Unlocking Real Estate for All

Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in real estate but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Lashon Byrd, CEO of Byrd Estates, located in Cleveland, Ohio, USA.

What's your business, and who are your customers?

My business is Byrd Estates, a real estate technology company that's joining the innovation of real estate investment and making it accessible to everyone, not just accredited investors. My customers consist of drug addicts and blue-collar workers! Haha, I am just joking. It's just your everyday people looking for a place to live and indirectly sponsoring, making this typically private class asset available to everyone.

Tell us about yourself

I'm what would be considered a multi-potentiality. Reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad, and Cashflow Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki inspired me to become an entrepreneur. The risk, reward ratio is what life is all about! To live is to risk it all! But more importantly, the potential to benefit society while providing you financial freedom is the essence of entrepreneurship. This particular business aligned with my passion for technology, interest in architecture, and lucrative potential, which got me started on it initially. What motivates me each day to do what I do with the business and outside of it is to advance our civilization in a few quadrants: technology, knowledge, and culture. An over-arching ambition I've had for nearly a decade.

What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?

As a business owner, my biggest accomplishment is probably winning a Global recognition award. It was totally unexpected and made me feel a sense of pride and success as an entrepreneur, and I'm unsure of any other type of recognition in the field that could be replicated or substituted.

What's one of the hardest things that comes with being a business owner?

Oh man, there are many, many hard things that come with being a business owner in multiple ways! But hands down, I'd say one of the hardest is maintaining steady, or constantly increasing, growing profitability. There are simply too many factors and hypotheticals to account for; it could drive one crazy! But hey, that's why you have a team, right? Haha

What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?

Make sure it aligns with your passion(s) and the product or service you're offering you're too passionate about. Otherwise, what's there to fight for?
Shake them off; you're doing something that diverges from the social norm; they'll all tell you just to get a normal job or take some other safe route. Don't listen to them; why listen to them? They're not someone you want to be anyway. Take their naysaying as a testament to you on the path of greatness, as the path to mediocrity is silent, while the path to success makes a f@#k ton of noise.
Service to society first, money second. Don't get caught in the trap of worrying about your salary from the company before you offer a tangibly great amount of value to the market through your product or service; your dividends (haha) will inevitably follow suit!