Gina Diaz With Diaz Case Law

Intro: [00:00:03] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studio in Chicago, Illinois. It’s time for Chicago Business Radio. Brought to you by Firm Space, your private sanctuary for productivity and growth. To learn more, go to firm spacecom. Now, here’s your host.

Max Kantor: [00:00:21] Hey, everybody. And welcome back to another episode of Chicago Business Radio. I’m your host, Max Kantor. And before we get started, as always, today’s show is sponsored by Firm Space, thanks to Firm Space because without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. And we got a good one for you today. On today’s show, we have an immigration and real estate attorney located in the Chicagoland area known as Hashtag the right attorney on social media. She’s also a founding member of We Win LLC, an organization dedicated to introducing women to the world of real estate. So please welcome to the show, Gina Diaz. Welcome to the show, Gina.

Gina Diaz: [00:00:57] Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.

Max Kantor: [00:00:59] I’m excited to talk to you about everything that you’re doing. So let’s jump right in. How did you get involved with law and real estate investing?

Gina Diaz: [00:01:07] Yeah. So I’ve been working in the law field since I was 18. You know, I started off as like a secretary, then, you know, moved my way up to a paralegal and, you know, worked for a couple of big law firms and realized that I really, really liked doing this. I didn’t want to go right to law school right away because, you know, law school is not cheap. And so I wanted to make sure that it was something that I really liked and I really did. So then I went off to law school and I started actually doing criminal law and doing family law because that’s what I really thought I wanted to do. But it quickly transitioned into real estate and immigration because that’s kind of like what I kept getting asked for and kind of like what people around me were were needing. So, you know, I started doing that and then realized that I really, really love it. Like especially the real estate part. I think it’s amazing. I love everything that has to do with real estate. And I don’t know if you remember the I’m sure you remember the 2008, 2009, you know, how the market crashed and all that with the real estate.

Gina Diaz: [00:02:18] I started doing a lot of loan modifications for people and, you know, doing a lot of foreclosure defense. So that kind of drove me deeper into real estate and helped a lot of people with modifications and stay in their homes and, you know, defend their foreclosure and whatnot. So then I discovered like yet another aspect of real estate that I liked. And I’m really passionate about real estate because I think that there is so many things you can do with it. There’s just like real estate is gold to me. It’s definitely something I love and immigration is more of a personal thing to me because I am an immigrant. I came here when I was five years old, and so I understand the struggle. I understand, you know, the way things are done and the laws, immigration laws are just beyond ridiculous and it’s really hard to navigate through them. So I definitely want to help people do that if in whatever capacity I can. So that’s kind of what my practice has turned into over the past 12 years. And that’s kind of how I got involved with real estate for sure.

Max Kantor: [00:03:20] And so now you’re with Diaz Case Law. What inspired you to create your own firm and start working as an entrepreneur?

Gina Diaz: [00:03:28] Yeah, So, you know, it’s funny because I never when I started practicing law, I like having my own practice wasn’t something that I was like, Oh my God, I really want to do that. The reason why I started doing it is because the firm that I used to work for, the last one I worked for, I was doing what I loved criminal defense and family law. But a lot of people were asking me about immigration and real estate. And I, you know, had brought it up to my boss and I said, hey, I know how to do this stuff. And, you know, there’s a lot of people that want to do loan modifications right now, but, you know, they don’t want to go to like, you know, there was a lot of fraud being committed by organizations and charging people like exorbitant amount of money to do a loan modification. And, you know, I brought it up to my boss and I said, you know, can we open up like maybe a division of this? I’ll take care of it. You know, it’ll bring, you know, this much revenue. And he was like, No, I don’t want to do that. And I was like, okay, well, all right. So I kind of tabled it. But, you know, it just it just kept being brought up to me. So then I’m like, you know what? Then I’m going to have to go do it on my own. And that’s exactly what I did. I I’m also a licensed real estate broker. So I asked my real estate company at the time where I had my license, can I rent an office from here? And then I moved basically started case law from there. And within a month I opened up my own office space and like 1100 square feet office space across the street from where my real estate company was. And then it just kind of grew from there. And that’s where I’m at right now.

Max Kantor: [00:05:13] That’s very cool. You saw you had a vision for exactly what you wanted, and then you went out and you did it.

Gina Diaz: [00:05:18] Yeah, exactly. Because, you know, like I’m sure my ex-boss is kicking himself right now because he didn’t believe that, you know, it was a profitable business or like, didn’t care to even think about it. And, you know, I feel that sometimes when you really want to do something and you really believe in it and you’re really like, you know, I got to do this. Like, you got to take that step and just go out and do it. And so what if you fail? You just, you know, learn from it and you try again. And that’s kind of the mentality that I had. I was like, you know what? I’m going to do this. And if it doesn’t work, then, you know, I can always come back and work somewhere else. But I got to give it a try and it worked.

Max Kantor: [00:06:03] Now, speaking of going out and giving things a try. I feel like real estate investing or investing in properties is on such a rise now. So can you talk a little bit about some tips for those who are interested in getting involved in real estate investing or want to learn more?

Gina Diaz: [00:06:21] Yeah, for sure. So as I mentioned, I’ve been doing real estate as an attorney, you know, for over 12 years already. And I would do like the traditional, like, you know, for some home buyer, you know, maybe someone that’s buying a second home type of investing. And, you know, I did have a couple people that were investors that were doing like, you know, a lot of investing. But, you know, as even as a realtor, I never asked, how are you doing this? And I always wanted to do it because I’m like, you know, I don’t have like a 401. K to fall back on. I need I need to find a way to fall back on something. And I always knew real estate, you know, was, was definitely gold if done correctly. So I bought my building where my practice is in Berwyn now and then I’m like, Oh my God, I’m going to have to wait another ten years to, you know, get another 100,000 and buy something else. So, um, luckily enough, I stumbled upon a friend at a real estate event who I knew was also not like, you know, born into money and didn’t, you know, like have all this money to go invest. But she was doing it. So I ran into her at this real estate event and I said, Hey, you know, like, how are you doing this? Like, this is something me and my husband really want to do.

