No One Is Coming to Save You: How Jamil Damji Took Control of His Life & Built a Real Estate Empire

when you're in a survival mode you do what you got to do to survive and that means you're clutching and grasping and filling holes of worthiness and filling holes in yourself with whatever you can and even what's temporary and even though the chemical last it's half light and then you got need more of it or you crash and you're on this hamster wheel of trying to maintain eventually you fall you fall on your ass and you see that you've got to make a real pivot a real change something from the inside out that's why I really believe success is an inside job this is right about now with Ryan offered a radcast network production we are the number one business show on the planet with over one million downloads a month taking the BS out of business for over six years and over 400 episodes you ready to start snap in next and cash and checks well it starts right about now hey guys what's up welcome to write about now we're taking the BS out of business baby that's the tagline but it's the truth and you know what there's no one better than my good friend Jamil Domji what's up Jamil what's cracking brother good to see you man hey man it's good to see you I always think TV when I see you and I talk to pace and you're best known for probably with the masses you're best known in our circles which is being a badass real estate investor but best known probably to the masses from triple digit flip how's life brother life is great man I'm really figuring out how to have this life where I get to do the things that I've been working so hard to do which is continue to grow professionally be there consistently for my family and myself yeah it's a delicate balance isn't it it's like juggling the balls but I respect the hell out of you for trying to get it done that's what it's all about at the end of the day yeah we all got a juggle balls no diddy Jamil let's set the table for everyone people probably heard of any show the triple digit flip they know you're a badass real estate guy what got you in real estate where is the passion and the energy come from it exudes from you word all that jazz come from I accidentally found myself in real estate I'm an East Indian culturally heritage wise my family had eyes for me to be a doctor or an engineer but doctor was where I was being groomed to have my life I didn't get into medical school which was at the time I was I'm one of the most disappointing and heartbreaking things that ever happened to me I had worked so hard in college to get a near 4.0 GPA I killed the medical school interest exam I did all the things you need to do to pad a resume with volunteering and extracurricular activities that I didn't have time for but did anyways because I needed it for my application and the interview process and then some dude saw me and said no you know just not today I saw that as a sign really because I had done all of the things that I had done all the things that you should do in fact I can say it now but in the medical school interest exam the guy who sat behind me cheated off me on the test I know him really well he's my cousin and he had party the night before and needed help on the exam and I let him cheat off me he got into medical school what the fuck that guy is prescribing you guys all the things and is giving you everything you need right now to survive he gets into medical school I don't get into medical school that just showed me the disparity in this whole process this some guy depending on how he woke up today or who I remind him of something about me made this guy say no it wasn't my testing scores because they were better than my cousins it wasn't my GPA it was also better than my cousins what about me made that person say no when I saw that I realized that another human being had control of my destiny and an arbitrary decision could change the trajectory of my life and I decided then never again I was never gonna let another human make my choices it was never gonna let a human being say yes or no to me no I'm gonna pay my own path I'm gonna do it myself and so that's where the passion came from who was a general looking at life and looking at the way the system is kind of set up and just rejecting it was a full rejection of what was paved out in front of me as a way to succeed I knew I had to take control of it now I find myself in an entrepreneurial situation which wasn't really lucrative at the time but it put me in proximity to a guy who was investing in real estate and I got an opportunity to do my first wholesale transaction which at the time I didn't even know existed there was no online education I thought I invented wholesaling because of the deal but I hadn't I thought I did because I hear from these developers that they're looking for these old bungalows in Calgary Alberta where I grew up that they could demolish they had just needed to have 50 foot frontage 110 plus feet in depth they needed to be zoned R2 and they needed to be in specific neighborhoods in the city now I lived in one of those neighborhoods in a rental and I had tried to rent one of these houses a few months earlier but I couldn't because it was $200 out of my budget but it was still available when I was walking my dog the next day and I call the forensic sign and I asked a homeowner if they would consider selling it instead of renting it because they had been unsuccessful renting the spot her answer was yeah for the right price and I inquired what that would be she says 350,000 and this decision that I make next is what changed everything for me I didn't go to the people who were looking