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Show Summary
In this episode of the Real Estate Pros podcast, host Kristen interviews Jenarda Makupson, a real estate entrepreneur and author of ‘Keys to the Kingdom: A Woman’s Guide to Winning in Real Estate.’ Jenarda shares her journey into real estate, her experiences in the California market, and her insights on empowering women in the industry. She discusses the importance of preparation, understanding financing options, and finding mentorship. The conversation highlights the significance of resilience in overcoming mistakes and the value of building wealth through real estate.
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Jenarda Makupson (00:00)
And then just see what you qualify for because a lot of people don’t go after what they want because they automatically think they don’t qualify. I had someone tell me he was looking for a property. He started off with a $200,000 budget because that’s what he thought.I looked at everything, I said, you can do a bank statement loan, sweetheart. and by the time I finished, he qualified for 1.5 million.
Kristen (01:56)
Welcome back to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I’m Kristen and I’m here with Jenarda Makupson She is a real estate entrepreneur and author. She’s the owner of Kingdom Keys Realty and Management. And then she has this new book, Keys to the Kingdom, a woman’s guide to winning in real estate, which I’m so excited to talk about. So there’s a lot here that we need to discuss. Thanks for being here, JenardaJenarda Makupson (02:16)
You are very welcome. Thanks for having me.Kristen (02:19)
So I would love to get into kind of how you got into the real estate world. You’re doing a lot. You’re a loan officer. You’re a realtor. You’re a real estate investor. Property management. You’re doing so much. How did you get into this?Jenarda Makupson (02:31)
Well, I actually started real estate when I was 19. I ⁓ just had my baby on my hip. I was a young mom. And um I was living in my grandmother’s home. I was paying rent. She always taught us responsibility. And she lived somewhere else. And when she was ready to sell her home,She said, you know, I think I’m ready to sell my house and I had been doing some work around the house, you know, just touch up painting and stuff like that. And people would walk by, you know, the neighbors and stuff and they say, is, is your grandmother trying to sell this house? You know, and I told her that and she said, okay, that’s great. That’s great. I said, grandmother, well, what if I did a little paint, you know, did a little more to the house and I was able to sell the house for you? And then she said,
Well, I want exactly this amount. And she told me her amount and I said, well, anything that I sell over that amount, I can have, right? She said, yes. So I went on and when we painted the outside, it really gave it a facelift. And so when people were walking by, it was very easy for us to sell the home. I was able to get all of my money back that I put into it and some additional cash as well. And then I said, hmm.
That was nice and that was easy. And then I said, I’m ready. I think I want to do this. This is what I want to do. I knew it in my mind.
Kristen (03:56)
That’s so cool and I think that’s also an interesting thing to highlight where you don’t have to do complete remodels sometimes. Something like a coat of paint can make a huge difference.Jenarda Makupson (04:08)
That isso true. I walk into homes and I just have an automatic eye for it. know, soon as I walk in, I can look at a house and say, hmm, if I just change the floors, add some fresh paint, put a couple of different, you know, upgraded, know, updated light fixtures, and I can bring the value up, you know, 20, 30, 40,000. So, and sometimes it is the cosmetic upgrades or the smaller things. And that really makes the difference.
Kristen (04:38)
Absolutely and talk about kind of where you’re at now in your investing career and your realtor career and kind of how you navigate the market and how you source properties and all that.Jenarda Makupson (04:50)
Yeah, so here recently, I just did a rehab here in California. I bought the home for about 1.5. We put about 400,000 in it and now it’s worth 2.6. So that was a really good one. And I do that everywhere. I’m licensed in California as well as Georgia. So I did quite a few of them from 2018 up until now and that’s what I continue to do.now in California as well.
