This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Lawrence Guerguis, a 24-year-old based in Orange County, California, who started investing in real estate in the Midwest while still in college. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I always thought I’d go into investment banking and work on Wall Street. During my sophomore year of college at the University of San Diego, I homed in on finance as my major.
One weekend during my junior year, I went out to the bars. We went out to this pizza spot that my friends and I usually go to, and I ran into this guy who was sitting there acting a little odd.
I was like, “Hey, is everything all right?” He turned to me and said, “Dude, I only have two weeks of the year to have a good time. Just leave me alone.”
I asked what he did, and he said he worked in investment banking, so I sat and talked with him for like an hour. He asked me if I loved money, and I said no. Money’s great and all, but I don’t love it.
He was like, “Well, I love money, and this is why I do investment banking. I don’t even have the time to spend the kind of money that I make. I make great money and all that, but my lifestyle is pretty rough.”
The next day, I went to my academic advisor and added a real estate major.
I was like, “We’re not doing investment banking.” That’s not what I want to live for. I don’t want to live for money. I want to live for freedom and have a purpose.
Courtesy of Lawrence Guerguis
I’ve always had a passion for real estate. I love houses — I used to go to open houses for fun in college just to check them out. So even if I went down the investment banking or finance route, I knew I could get into real estate.
But after that conversation with that guy, I completely shut down finance. I thought, “I’m going to go all-in on figuring out what we’re going to do with real estate.”
I sold my car to finance my first investment
My junior year, I had a hand-me-down car, and I was like, “I’m at this university, and I really don’t need it.” So I sold it.
I got $16,000 from that sale, and my dad was like, “We can get another car.”
He didn’t know what I wanted to do at the time.
I started looking for a property to buy. Obviously, I couldn’t get anything in San Diego or Orange County for $16,000.
So I was like, “All right, we’re going to have to start looking elsewhere.” I looked at different Midwestern states, and I ended up coming to a pretty interesting town in Illinois. There, $15,000 covered the down payment on a property, and the extra $1,000 covered a couple of months of the mortgage. I was like, “Let’s do it.”
I knew it was a risk, but I was 21 at the time, so worst case scenario, I’m in some debt, but I’m sure I’ll figure it out. I pulled the trigger on that house.
I didn’t have a W-2 income — I never have — so I couldn’t do a conventional loan. I did a typical Debt Service Coverage Ratio (DSCR) loan. A DSCR is a debt service coverage ratio, which pretty much sees if either the property’s current rent or expected rent will cover the mortgage payment — and the ratio needs to be 1.25.
For this house, just because it was so cheap, my payment was around $400, and the HUD rent for that ZIP code was about $1,300 — well over 2.0.
I thought, “I’m going to need a tenant that doesn’t miss rent,” which is a pretty crazy ask. I then stumbled across Section 8, and, thankfully, my first tenant worked out. My screening was awful — I don’t even think I did a screening that first time — I kind of just went with the flow, and thankfully that one worked.
Once I got that first house junior year, and cash was flowing, I was like, “I think this is what I want to do in real estate.”
Before that, I thought I just wanted to work in real estate and own houses. But once I owned the house and got that first Section 8 tenant, I was like, “OK, this is my niche.”
That first house was a pretty ballsy decision, but I knew that if I wanted to get into real estate at some point, I needed to either make a move soon or make a mistake soon.
I’m making passive income now, but I got my hands dirty at first
When I graduated from college in May 2024, I packed all my clothes into a checked bag, my PC and cables — not even the keyboard and mouse — into a carry-on, and moved across the country to Ohio not knowing anyone there. There, I started buying more properties and managing them.
I was in Cleveland for two years, and the first year and a half, I was doing everything on my own.
I was painting these houses, I was doing flooring and ripping out carpet. I was figuring it out: I had YouTube open on my phone, looking up how to take off a toilet and put it back on.
Courtesy of Lawrence Guerguis
I didn’t have too much experience in construction; I couldn’t tell you the difference between PEX and PVC plumbing.
Now, I know all that stuff. And I have over 30 properties.
That first year and a half, I was an investor and a landlord. I was doing all the screenings, the tenant showings, all the communication, everything.
At the year and a half mark, I started my own property management group. I’m still a landlord, I still go over screenings, but I have people who do repairs for me, who do the showings for me. I don’t necessarily need to be there.
It’s become passive, and I’ve been back in California since June. I’ve done phone calls and sent a couple of emails, but it’s not like a traditional job.
Honestly, I kind of like how hectic it is being a landlord.
I like moving. I like doing stuff. I know some people say landlording is rough — and that really just depends on your screening criteria — but I knew that it was something that came with owning property and becoming an investor.
For me, taking on that responsibility of becoming a landlord was worth more than sitting at a desk. Thank God I’ve made a living.