for that house and say I can get you this house for 350 which most people would have done I went and I asked the question how much would you pay and they said 400,000 so now I have a $50,000 problem to solve because I can buy it for 350 I can sell for 400 I have no money I have no credit I have no way of acquiring this what do I do I start talking to my family members I start asking for a loan I start seeing who could give me 350 grand for a week or two and nobody wanted to give me any money I'm the kid who didn't get into medical school why would he give him anything then I start calling real estate attorneys and I get all the way through to the letter s a guy named David Steed answers my call he's so fresh out of law school he had no secretary and I tell him my problem and he's like oh that's easy that's called a skip transfer and I'm like explain he's like you take two contracts one where you're the buyer and you pay 350,000 on that contract and then you take a second contract with everything else lining up except you're now the seller on that contract and the new buyer is going to be who the buyer line is and the price is going to differ because you're buying for 350 you're selling for 400 everything else has to be the same so the conveying attorney condition dates all of that have to line up for this to work but once you've got these things signed bring these contracts to me and then I asked what happens then he said takes me a couple of weeks to do some research look at leans make sure that I can convey title pay off on the mortgage all of the documents have to be prepared and once that's done I'll have a check waiting for you it happened I get a $47,000 cash year check and coming from a situation where my parents hadn't made close to that in a year in either of their lives for me that was the game changer that's where the scales fell from my eyes and I saw what is possible in life and I never looked back I went ham after that and I started wholesaling full time I do really well in it until the financial collapse in 08 where I lose everything because of leverage and just inexperience and doing too much which is essentially how I got caught up in that but it was a beautiful education and it taught me so much that's where I get started that's where the passion comes from because quite honestly Ryan I look at life as a series of choices you see everybody gets a chance to choose something different choose something that's outside of your regular patterns and your life is pregnant with these possibilities of making different choices but too many of us get stuck in patterns that are familiar and comfortable now if you continue to choose the same thing you chose yesterday then your tomorrow will look like it does today and if today looks like a job you hate a relationship that doesn't serve you and just general discontent with where you've gone then you're doing what I learned from Andrew Huberman how they treat rats who they're testing for depression it's this theory of hopelessness at what point does a rat that you put in water stop swimming when does he give up and they look at that time and then they give these rats drugs to see if they can extend how long the rat will swim and then they say that's the drug that's going to cure depression or at least solve some symptoms well what about not putting that rat in that situation or how about helping the rat out of that situation rather than just extending how long he'll swim what about figuring out how to put that rat in another medium and that's what we're doing to each other in life we're putting ourselves and we're putting each other in these glasses of water and these tanks of water and where's like swim and this is like people that are in relationships that are terrible these are people who go to their nine to five job that they hate they work for somebody they don't admire or don't trust or wouldn't trade places with based on character and they give up at some point they say life happened to me and now I'm just gonna do what I do until I have to retire the passion comes from being able to get in front of that person making the choice to quit making the choice to give up and saying hey I know about another glass I know about another way that you can get out of this spot where you're no longer hopeless and you can maybe do something with your life that would make you proud damn man we say taking the BS out of business that's how you take the BS out of business that's real shit right there they say the best and greatest growth happens in discomfort I firmly believe that when you didn't get into medical school when you've been working for that that's the expectation you were highly uncomfortable I would have to guess the greatest gifts sometimes come in these surprises in this discomfort I joke all the time I have balloons and clowns at my pity parties but they only last an hour they're one hour you may have had a pity party for a little while I'm sure we all do but you flip the fucking switch dude and you turned it into greatness not only going into the real estate but uncovering and unlocking the whole silly aspect and the ability to do something that a lot of people around you that didn't know how to do that's what I call grit and resourcefulness the two greatest attributes on earth and you exude it man I love that shit that grit and resourcefulness got you through that now you're passionate about sharing it with others and turning them around that's the greatest gift we all have because I remember one of my 20s I was early successful but it was me me me me me me me me me when you start sharing those gifts and you start spreading it around that's