Kristen (06:03)
Yeah, can you talk about the California market? Because I think a lot of investors are very hesitant to enter that market because it’s very tenant friendly and you know, I think it’s an interesting state. What have you kind of seen with the market today?Jenarda Makupson (06:18)
In California, I think that you just need to educate yourself because educate yourself on the different areas and locations and what’s allowed and what’s not allowed. Educate yourself on the zoning, you know, because LA County and this area might, you know, be zoned in a certain way and then you go around the corner literally and incorporated Los Angeles and it’s a completely different situation. So you really need to educate yourself on the market.and decide where you want to purchase at. And as an investor, a lot of people in California, there’s a lot of cash buyers out here that will buy eight, $900,000 homes as long as the return on their investment is good. But if you’re not ready for that, if you’re a new investor, then you know, or your budget’s just not ready for that, you can go out a little bit. Go out a little further in California.
and you can get a home for three, four hundred thousand. And people don’t even think that they exist. They don’t know that, but they do.
Kristen (07:14)
youYeah, think, I mean, I live in California and I think that there’s this, people only think of it as, you know, San Francisco and Los Angeles. And there’s so much in between and so many, you know, areas everywhere. So yeah, it’s the same thing where people have general opinions about the market. And reality is each state has its own market. And you’re saying even each county in each area has their own market, which I think is a good thing to highlight.
Jenarda Makupson (07:28)
Yeah.Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Kristen (07:49)
What wouldyou say to someone right now who’s kind of maybe a little cautious to enter the market?
Jenarda Makupson (07:55)
Say.Proper preparation. That’s the best way to success when it comes to real estate. You need to sit down, put a budget together. Okay, I have this, this amount put aside. I have this amount, you know. You can buy a house and, and you can purchase with a hard money loan and put down 10 % of the purchase price and then they might do the full rehab for you.
So you really just need to prepare and you need to make sure whatever your budget is, stay within your budget. Don’t just go out there and say, I’m ready, I have $20,000, I want to flip a house. No, you need to put your budget together. So when someone like me says, okay, what is your budget? What are you working with? Then I can take your budget or maybe another agent or whomever and say, okay, so this…
will fit within his budget. This is how he can make a nice return on his investment. you know, so I would say sit down, write it down, put a budget together, and be sure all the way through to keep up with your paperwork. Keep up with the amount you’re spending as you once it does happen. You know But put a budget together and properly prepare.
Kristen (08:57)
youAbsolutely and
When it comes down to actually borrowing the money, what are your best tips for people? I know you’re in the loan industry. What are the best options out there?
Jenarda Makupson (09:30)
When it comes to borrowing the money,That’s, that’s, that’s a little vague the way you said it, but I will say one thing. See what you qualify for because there is FHA 203K, there is FHA, believe it or not, there is loans for small cosmetic upgrades. And then if you want to get into the bigger things, bigger rehabs, then there’s hard money lenders, which are amazing.
I have a great one. And I’m always looking for more.
And then just see what you qualify for because a lot of people don’t go after what they want because they automatically think they don’t qualify. I had someone tell me he was looking for a property. He started off with a $200,000 budget because that’s what he thought. I mean, $200,000, that’s, that’s it. That’s what he qualified for. That’s what he thought until he met me.
I looked at everything, I said, you can do a bank statement loan, sweetheart. He didn’t even know. I’m like, what? I said, and by the time I finished, he qualified for 1.5 million.
So, you know, it’s amazing how people just, they don’t know what they qualify for. They might think, okay, I don’t don’t don’t have, I have a tax returns. My, my situation is a little different. There’s Quantik Bank, the bank where I work,
for, I mean, the loans are just amazing. work, we do bank statement loans, we can do P and L loans, profit and loss statement loans based on your income. You know, there’s just so many different loans we can do. We can do a loan as low as 500 with a 500 credits for as long as, but you have to put down 10%. So you just kind of really got to talk to a professional to kind of put together, what is your goal? What’s your goal?
And once we know what your goal is, then we can put together the right situation to fit within your goal to make it happen.
Kristen (12:03)
Yeah, absolutely. I think you bring up a good point of expanding beyond yourself when you’re putting together a deal and not just assuming you know everything and really collaborating with people who are experts in each field.Jenarda Makupson (12:16)
Eachexactly. I agree, Kristen, 100%. Yep.
