather than a solo player. So, I had to work through that. But I want to tell you about some of my early failures in multifamily, right?

Josh Cantwell: I’d love to hear those. You mentioned you’re ready for this about you first have to raise money.

Camilla Jeffs: I know, yeah.

Josh Cantwell: That’s the funny one, I’m dying to hear about that.

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah. So, as you’re looking at getting into multifamily, so if you haven’t made the switch yet or you’re curious about it, really, I like to think of it, and there are four main roles on a general partner team. There’s an acquisition specialist, you have the underwriter, you have a person who brings the capital, and then the asset manager. So, as I was studying these roles, I felt like the most natural fit for me was raising capital. And so, that’s what I really started to hone in on. I mean, I learned all the others. I can do all the others, for sure, but I really love raising capital.

So, as I started getting investors and talking to people about it, everybody was interested and like, oh, yeah, I want to invest in real estate. I want to invest in real estate, right? And so, here I am thinking, okay, I got a bunch of people who are going to invest with me. So, then I started networking with lead sponsors and I found a lead sponsor. I had been networking with them for a while. I don’t ever invest with someone unless I’ve known them for a while. And he’s like, okay, you think you can raise money? You need to raise at least $500,000. I’m like, okay, yeah, I got this. I totally got this. I’ve been talking to all these investors. They’re all excited. And he’s like, okay, great. So, we go through the process, and I launched the deal to my database and thinking, okay, here we go, right? I was excited. And one person invested $50,000. Like Grant Cardone talks about 10X’ing. Well, guess who negative 10X her goal? Yeah, this girl right here.

Josh Cantwell: Nice.

Camilla Jeffs: Oh, it was so embarrassing.

Josh Cantwell: How did you circle back with the other general partner, the operator depending on that money?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah, he has texted me daily. He’s like, “Where’s the money? Where’s the money? What’s happening?” I mean, he was kind. He wasn’t mean about it. He was like, “What do you need? Do you need me to get on calls with investors? Do you need me to do stuff?” Like, he was interested in bringing that money in. And I tried to be so scrappy, I tried calling investors. I tried, like I emailed them a million times. I held a whole bunch of webinars. I did everything that I felt like I knew how to do to get that $500,000 and still ended up with just one $50,000 investor. And finally, at the end of the day, the lead sponsors, like I really can’t bring you on as a general partner. It’s like, god, it’s $50,000.

Josh Cantwell: You promised, yeah.

Camilla Jeffs: Right. And it was just a complete failure for me. And at that point, I’m like, I’m hanging my head and I’m thinking, is this not for me? Am I just not cut out to do this? Like what happened? And I was pretty…

Josh Cantwell: Like what were the takeaways? What are you doing differently now? And it’s probably very psychological. I’m going to bet the way that you did it and how you presented it to investors is very different. A lot of the mechanics of talking to investors, holding webinars, it’s probably similar. You held a webinar, you talked to investors. But it’s the style, the delivery, the mechanics, kind of the setup of it all. Tell us what’s different today, and what did you learn?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah, and that’s 100% what happened, right? So, as I thought back about why did I fail, like why did people not invest, what happened, I realized that I was coming from a place of desperation and scarcity. Like my mindset, it was all about me. I wanted to raise that 500K. I wanted to prove to that lead sponsor that I could do it. I wanted to break into multifamily, right? Like every thought process was just about myself, and I realized, oh my gosh, Camilla, you’re 100% wrong because the thought process needs to be about you’re providing an opportunity to investors because the way I was talking about it was, oh, I need your money. I need you to invest in this deal, and you’re like, I need you, I need you, and I was trying to pull from them instead of framing it as, oh my gosh, this is an amazing opportunity for you. You don’t want to miss out on this. Like the way you talk about it, I was talking about it so wrong in the beginning. And now, that I’ve flipped the script, I’ve been able to raise millions and millions of dollars in just a single year. And the reason is because I’m coming from a place of education, I’m coming from a more humble place rather than I have to prove something to everybody in this world.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, like, let me show you something, and if this is the right fit for you, what the funny thing is, it’s really a fit for everybody, right? So, it’s really up here, like you said about how do you perceive it? How do you present it? Because I tell people all the time, look, if this isn’t for you, no big deal. Like I’ve got other investors that’ll fund it. I always came from even at the very beginning, kind of fake it till I make it. But I always was like, oh my God, I hope they invest. Oh my, I really need the money. But I was never going to allow that to come out and it’s worked. And my process is very similar. Like we do a lot of networking, we get a lot of referrals, talk to a lot of investors who kind of tee everybody up, go through multiple Zoom calls, get to know people really well so that when we finally do a webinar and do a raise, like we oversell because it’s a lot of just this front-end work that makes the commitment.