what really unlocks not only greater gifts but it's amazing what starts the doors that start opening and we had some other doors that start opening when did it all change what was round two and three of this journey the building of kegley my wholesale business was a beautiful dream come true unlike what people may believe the perfect entrepreneur looks like I definitely wasn't in the beginning I was struggling with alcoholism and addiction to pain medication from a motor vehicle accident as I'm building this company I'm still struggling to just maintain life and maintain my head above water and my relationship is good as it can be with a man in that state I did well I tried I was doing okay but it wasn't until I took a good look inside and I said what am I doing who am I why am I here why am I giving up why am I getting my energy and my fuel source from this false light from these false sources how do I change this that took me down a path of self discovery and I was reintroduced to maslow's hierarchy of needs which I had been originally introduced to in elementary school by a person who didn't understand it themselves there I was looking at the pyramid and seeing I've been living in survival and of course when you're in a survival mode you do what you got to do to survive and that means you're clutching and grasping and filling holes of worthiness and filling holes in yourself with whatever you can and even though it's temporary and even though the chemical lasts its half light and then you got need more of it or you crash and you're on this hamster wheel of trying to maintain eventually you fall you fall on your ass and you see that you've got to make a real pivot a real change something from the inside out that's why I really believe success is an inside job we can kick in as many doors as we want and we can do this the Newtonian way where every cause has an effect and every action has an equal and opposite reaction and I can look at the laws of physics and say okay I need to have a force and that means I need to have some mass and acceleration behind me so that I can actually move this obstacle or I can work with my spirit I can work with the creator the thing that binds all of this together and I can part-red seize I can build universes I can tap into divine qualities within me and not have to do this the hard way and that is where things really started to change that's where second part in the third part of this story come from was me getting in and having a real honest look at who I was and how I was showing up in the world and making adjustments and changing my patterns and deciding that I wasn't going to be the same Jamil Damjee as I was today I'm going to be a new one I'm going to make a new choice and I don't I can't say you make all the changes and choices all on one day you'll turn out and you won't be able to sustain that either but it was small micro change after small micro change after small micro change slowly but surely I started to evolve I evolved spiritually and then I evolve emotionally and then the last drop was physically I recently dropped 80 pounds you know I was a heavier guy and unhealthy at that I had to make that final adjustment in my lifestyle and I feel completely different guy today I'm healthier I'm happier I'm more fulfilled I've made more money with those attributes still there in an attack and I'm continuously learning I'm still finding myself in hard situations I recently just went through a separation with my wife who is a beautiful human being and one of the greatest women I've ever met and it's a friendship that will I'll carry on in for the rest of my life I learned so much and how that happened what I can do differently in my life to show up better as a father and as a husband in the future I'm making those adjustments and I'm going to continue pushing forward and growing that brings me to today I'm ecstatic with what's around the corner I know that because I'm not living in fear I don't have anxiety about what's coming I live in faith and so I have excitement you look great you do look good I wouldn't be surprised I'll hand some devil lots of doors might be opening for you when I'm ready I guess you know I still got a lot of healing and things to go through you got the physical but it's all hide together and I love what you said about strength and success haps starts within there's never been a true statement everything starts internally and it manifests in the mind or so it starts in the mind and manifests in the body if you don't have your head right in the right headspace and that can be spiritually that can be meditation whatever your outlet is but having that being centered and focused and it's just so important and I know that's had an impact for you I'm sure the audience would love to hear probably some A&E fans out there some triple digit flip fans out there talk about that experience a little bit it was wonderful while we did it pace and I my sister and Laura Morby we got to spend hours and hours and hours on set hanging out doing what we do enjoy each other's company and flip real estate it was really a blessing and I have a tremendous amount of respect and love for our friends at A&E for the opportunity that we had they originally signed us to a six-season deal and as you guys are probably aware we only have produced two of them they did have an order for us of 30 episodes which pace and I humbly declined the reason for it is just at the end of the day we are principles in the real estate business our daily job is not choosing tile and picking paint colors which unfortunately in a visual medium like TV is something that people want to see