Kristen (12:21)
Yeah, and I’d like to shift gears a little bit. I would love to talk about your book. I think it’s so exciting. The Kingdom, A Woman’s Guide to Winning in Real Estate. Talk about how you kind of came about writing this.Jenarda Makupson (12:33)
Well, because my first book I wrote, wrote was called Breaking Cycles, a story of breaking cycles of abuse. it kind of just, was a little more on the personal side. It touched on some of the real estate, but it was saying how I, you know, how I flipped homes and did all of those things. And then in Ohio, and then I ended up moving back to California, getting back into real estate. So I wrote the book because, you know, there are lots of women out there who are in,relationships and you know it’s great to have a husband I’m so for that. I’m all about love but you have to have it you should have some things for yourself you know you should have a career for yourself or you should have some savings for yourself and if you’re a sad home mom you still can invest in a couple of properties and have some income coming in every, every month just cash just coming in like wake up
and ⁓ they deposited my rent. So I personally believe in that when, when I just believe that women should, should have their own and to be able to build their own because not only just for themselves or maybe for their kid, their kids but their husband might need them one day. He might have a bad year, but no problem. I have five homes that are.
generating income every month. So I’m just all about women being powerful. And then, know, like my other book, you know, I got into a situation and if you don’t save your money and if you don’t have that of your own separate, you know, you can find yourself in a situation where you’re broke. I, I literally was all the way flat broke before, you know, and I had to come all the way back up again. So
with me going through the experiences that I went through.
Jenarda Makupson (14:23)
those who want to do better, to get the keys to the kingdom so that they cannot make those mistakes, you know? It’s good, I believe, in women being independent and still having a loving relationship, but you know.Kristen (14:41)
Absolutely, I think it’s so important because I think a lot of women, I mean it’s very easy, especially when kids are involved, it’s very easy to kind of rely on your partner for finances, but I do agree with you, it’s so important to have your own and to be independent to a certain extent. And even like your independence could help your entire family as you said.Jenarda Makupson (14:58)
Yeah.Absolutely, it’s about building wealth. It’s about wealth. those are some, some of us didn’t learn that when we were in our family growing up. We didn’t learn that. So when I finally, you know, I live with my mom and then I went moving out to Ohio with my grandma. So my mom was, she taught me amazing morals, values and principles, but she wasn’t telling me like, you need to put this money aside and you can buy a house. And do you understand that when you have a house, it’s not only your home, it’s your investment.
Kristen (15:47)
right.Jenarda Makupson (16:15)
So if you want to pull some money out of your house five, six, seven, 10 years from now for an emergency, maybe your child has to have surgery or maybe on a happy note, it’s graduation time and you just want to go all out, you know, or whatever the case, you have that money. So you’re paying rent every month to whoever when you can be paying rent, it’s going back into your own investment. You’re the landlord. So I just, I just would love for.women to know those type of things and, and educate themselves on that so that they can just have a little bit easier life, you know?
Kristen (16:52)
Absolutely, and when you were kind of coming up through this industry, did you have women that you were able to learn from and kind of have mentorship from?Jenarda Makupson (17:00)
Absolutely.I had an amazing, oh my God, I had this lady, her name was Pat- I don’t wanna Patricia, Patricia Weston. She owned home healthcare agencies and she was business like. when it came to paperwork and keeping things together and writing things down, like um you know, just being very organized and everything, I learned 100 % from her amongst a couple other women, but she’s
Definitely someone I looked up to and believe it or not. She ended up coming back to me and asking me like Jenarda so you’re in real estate Well, she trusted me and she gave me hundreds of thousands of dollars in my bank account so that I can find the house for her fix it up and sell it she is actually ended up being one of my investors and We we did a few how homes together and that was a great opportunity for me moving back, you
Kristen (17:48)
that’s a…Jenarda Makupson (17:56)
from Ohio just to get back rolling in the real estate business. And she trusted me and it was, and it turned out great. It was a great experience.Kristen (18:05)
That’s amazing. Um how do you have suggestions for people how they can find mentorship or how they can create community?Jenarda Makupson (18:12)
Yeah, if you’re around people that, that don’t, um you have to be around the right, the right group of people. You have to be around, if you look around and no one around, around you motivates you, no one, then you might need to go outside of your circle to find your mentor. you know, ⁓ if no one around you supports your goals,Kristen (18:27)
night.Jenarda Makupson (18:37)
Definitely go outside of your circle to find a mentor. And if you have to find one online, you just gotta find somebody that, that, that motivates you, you know? That you look up to. Yeah.Kristen (18:52)
Absolutely,and I feel like your book even kind of acts as almost a mentor because you go through your own experience and your trials and tribulations and you give a lot of advice. So think even something like that could be super helpful for people.
