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What's going on, YouTube? In this final installment of our four-part master class in co-living, we are going to talk about how you can get free money. Free money for your co-living project. So, you definitely want to watch this one.
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All right, guys. So, how do we get our hands on the moola? How do we get our hands on the money? And there is a lot of money available. And I'm not just talking about foreign investment. I'm talking about government money, grants, 501c3 tax exemptions. Yes, guys, I'm talking about ways to earn money while you are solving major problems in the community, but also to do so in a way that saves you on taxes or exempts you from paying taxes altogether. So, let's dive into how you can get grants or some free money to build and scale your co-living business.
We'll start off with the 501c3. Yes. So, you definitely need to be a 501c3 if you want to take advantage of some of the things that I'm going to talk about here. And that's essentially giving you a tax exemption. So, you're not going to be paying taxes to the IRS on any income that you generate, as well as have you be a nonprofit. So, now here's the thing, guys. It's a real nonprofit. Now, I don't want to get into the legalities of how much you pay yourself as one of the members or the board members of the nonprofit and the legalities of whether you should pay yourself a million dollars a year or $500,000 a year. I would say I am not an accountant. I am not an attorney. Please seek professional tax advice from a professional who can tell you on the ways to make sure that you're doing this totally above board.
But you want to create a 501c3. Then you want to look for some public housing initiatives. And believe me, every single state, every county has their own housing initiatives. Now these are programs. These are specific plans or incentives that the government is offering for people to come solve housing problems. Now, if you can actually put together a plan to solve some of those housing problems and it involves co-living, repurposing either homes that the city has appropriated or taken over or abandoned properties, there are so many properties like that that the city might just hand to you for you to turn into affordable housing initiatives or affordable housing programs. And Phoenix, for example, they've got so many homes that have been abandoned that the city of Phoenix is actually in possession of. They own these properties. Now, if we can present to the city of Phoenix a plan on how we can turn that property over to turn it into an opportunity for affordable housing, the city of Phoenix may sell us that property at a severe discount or even gift us that property.
Now, again, lots of people, especially wealthy individuals who might be holding on to property, are always looking for ways to save money on taxes. Now imagine if you have a wealthy donor, somebody like Pace Morby for instance, who's just sitting on a house and he's got, let's just say, an tax implication of a million dollars. Now, let's say Pace buys this house for $100,000. But if he was to go get a fair market value assessment on it, let's just say it assessed at $500,000. But what Pace could do is he could actually donate that home to your 501c3 and he could write off $500,000 on his taxes even though it only cost him $100,000 for the house. See the play. Now you could take that property and fill it with people and generate income and now you've got something really interesting, right? The one individual got a tax break, massive tax break, you got a free or a cheap house and we're solving a public problem. So these public initiatives, they're always there. You want to go out and research and you want to see what specific public housing initiatives is your specific state, city, county offering and then maneuver within that.
Number two, veterans. Oh my goodness. This one is really near and dear to me because when Raheem and I first started getting involved in this model, unbeknownst to us, we were involved in co-living nearly a decade ago. We just didn't know what it really was. Raheem and I were doing veteran housing and this is where we would take one specific building and we would fill it with veterans and we would do exactly what we're doing right now in co-living where we would make little gardens and have little communities in there and really go above and beyond to show the people that we care that we actually honor our service members and the people who have laid their lives out on the line for us for our survival and our freedom and we wanted to give back. Now in addition to that we were also getting government money to do so. So we're doing something good. We're getting paid handsomely to do it. I don't see anything wrong with that. In my world, that's a perfect situation. So, there's a tremendous amount of opportunity with veteran housing in the VA. You just got to go out and you got to start asking questions. You got to connect with people at the VA in your specific state. Find out what housing initiatives are available and start filling the orders. Go fill the orders. There are so many homeless vets out there and you could be a part of solving that problem.
Number three, community nonprofits. I'm going to give you an example. In Phoenix, Arizona, we have this incredible, actually, it's a national nonprofit called Dress for Success. Now, Dress for Success, what they do is they help judicially impacted women who were re-entering society after incarceration. So, these are ladies who have been incarcerated for whatever reason, and they're now re-entering society, and they need some help. And so what this nonprofit does is they help those ladies re-enter society, giving them clothes, housing, a way to maybe earn some money in the first few weeks, really get them on their feet so that they can come out and be productive members of society, which all of us want. The reduction in recidivism or people who actually re-offend and go back to prison substantially decreases when they're strong community ties. And so this is a form of community tie. Now, Dress for Success is given grant money by the city of Phoenix to have a housing initiative. Now, Dress for Success has partnered with Kest, my company, to be able to provide housing for those women who are being released from incarceration and they're about to be entering society. So, on our last project where Dress for Success was given a $10,000 check and our home was outfitted entirely of all of its furniture by Walmart. So, there's so many public organizations. There's big corporations. There's government grants. All of this money is available when you're getting involved in some of these projects that are helping people that are underserved or helping people that are in real need of our assistance. Again, women who are re-entering society after being incarcerated is definitely a demographic that we can help. So, look for those community nonprofits that have a housing component with them. They are desperately looking for people like you, investors who care about impact, who care about the community, who care about providing affordable housing, and of course are looking to make some money so that they can partner with them so that they can find more and more housing, get more grant money to keep their organization afloat and also help serve you so that you can keep your business afloat. See, it's a synergy. You help them, they help you, you help them, they help you, and the circle continues. So find those community groups that you can support that have a housing initiative that will or may be able to open doors for you to receive grant money or corporate sponsorships.
And then lastly, guys, government bonds. There are huge government bonds available for companies that are wanting to solve housing problems. In fact, right now we're in application at the city of Phoenix for a $25 million bond. That would be sub-3% in interest. Where am I going to get money sub-3% anywhere in the world right now? I mean it just doesn't exist but it does if I am working in that world of government bonds. So you can apply for these. You can actually show the government how you plan to help reduce homelessness or help reduce situational housing problems where the working poor have nowhere to go or you're solving a problem of affordability in this specific sector. Whatever that is, get really specific and show how your plan is a sustainable and also real plan that can help solve a problem.
Now again guys, I am not telling any of you guys to go get any of this money and not do the right thing with it. What I'm saying to you is there's a lot of money out there. So money shouldn't be your excuse. If you're sitting here right now, you're like, "Man, I want to be involved in affordable housing. I want to do this co-living thing Jamil's been talking about, but I just don't have the money to do it." That's an excuse. There's a lot of opportunity. There's a lot of programs. There's a lot of free money available to you. All you have to do is start taking action.
So, if you want to learn more about how you can work with me, my sister, and the rest of the housing alchemy community, in the description below, there will be a link for you to fill out so that you can talk to somebody on my team so that you can come be a part of our co-living adventure. Friends, this has been a fun series. I've had a great time exploring the world of co-living with you guys. Showing you how you can get out of bad stuff and get out of bad deals, how you can make money hand over fist, how you can get great deals on property, how you can make incredible cash flow on that same property, how you can help veterans get government grants, government bonds, and really just be an overall badass in your real estate investing career. I really truly hope that you get involved in co-living and I would love to see what you guys are doing. So reach out to me. Send me a DM on Instagram. Let me know what you guys are doing in your neck of the woods. And leave me a comment if co-living has really impacted your mind, your consciousness, and if you really want to be a part of this, then let's work together. I'm Jamal Damian, and if you guys haven't already, like the video, subscribe to the channel, cuz half of you who watch this don't. So, please subscribe, leave me a comment, and I'll see you guys in the next one.
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