We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jasmine Willois. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jasmine below.
Alright, Jasmine thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Early in your career, how did you think through the decision of whether to start your own firm or join an established firm?
I’ve always been an entrepreneur. My first business venture started in elementary school, as far as I can remember. How I started in the private equity space plays out like a scripted journey, and my decision to start my own firm was kismet. The journey starts with my exposure to mortgage notes as an asset class, I was exposed to it from the top down. After college in my 20s I moved back to my hometown, New York City and landed my first job on Wall Street at a small boutique shop where I was sponsored to take my series 7 and became a stockbroker. Shortly afterwards I was poached by Morgan Stanley Dean Witter and worked out of the World Trade Center. Working on the inside gave me a seat at the creditors table and showed that debt was traded just like stocks and bonds. Fast forward to 2005, life had unfolded around me in a very precarious manner. September 11, 2001 helped me decide that the fast paced, high-staked lifestyle of Wall Street was not sustainable; and I moved back to San Diego to work with GMAC Homecomings (the residential funding arm of General Motors). My job title was portfolio manager responsible for loss mitigation of a 380M portfolio of mortgages underwritten and serviced by the firm. Things were going well as one can imagine, withstanding the fact that I was to be confined to a traditional 9 to 5 role. During this time, the entrepreneur in me required that I maintain my real estate license and MLO license to supplement my income. Two years later, my first child was born and there was no doubt in my mind that the current structure of corporate America would fail me as a mom. So I left being exposed to the integral and profitable side of mortgage note investing and set out to carve a piece of that out for myself and that, in a nutshell, is how and why I decided to go out on my own. Working for major players in the industry is something I highly recommend when possible before branching out on your own.
Looking back, I feel like I made the right decision because life unfolds for us all one way or the other. Being fortunate enough to ride this wave with a bit of control over my time, became a necessity for sanity once I became a mother. I still have to deal with the ups and downs of the economy everyone else endures. The fact that I carved out my space in life has proven to be very satisfying and rewarding enough to make the risk make sense. I am not vulnerable to mass layoffs, but at the same time, I have had to lay people off. In summary, I have determined that with the right guidance, the financial risks of being an entrepreneur in this space are balanced with those of being a b-suite or c-suite executive.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
Jasmine R. Willois is the Founder and President of The Note Assistance Program℠ , which offers a proven, proprietary system for educating professional investment groups, accredited investors and family offices on how to buy 1st trustee mortgages from big banks, hedge funds and credit unions.
Ms. Willois’s unique approach is predicated on her more than two decades in the fields of economics, marketing, real estate and work as a trader on Wall Street during the dot.com era. Her talents are on full display on her weekly podcast Naked Notes Podcast™ a FREE educational tool on what it takes to be a successful mortgage note investor.
Prior to founding The Note Assistance Program©, Ms. Willois worked as an equity trader and investment banker for Morgan Stanley and Dean Witter. After losing close colleagues on 911, she left the industry and worked as a loss mitigation specialist with GMAC Homecomings. Bit by the bug, Jasmine left corporate America to chase the freedom and returns of real estate investment.
By 2013 she had combined her leadership qualities, her equity trading background and her knack for real estate to create the community, affectionately known as the “NAPNATION”. This private group of beneficiaries use first position mortgage notes to access stable cash flow and execute generational wealth strategies. Her most recent move was in January of 2023, as a general partner of Eleos Capital Group where she launched a 50M regulation d fund for passive investors interested in joining in on the financial security that notes can offer.
Jasmine earned her BS in economics, a minor in Industrial Organization from California State University at Long Beach and holds a MBA in Marketing from Ashford University. A passionate advocate for responsible investing, she is an in-demand nationwide speaker and serves on the board of Alternative Wealth Investments, Engerman Estates and Hope Ranch.
When she is not busy working with mortgages, Jasmine can be found playing Texas Hold’em, spending time with her son and traveling.
We’d love to hear about you met your business partner.
Before I started my firm and in a second life, I used to run around with some of the “Gurus” in the industry. I was more than happy to be the gopher girl and shadow these guys around in my youth. During one of the events there was an older gentleman who was attending classes as a mentee. This guy ended up purchasing a note from the Guru who brokered notes to his students but provided very little if any support after the sale. Needless to say, as word got out that I was aspiring to put together a community that addressed this issue he wanted to be involved. He was able to watch me work and support the Guru for long enough to know where my values and work ethics lay so once I got the firm off the ground he approached me about working together on a much larger scale.
Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?
Entrepreneurship lends to private equity in so many ways. However, there are many aspects of entrepreneurship that do not. One of the many things that stood out to me right away was the approach and mindset one must take in order to be successful in private equity.
I found that when wearing the entrepreneur’s hat, I would constantly be on the hunt for a less expensive route or how we could cut costs to increase profitability. Simply put, that is a perilous way to live as a creditor. Paraphrased from Spiderman, “with great profit comes great responsibility.”
I had to learn to find the best quality vendors and then pay them what they requested was the way to increase profits and reduce expenses on this side. I learned to align myself with individuals that are willing to pay for things to be done right, even if it meant us taking the longer more expensive route. Mortgages are different from typical products in the sense that they have families and human beings that depend on them being treated properly.
One of the most recent stories involves a transaction we participated in with a fund through a broker. As a steward of other people’s money, it is important to get processes started sooner rather than later when dealing in the secondary mortgage market, and as best practices are applied, the buyers have agreed to record the chain of title to reflect the current sales. A year later, one of the borrowers pays off his home and is rightfully requesting the deed to his home be correctly put into his name. Now straddled with a sense of urgency, the general partner of the fund attempts to circumvent ownership and record the documents directly to the borrower. This represented a red flag to our firm and we were able to convince their counsel that taking the time and expense to record the entire chain would be in the best interest of all parties involved. As much as I understood from an entrepreneurial standpoint where this guy was coming from, I could not process that comfortably as a banker, creditor or private equity lady.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.noteassistanceprogram.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/noteassistanceprogram
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ms-jasmine-willois-mba-6056811/
- Twitter: @NPNAssistance
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@nakednotespodcast1406
Image Credits
Bauman photographers