Now, we’ve completely turned the tables, and I’m sure you’ve seen this where you have a webinar with 50, 100, 200 people on, but you’ve only got room for maybe 25 investors. Now, all the leverage is in your direction versus the opposite. Like the first time you did it, you had zero leverage. So, any other comments on that, like what you’re doing today and kind of gaining leverage with investors to be able to come from a position of strength?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah, I mean, you hit the nail on the head, right? For anybody wanting to raise capital, there’s so much work on the front-end, right? Before you ever get a deal, you’ve got to be educated. And my focus has always been just massive education. Think through what does the investor journey look like? Like from the moment that they find you and then they reach out, or you’ll get into your system somehow, how are you walking them through the process so that when you do have a deal and they are just falling over themselves to invest, right? And it was pretty incredible once I hit that point where I launched a deal, and sure enough, in 24 hours, it was full. And I was like, “What just happened here?” And I took a moment of gratitude just to realize that I am so grateful for the journey that I’ve been on. I’m grateful I didn’t quit in the beginning after that, to me, a massive failure rate that I could have just been like no, I can’t do it. I can’t do it. But no, I was able to work through that challenge and then get to a spot where I could fill a deal in 24 hours. It was amazing.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah, I love it. When people ask me, like, say, “Hey Josh, I’m trying to raise money for this deal.” Whether it’s resi or multifamily or big syndications, they’re like, but I’m not converting anybody. My answer to them is typically, you’re asking for the money too soon, right? The longer you can wait, the more you can delay, the more investors start to really, for lack of a better word, like kind of foam at the mouth. They’re like, okay, I get it. I saw this deal. I saw this past deal. I saw that past deal. I’m sold. Give me something to invest in. That’s when the thing’s over.

Now, what you’ve really done is you’ve provided so much value up front to give them a good education, mitigate risks as best as you can, provide them a secured investment that they understand that then they look at everything else, stocks, bonds, crypto, mutual funds, some other syndicator, and they’ve basically DQ’d everything else. And now, they’re like, I really want to park money in this deal with you, Camilla, or with you, Josh. Bring me a deal. Now, again, you’ve got all the leverage in your way, but only because you did it the right way and put so much time in at the front-end. That’s the result of providing a lot of value and a lot of education.

One of my guys in my mastermind groups, a really good investor but hasn’t really raised a ton of money, and his name is Tony. And Tony’s like, Josh is not working for me. I’m like, well, when are you asking them to invest? He’s like, well, at the second meeting. I’m like, dude, way too soon. What about, Camilla, any other takeaways, not just about raising money, not just about real estate, but what kind of advice do you think you’d pass back to your younger former self? Or if you were mentoring someone, what are some takeaways from your journey that you would pass along with them?

Camilla Jeffs: I think number one is just have patience, right? I mean, we all get this anxiety about having things now. And I sent something out to my investors the other day about why New Year’s resolutions fail. And it’s because we all set marathon goals, but then we want to sprint it and we’re not willing to just go a little bit at a time. And really, literally, it’s just one foot in front of the other. You take it slow. Don’t have all this anxiety about it because that’s another reason I failed in the first place, trying to raise capital because I had anxiety about, oh my gosh, I got to get my first deal. And for those of you who are looking into multifamily, you know the power of the first deal. It’s important. It’s definitely important. But have patience, like there’s no reason to rush into something. There’s no reason to form a bad partnership just because you want a deal. And so, that’s really what I would tell my former self. Like, there’s no reason to have all this anxiety that I held inside my own head and really something I created inside my own head. I didn’t need that. They didn’t serve me at all. And the fact that it was the opposite of serving, like it did not help. So, that’s the advice I’d give right now.

Josh Cantwell: Yeah. And to add on to that, like in multifamily and especially large syndications, the deals are so much bigger. You don’t have to do tons and tons and tons of deals like we’ve done 18 large syndications, but you don’t have to do 18 to make a massive financial impact on your own life and the life of a lot of other people. You could do one or two or four and have an amazing, amazing portfolio, right? So, you can go slow. I love that, having patience. I wrote this down, marathon goals, but trying to accomplish them in a sprint. I thought that’s very powerful. So, Camilla, let’s finish off with the final five. You ready for these?

Camilla Jeffs: I’m ready.

Josh Cantwell: Okay. So, real quick, what’s your favorite way to find deals?

Camilla Jeffs: My favorite way to find deals, well, I followed the cosponsor methods. So, my favorite way is to lean on someone else to do it.

Josh Cantwell: Okay, love it. What’s your favorite way to find capital? There are podcasts, webinars, emails, social media, networking, what’s your favorite way to find capital?

Camilla Jeffs: LinkedIn right now, actually, that’s my favorite way.

Josh Cantwell: Great. Tell me about that. How come? What’s happening on LinkedIn that I need to know about?

Camilla Jeffs: Well, I love LinkedIn. So, I mean, I post on LinkedIn five days a week, and it’s just a fantastic way to get investors. I mean, every post I put on there will reach 8,000 to 10,000 views. I mean, there’s 8,000 to 10,000 people who are looking at what I’m saying and are following along, and then just doing that consistently over and over. And I always do it story-based pictures, story-based that resonates with people a lot more than just saying, hey, the market report says it’s this and that, right? Like, tell a story about it. Don’t just give me facts, the data, that’s boring. So, LinkedIn has been a really great way for me. And then people just like will DM you, and then you start the conversation and you talk to them, and I can’t tell you how many investors I found on LinkedIn. It’s kind of a goldmine.