and the general public doesn't realize that real estate investors don't do those things during the day I've got people that picked tile I've got people that choose the paint color I have staff that handles those things I'm not the guy doing that I'm looking for new opportunities I'm doing the boring stuff but the boring as far as TV goes stuff throw up your sleeves and deals and hunting and networking and all that shit they want me to demo a wall it's just not authentic to the experience that I have on a daily basis and when you look at it from the perspective of how long it takes to shoot an episode they're looking at 80 to 100 hours of footage for a 42-minute episode which is oppressively long and it takes us out of our day-to-day responsibilities it removes us from being able to show up better for our communities which I'm 100% committed to and it takes us away from being able to be there for our staff I've got over 300 people that rely on Jamil Damjee being the best version of himself every single day and to be there to answer questions to motivate to lead and if I'm on a TV set pointing at tiles and choosing paint color I'm not doing that unfortunately that's just not a show we want to continue making again no judgment for people who do and a tremendous amount of love and respect for our producers and friends at A&E they are professionals I have so much respect with A&E we originally told them hey we're never going to do this fake drama stuff I'm not going to throw a contractor under the bus or a vendor under the bus and pretend like somebody screwed something up they don't do that now if something authentically happens and a mess up occurs and we catch it and we want to talk about it I'm totally down but I'm not going to make it up but we're not going to lie and there was only one instance where a producer a director had asked for us to do that and I walked off set I just left I got in my car and said no not doing it and then the executive producer got on the phone until that director what are you doing he's like I'm doing what I do this is what we're supposed to do he's like not these guys not this show I was apologized to got back to set they said you just do what you do and I'm like we do it by heart we do this thing for real and I'm never going to dramatize and throw someone under the bus unfortunately that's not the TV we make they honored that and they produced a television show that I am proud of that I know my children will be proud of and even though it will live in the ether somewhere on the internet at some point in 20 years my kids will look at it and say wow look how fat dad was this is cool but we want to do something that is meaningful on a societal level and so pace and I are self-producing a show where we're going to look at how we can help solve problems we have a hand in now there's no doubt in my mind that real estate investors wholesalers fix and flippers have a hand in the inventory shortage and affordability going where it's gone in the United States and if we want to pretend like we don't have a hand in it then we're blindly deluding ourselves that's not to say that I'm not going to participate in it because that's how I feed my family it's the way that life is and that's just unfortunately how it's going so houses are going to get more expensive they're going to get harder to buy but knowing that I have a hand in things getting more expensive can I not find ways to help the people who are being negatively impacted by what's going on in real estate and that's what pace and I want to do moving forward we're self-producing a show where we will go into skid row we're going to go into tent cities and we're going to find vulnerable people who really want to affect some change in their life and we'll show them how to do this business we'll show them how to get deals we'll show them how to make money and we'll do that with our own time our own resources and prove that you can teach a man or a woman to fish and change their existence that's going to be how we can at least begin helping solve the problem that we know is sweeping the country and then change that model from people that are experiencing being unsheltered to single parents who are doing the best they can to other disenfranchised communities in United States that would benefit tremendously from the knowledge that pace and I have gained in this industry I don't give a dang if anybody watches it or doesn't watch it for the fact that we'll be able to do it and do it authentically and it'll be a subject matter that we're very tied to that we're very interested in and that we know will make a huge impact on society and if you watch that and you see that we can help a person struggling with addiction or struggling with other factors in their life and help them do the business then what excuse does somebody who has everything going for them except lack of priority and how they want to spend their downtime whether that be watching Netflix or doing something that can help change their financial life when we can show that and prove the concept of people that hey anyone can do what we do then we'll have a title wave of people that will start taking responsibility for what they produce in this world and how they show up I love that man I can't wait to watch it I'm surprised and you probably did but maybe I didn't have a discussion with they pitching it there we did but they just said people aren't ready for it they want to still see house porn and that's okay that's totally okay it's not until you break the mold that new molds are formed and maybe we got to self-produce this and show how strong the appetite is from a internet