How a passive income teacher and real estate agent built wealth

Often these strategies focus on real estate. But most real estate investors will tell you that you can’t make money by putting in minimal effort like the internet would have you believe. Just ask Tiffanie Vendryes.

In 2015, lured by the idea of ​​generating income from buying rental properties, Vendryes, now 37, bought three units in Florida that housed up to seven tenants.

But Vendryes quickly learned the hard way that residual income isn’t all it seems at times. “I was blinded by the level of income [I could earn]and I didn’t realize that all of that would go into maintaining the property,” she says candidly.

Vendryes says she chose properties that were older, needed work and were in low-income areas. Instead of sitting back and reaping the profits, she was overwhelmed with late rent payments, evictions and expensive repairs, including a leaking roof and replacing water heaters and air conditioning. “I failed and lost money,” she admits.

But Vendryes says the experience, while harrowing, taught her important lessons that helped her build her current net worth of about $565,000. So she came back.

Play the real estate game in Florida

After graduating from Stevens Institute of Technology in 2006, Vendryes had approximately $25,000 in student loan debt, mostly thanks to grants and scholarships. She got a high-paying job in tech sales — she made between $70,000 and $130,000 in three years — and lived frugally, at times having up to three roommates. Vendryes was slowly able to start building her fortune, and by the time she turned 25, she said she had saved about $100,000.

But then the 2008 financial crisis hit and Vendryes was fired, prompting her to move south and turn her career around. “I moved to Florida and I chose education,” she says, adding that the shift from selling technology to teaching meant a significant pay cut from $100,000 to about $40,000.

But in 2010, Vendryes was able to use her savings to buy a home in Palm Beach County. Five years later, the value has increased by more than 60% – from $118,000 when Vendryes bought it to $190,000 when she sold it.

Using part of the proceeds from her home sale, Vendryes got into the real estate business in a big way, buying three investment properties during 2015 and early 2016. But luck didn’t last.

The fixer-uppers were within their budget, but they brought with them a lot of maintenance issues and quickly became money pits. Not to mention the problems with people: Vendryes says she’s had tenants fighting with each other, calling the police and calling them about their arguments – and being a landlady became a huge time-waster and an emotional drain.

“I decided that probably wasn’t the best investment strategy for me,” says Vendryes. Within six months, she unloaded the properties and sold at least one at a loss.

Creation of diverse income streams

Although Vendryes struggled to get it right with rental properties, she never gave up her day job as a teacher. And a full-time job helped her stay afloat when that other source of income wasn’t working.

It’s one of the biggest takeaways, she says: Got multiple gigs. Vendryes, now a mother to a two-year-old, got back into the rental property business in 2019 and started her own real estate agency. But she also keeps her teaching job.

It turns out that buying the rental properties has sparked Vendryes’ interest in being more than an owner. “When I bought these three properties, I sometimes felt bad because I was asking my agent too much or seeing too many things,” says Vendryes, adding that she received her own license in 2016. That way, she could look at any properties she wanted before making an offer — guilt-free. Not only that, it had the added benefit of saving her money as both a buyer and seller.

After taking some time to regroup, Vendryes bought a 2 bedroom apartment in a nicer area in 2018 with the idea of ​​eventually renting it out. A year later, it started generating revenue. This time, with stable renters and minimal drama, she’s making about $6,000 in annual rental income. Also, Vendryes does not touch most of the income. Instead, it goes into an account so if there is a maintenance issue with the apartment, the cost doesn’t come out of their daily budget. She currently has a rental property and townhouse that she owns and lives in.

Vendryes also opened her own real estate agency, Grace Realty Group, last year. She has an agent working for her. So far this year, they’ve sold $2 million worth of properties, which Vendryes says translates into approximately $38,000 in commissions for them.

And thanks to her tenure and additional responsibilities, Vendryes has increased her teaching salary to about $79,000 a year as she works as an assistant principal and correspondence high school math tutor.

Aside from the early setbacks, Vendryes says she really likes real estate and enjoys looking at houses and showing properties. “It’s important to do something you enjoy so you don’t feel like you’re doing a lot of work,” she says, adding that while her job as a teacher is flexible, she still relies on her mother juggling the real estate business, her tuition, and the duties of a landlord.

All things considered, Vendryes expects to make about $123,000 this year. With her current home value (she bought a townhouse worth over $400,000 in 2021), retirement savings, and investments, she’s looking at a net worth of over $500,000. And she has no outstanding debt.

But she’s the first to admit it was a lot of hard work. “My story was not a simple success story. I got fired from my first job. I started my apprenticeship with less than 50% of my previous salary. I made bad decisions when it came to real estate,” she says, noting that all of this has allowed her to amass wealth. “It’s about discipline and hard work and learning from my mistakes.”

Perhaps the greatest lesson? It takes haste. “It’s not really passive – everything takes work,” says Vendryes.