Josh Cantwell: Love it. Love it. Fantastic stuff. Camilla, who do you think has been the mentor for you that’s had the biggest impact on your journey?

Camilla Jeffs: So, the mentor for me right now has been Julie Lam and Annie Dickerson. So, they run Goodegg Investments. And they were my mentors early on when I decided I was going to niche down and get really good at raising capital. That’s what they did, and I basically copied them. And it’s been perfect and just success leaves clues. You just follow in their footprints and then you’re good, but they are a pretty amazing team.

Josh Cantwell: Got it. When is enough enough?

Camilla Jeffs: Oh, my gosh, I can’t believe you just asked me that question. So, in my mastermind group, we’ve been talking about this, right? When is enough enough? Or what’s your definition of success? And I’ll be vulnerable here with you because I don’t know. Like, I don’t know, I’m hard-wired to achieve, and it’s something inside of me that just, okay, I hit this goal, right? Like, for example, I did a half Ironman. And I’m like, hey, awesome, I achieved that. Do I ever want to do it again? No, because I already achieved that. Like, now what? Now, what do I do? What’s the next big thing? What’s the next big thing? What’s the next big thing? And I don’t think it’s healthy. And so, I’m trying to figure out what is enough, right? Like where is enough enough?

And I think I’m just trying to understand myself a little bit more, trying to understand that, I think as long as I’m growing and learning every day, that should be enough, right? It should be enough that I am already successful. I can say that, I’m already successful, but I still want to grow and develop. And I love that, that keeps me alive and happy. But yeah, that’s a great question, I’m still pondering.

Josh Cantwell: Got another one for you. What’s the definition of happiness to you?

Camilla Jeffs: The definition of happiness has got to be very similar to peace. So, having peace with who you are and what you are providing in the world. Like what kind of impact are you making in the world, I think, really brings a lot of happiness. And for me, simply impacting my family, I have five children, and growing a business and being active and going for dreams and shooting for big dreams and showing them the failures along the way, they know all my failures stories. They understand it. They will cry with me and laugh with me, mostly laugh at me. It’s all good, but just showing them like dreams, I think that’s brought me an immense level of happiness because I see their minds working now and I see them feeling like– because I always say, as a parent, you want your kids to achieve big things. Like you look at your kids and you’re like, oh my gosh, I just want everything for you. I want you to go after it, like whatever you want to do, go get it. But if they don’t have an example of a parent who’s doing that and living it, how do they know they can even attempt?

Josh Cantwell: Oh, yeah.

Camilla Jeffs: So, it’s something that’s very core to me and brings me a lot of happiness to see my children trying to go after dreams, too.

Josh Cantwell: I love it. Camilla, listen, thank you so much for joining us on Accelerated Real Estate Investor. I know that our audience would love to connect with you. Where are some websites, maybe your LinkedIn, where can they connect with you online?

Camilla Jeffs: Yeah, please connect with me. You can go to my website, CamillaJeffs.com, and you can connect with me there. I have some materials there that you can download some information, right? But also, LinkedIn is a fantastic place. You can just find me, just my name, you can type in Camilla Jeffs. I think I’m the only Camilla Jeffs around. I don’t know, maybe there’s another one. I don’t have a common name, but you can find me there, that’s a great place to connect with me as well.

Josh Cantwell: Awesome stuff. Camilla, listen, I had a blast getting to know you today. Thank you so much for joining me.

Camilla Jeffs: Thank you. This was awesome.

[CLOSING]

Josh Cantwell: So, guys, there you have it now. Wow, Camilla was powerful. Lot of nuggets there to take away. So, I appreciate all of you listening. Listen, if you’re looking to kind of take the next step, expand your journey into real estate and entrepreneurship and multifamily. You listen, I put together this mastermind group. We’ve got over 40 members right now. We’re going to build this group to 100 members in this ecosystem, which I call the Forever Passive Income Mastermind. It’s a lot more than a mastermind. It’s actually quite a bit of a coaching program. We also partner on deals together. But you can apply to be a member of the Forever Passive Income Mastermind. You can apply at JoshCantwellCoaching.com, JoshCantwellCoaching.com.

When you apply and if you’re accepted to join the group, listen, you’re going to be involved in an amazing ecosystem of owner-operators, entrepreneurs, lenders, property managers, passive investors, underwriters. Again, all these main roles of a general partnership, I’ve got all of those people already in the mastermind. So, if you’re looking to basically kind of unplug from wherever you’re at and plug in to a group that’s just really, really diverse and really growing, and of course, I lead the group, so you get the benefit of all of my years and years of experience in real estate. Check it out Forever Passive Income, you can apply at JoshCantwellCoaching.com.

Listen, also, leave us some feedback, I mean, Camilla was a great guest, a lot of great nuggets there. Please leave us a rating, a review, thumbs up, thumbs, whatever. Tell us how we did, I’d appreciate that. And we’ll see you next time on Accelerated Investor.