Jenarda Makupson (19:04)
Absolutely, and I hope that that’s the way it touches them. I hope that it inspires them and you know to ⁓ do great things .Kristen (19:13)
hmmYeah and I mean I’m sure there’s so many amazing takeaways from the book but can you kind of highlight one of the big you know maybe themes of the book that you’d love people to take away from it?
Jenarda Makupson (19:26)
Good question. the book has so many great things to it. I think I like the way the book showed when I made a mistake, because mistakes happen. I made a mistake and got overly excited about the actual home.Kristen (19:39)
Totally.Jenarda Makupson (19:47)
you know, and the vision and all of that, that I went over budget and I didn’t properly prepare myself. Oops. And then, and how I ended up kind of just breaking even. yeah, breaking even is, but it could have been worse. I’m glad I broke even, but you usually want to getKristen (19:52)
hmmYeah.
That’s not bad though, breaking even. Yeah.
Jenarda Makupson (20:14)
some profit off of it, unless you’re running a non-profit organization. But anyway, and I do love helping people. So that was one of the things, is that it shows how you can make mistakes, but you just have to get up and bounce. You gotta bounce back. You can’t let one mistake stop you. You know, you never, no one’s perfect. you always gonna Mistakes happen, but you have to be determined to get up and keep going.Kristen (20:41)
Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s important because I think people, someone might look at you and everything you’ve built and be like, well, I’m messing up. I can never be that. Um But it’s so true. Even the most experienced investors make mistakes here and there.Jenarda Makupson (20:49)
Yeah.Absolutely do, absolutely do. And I think another thing ⁓ about the book is how I started off basically with nothing. You know. That’s kind of big. And ended up being owning over a million in assets, being worth over a million. And I was just a regular girl from Ohio.
Raised in California though. I was just regular. So, you know, I think that that should be enough determination. And then I also go on and I break some things down as far as like I even left some templates in the book, you know, where that kind of shows you how to put your budget together. It gives you some tips. It definitely gives you some tips. So.
Kristen (21:45)
Amazing.Well, it sounds like such a great guide for people who are, you know, getting started or kind of just looking to level up what they’re already doing. So tell everyone where to find the book and kind of how to find you and Kingdom Keys.
Jenarda Makupson (21:53)
Yeah.Yeah, so you can find the book on Amazon. It’s uh, it’s uh Keys to the Kingdom, A Woman’s Guide to Winning in Real Estate. And you can pre-order it. ⁓ The actual release date is ⁓ November 17th, but you can pre-order it. And ⁓ I am here in Los Angeles, California. And I am working with buyers, sellers, investors. ⁓
I do property management also as it comes. I’ve been doing that since 2008. So I’m right here. My location is in, I have one in Van Nuys and I also have one in Beverly Hills, but I’m also able to use all different types of offices. So if you are not in those areas and you want to meet with me, just let me know and I’ll arrange an office closer to where you are.
Kristen (22:50)
Amazing. Do you have any personal social media that people can look up?Jenarda Makupson (22:54)
Yes,so my Instagram is Jenarda J-E-N-A-R-D-A, sells S-E-L-L-S, real estate. That’s my Instagram. And my Facebook is BrokerJenarda And my LinkedIn, you should be able to find me as I believe once again, Jenarda Makupson on LinkedIn. And I also have a YouTube page and it’s just at Jenarda
Kristen (23:24)
That’s great to get that user name. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for being here, Jenarda I think people probably learned a lot and got a lot of good inspiration.Jenarda Makupson (23:24)
That’s pretty. So I’m all over social media.I hope so Kristen. And you were great. Thanks for having me.
Kristen (23:39)
Thank you so much and thank you everyone for listening. Yeah, please check out that book. Please pre-order it. I think you can learn a lot. So we’ll see you back next time. Bye.Jenarda Makupson (23:48)
Thank you so much. Have a great night.
