Luisa M. Brown

I come from Peru, and in South America, after 25 years old, they usually don't hire you, so people there create all kinds of businesses. They're very creative in order to create their business, and I think that to become an entrepreneur, you have to be willing to do it - you have to try it and risk it. I'm also very creative. I love design and making the place you call home beautiful according to your liking. I love to design apartment rentals for people. I remember at the beginning when I first started doing this, I would think about the layout - if you stand here, you have the refrigerator here, you need a quick counter so you can put your groceries in there. I think my success is that I love it, that I enjoy it, and I come from a background where you have to get ahead.

You have to love what you do. You have to love what you do, because if you don't love it, you're just not gonna be into it. I love the industry, that's what I do. And keep education flowing - every year, I take a different license or certification. I took a boiler operator license to be able to help with annual inspections with boilers, so you have to make sure that you know what you're doing. I'm gonna take an insurance course because you have to bid for insurance for your property. There's different things, but my best advice, I think, is just to love what you do.

Just keep going. Do it. Do not back out. Just keep going. If you want to open a business, open it, and connect with other people, and before you know it, you're gonna be out there doing it. Do not be afraid because you're a woman, or because you're Hispanic, or whatever. I have friends from everywhere, and they're all great, and they all had the thought about having a business instead of working for somebody, because working for someone is not as easy as it looks. I think it's an achievement, and you should try and be very happy. At least you tried.

In property management, there are big agencies that try to manage multiple buildings, and they cannot answer the phone. They have too many properties, and there's not enough managers to handle all the properties. I only give my managers the properties they can efficiently handle, because things fall through the cracks - the paperwork doesn't get done, and you have to do fire prevention and other things when you do your physical inspection. To me, the managers have to be doing the proper work that they can effectively handle. I see other agencies that are constantly advertising for management, but they don't have enough managers to handle the property, and they're doing a disservice to the customer, in my opinion.

Transparency, fiduciary duty, loyalty, care, and the Code of Ethics - I think those are most important, especially fiduciary duty, loyalty, and care for your clients. Those values apply in my personal life as well, along with family.