ASPIRE Interns Make a Difference

  • SeaChange Editorial Team

ASPIRE Interns Make a Difference

In July 2021, Windermere partnered with the University of Washington College of Built Environments (CBE) to host students enrolled in the ASPIRE internship program. ASPIRE offers financial support, mentoring, and skill building through academic and professional office settings to CBE students, with a focus on those from historically underrepresented or marginalized groups.

As part of Windermere’s commitment to increasing diversity within our industry, participating Windermere brokers and owners teamed up with the interns for eight weeks. CBE handled the academics, while Windermere provided real world learning experiences, offering platforms for learning about sales, marketing and finance in single and multi-family real estate markets. It was Windermere’s hope that participating in this program would inspire students of color to explore and seriously consider the wide variety of careers and opportunities for leadership in the real estate industry.
At the end of the eight-week journey, the students presented their work. This is what they taught us about home ownership/the real estate industry as it relates to opportunity and equity.

Student Group
Anes Trabuni, Jahlil Frans, Tony Tran

Topic
How to encourage entry of BIPOC people in real estate professions

The barriers to real estate as a profession for people of color are hidden, related to a lack of reserves and financial security, generational knowledge of the homeownership process and networks (if you don’t have anyone in your family modeling homeownership, you are less likely to pursue a path that leads to homeownership yourself — much less one of entering the real estate profession, without a source for creating a profitable database).
Disparity of wealth/financial reserves. In the United States, the average net worth of white individuals: $188,000, Hispanic individuals: $36,000 and Black individuals: $24,000.
A strictly commission-based income is scary and the ability to survive for 6 months without a reliable income stream is cost-prohibitive, especially without insufficient savings in reserve.

Proposed Solution

Offer an interest-free line of credit to help offset start-up costs such as training and supplies AND ongoing financial support and education for the first two years until income is more consistent. The loan is paid back from a portion of each commission earned.
Mentor new agents with other experienced BIPOC agents and share commissions.

Student Group

Jules Travis and Fangnuo Tao

Topic

Lack of Affordable Housing

Proposed Solution 

Urban Co-Housing

Challenges
Changing the culture to steer away from individualism and embrace the advantages of collaborative living close to public transportation and walkable amenities.
Finding creative workarounds to our current zoning restrictions that prevent building multi-family housing in single family residential areas.
Advantages of Collaborative Living: Affordability, opportunity for equity-building, multi-generational/cultural living, shared labor and resources, low-cost/no-cost childcare, community engagement/sense of belonging, smaller ecological footprint.

“I was initially a foreign language major, but decided to give real estate a chance by applying to the Windermere internship because I wanted to see what real estate was all about. After learning about the different roles that brokers, agents, property managers, developers, architects, lawyers, etc., have in the industry I decided to switch majors. I am now studying real estate and construction management. Personally, I enjoy the process of planning and creating buildings. The building process excites me the most because of all the critical thinking you have to do when it comes to making a building come to life.” – Jackelin Jimenez, ASPIRE Intern

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Student Takeaways

“I was initially a foreign language major, but decided to give real estate a chance by applying to the Windermere internship because I wanted to see what real estate was all about. After learning about the different roles that brokers, agents, property managers, developers, architects, lawyers, etc., have in the industry I decided to switch majors. I am now studying real estate and construction management. Personally, I enjoy the process of planning and creating buildings. The building process excites me the most because of all the critical thinking you have to do when it comes to making a building come to life.”

Editors Note: After listening to the presentations of the ASPIRE interns, I was deeply impressed with their focus, creativity, brilliance, and level of commitment. Windermere’s association with the College of Built Environments has renewed my pride in being a Windermere broker. Supporting the ASPIRE program means holding a new vision for the way a city is built, who builds it and how we live in it together. ASPIRE’s program manager, Alexis Wheeler, states homeownership “cultivates a sense of belonging and stability, encouraging people to grow into the fullest version of themselves and fostering vibrant communities throughout our region.” I have no doubt that these ASPIRE students will be a part of building exactly those kinds of communities.

For more about the ASPIRE program, visit https://www.windermere.com/blog/college-of-built-environments-launches-aspire-program-starting-summer-2021

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