basis because pace and I have really good YouTube channels and our communities are super connected and they are engaged and they're all excited to see this come to fruition even if it's just self-produced and watched by our communities cool if it catches on and others see utility and want to share it and do the same amazing and then if that then turns into a conversation with A&E again where they say thanks for proving this now we want to do this type of show awesome and if not awesome there's not a day that goes by since not filming the TV show that I miss it it's not sexy brother I know I've been on both sides of show business for quite a while creating ads for some of the biggest brands in the world sitting on some of those TV sets and everything else and it's a lot more work than people realize we talk a lot about marketing on this show and the power of branding I happen to own the trademark on the phrase it pays to be known with that said I don't want to gloss over too much you did homage to A&E but the power of television even still today it's diminished you guys did it for a reason the show it was good for them good for you I talked to people all the time don't get it twisted if you get the opportunity to grow your reach and frequency and awareness on the power of the medium of television as long as it's in line like you said with your morals your beliefs and it's not altered you better take that ticket it's still very powerful it absolutely is and tremendous amount of love and respect for A&E and Six West our production company that was a huge support and partner through the whole process and pace and eye and the rest of the cast have just the utmost respect for all of them it was a great opportunity and I'll always have the TV show under my belt I'll always be able to lead a bio with A&E TV star and that's awesome it'll never be stripped from me it's not something that you can never take away but I did my time if you have the opportunity of course take the opportunity will it be a lot of work yes will there be a tremendous financial return no will you get credibility and unlock doors that you wouldn't have been able to unlock without it absolutely and will those doors lead to greater ROI's an opportunity you better believe it TV show is not just the eyeballs of the housewife where the house husband that's watching you on a Sunday at 11 a.m. while they're looking after the kids and doing DIY home project that's not the guy who's gonna stroke a check and join your mentorship or your coaching or do a deal with you and buy a wholesale property that's not the person the voyeur isn't the avatar of my customer but my customer respects that I'm on that medium and it lends to my credibility it lends to the visibility and let's just be honest it's cool for somebody to have a TV show and it's even cooler for you to be friends with or know or learn from that guy when I'm on my coaching calls with a few hundred people and they are having a lengthy discussion with me how many times do I hear I just can't believe I'm talking to you and I'm like bro I just farted it's all good I love you if you weren't on TV man thank you talk about some of that coaching stuff you mentor you coach teaching people to do what you do you mentioned helping that on the TV show which will be amazing but for the everyday person how are you unlocking these opportunities I built the nation's largest wholesale operation because I scaled and I created a replicable business where people didn't think it was really possible no one's ever sold a wholesale business until we came in and franchised ours and built a replicable model that has now been operating in over a hundred and eighteen different markets under the same brand when you're able to do that you can prove to folks that this is a replicable business and this is a sellable company that for me is really awesome but in addition to that I looked at this business from a relationship standpoint and what most wholesalers were doing in the past and what people were teaching them to do were was very difficult lead generation techniques like cold calling door knocking putting up bandit signs and direct mail and all of this is extremely expensive time consuming and the ROI is maybe maybe not because for somebody that is working at W2 and doesn't have a lot of expendable resources and disposable resources available then asking that person to gamble five six seven thousand dollars on the possibility they may get a lead or get a contract is a hefty ask I know we can talk forever bro where can everybody keep up with all these projects everything you got going on and where can I keep up everything my youtube is the best place it's just youtube.com slash jameel damg j-a-m-i-l d-a-m-j-i also i'm you on instagram at j d-a-m-j-i so at j damg send me a dm I love hearing from folks subscribe to my youtube learn what I do for a business I love cracking jokes I like making people laugh you'll be entertained you'll be educated if there's anything that I could do to help you with learning something that I have a skill at send me a dm and I'm happy to be a part of your world thank you so much for coming on bro hey guys you don't find us Ryan is right.com you can find links to all of jameel's stuff all of the highlight clips from today all of our social media you can find me at Ryan offered a blue check mark but had it before you could buy it we'll see you next time we'll write about now. This has been right about now with Ryan Alfred a radcast network production visit Ryan is right.com for full audio and video versions of the show order one choir about sponsorship opportunities thanks for listening.