Gina Diaz: [00:07:42] But, you know, we just don’t have all the capital to do it. And she said, you don’t need any capital. And I said, What do you mean? And she goes, She gave me this flier to go to this three day event. And she said, Go to this event. I promise you’ll you’ll love it. And I said, You know, if I’m going to go to this event, and it was like Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and they’re going to come to me with like, give me $50,000, here’s a DVD and an 800 number. I’m going to bill you for it. You know, because this is you know, I’ve been to those type of events and that doesn’t work for me. She’s like, No, no, no, you’re going to love it. So I went to the Andrew Homes Building an Empire three day event. And after that first day of of hearing people that have been doing this the way they teach it, there were two people on stage. There was a it was like a 19 and 20 year old. They were personal fitness trainers and they already had four properties under their belt. And that kind of opened my eyes to like, what am I doing? Like, I got to do this, I just got to step in. So I joined the program three and a half years ago and fast forward to now, I have over a 50 property portfolio using zero of my own money just following the system that they’ve, you know, gave that they’ve developed.

Gina Diaz: [00:08:58] And I’ve been helping other people do the same because a lot of people, when we think of real estate investing, you know, and me, even as an attorney and as a realtor, I still thought like you, you got to have money that you can kind of play with. Right. To be able to do this. And it’s far from the truth if you do it the right way, if you, you know, go to the program and figure it out there, you don’t have to use your money. There’s people out there that are willing to lend you their money, either from a 401. K, an IRA, um, personal savings, whatnot. They’re not getting much interest on it right now, so they will lend you the money, obviously with a lot of paperwork and stuff that goes into it. But you that’s how you grow your portfolio. And then, you know, slowly you start using your own money. Whether you want to do a flip, whether you want to, you know, keep it and rent it, whether you want to Airbnb it, short term rentals, whatever you want to do, there’s the possibilities are endless. So I got obviously really excited about it and I started like, you know, telling my friends and telling people and, you know, then I kind of joined the group and, you know, helped them.

Gina Diaz: [00:10:08] Aside from being their attorney, I also helped them with all of their real estate closings, tons and tons of investors. We do, you know, all types of of real estate. There’s like creative financing. There’s like the regular, you know, conventional FHA loan. There’s, you know, commercial loans. There’s there’s just so much out there that anybody that really wants to do it can do it. And even if you just want to do it, like to get your feet wet and say, well, maybe I’ll just take a property and flip it like you can and there’s people out there that will help you and there’s ways to do it. So I just love the way and it worked for me. And I’m one of those people that will never recommend something that I haven’t already tried or that hasn’t, you know, worked that I know it works personally because it’s my name on the line, right? So just like when they tell me to recommend an attorney for something I don’t do, if I personally don’t know that person, I won’t recommend it because you know it’s your name on the line as well and your reputation. So, um, so that’s kind of. And then me and my best friend who’s also a part of this group, you know, we said, you know, this is this is really great for women.

Gina Diaz: [00:11:13] Like women need to start getting more involved in real estate investing because, you know, when when you go buy a house, usually you have a significant other or, you know, your mom or whoever it is that you always want their opinion. And most of the time the women are the ones that kind of make that decision because they’re like, well, this is the type of kitchen I want or this is the type of, you know, whatever I want. So why can’t they become investors? Why can’t they do it? And we create it. We win, which stands for Women, Entrepreneur, Women Investor Network. And the idea of that was to kind of like create an open space for women to come together and help each other with investing, whether it’s, you know, we have women that are general contractors, women that are electricians, plumbers, you know, things that you would normally think is, you know, it’s a man. We have women that also do this. And so we connect women with other women, and we kind of make it so that they can speak freely and, you know, just, you know, do all that they would traditionally now want to do in a open forum or get intimidated by a man. So we started doing a lot of that. We started we started right before Covid, which, you know, kind of threw us off a little because, um, you know, a lot of the in-person meetings were canceled and stuff like that.

Gina Diaz: [00:12:36] We were doing in-person meetings like once a month where we would have free seminars on real estate investing and how you can get started and how we can help you. And then we started obviously doing them virtually. And then because of the pandemic and everything that happened, we then created a non-for-profit called We Win Non-for-profit. And what we did is we basically hit up all of the investors and said, Listen, you are investing in this neighborhood, so you have an interest to make sure people in this neighborhood are good. You have an interest to make sure, you know, like houses don’t go in foreclosure. You have an interest to keep this neighborhood. Right. Because it’ll increase your property values, too. So we’re going to this neighborhood and we’re going to give out, you know, food or, you know, jackets or help them pay their first month rent, whatever it could be. We’re going to go out there and help people, but we need you guys to donate. So then, you know, investors were like, Yeah, sure. And we started collecting donations from investors and going into different neighborhoods to do food drives, toy drives, turkey drives. We would give grants for women that wanted to like start investing so they can put their their earnest money down. We would give grants to people that couldn’t pay their rent, you know, and to help them through or help them pay an electricity bill or whatnot.

Gina Diaz: [00:14:00] And this was all because we this was all sponsored by the investors, not like, you know, private money or we didn’t hit up like companies or anything. It was all investor based. And so we now we kind of keep it going. You know, we do 2 or 3 events like that on a year to keep it going, to help others to make sure that you’re not just an investor taking from the community. You also need to give to the community. Because a lot of times I think when people think of, you know, investors, they always think like, well, they’re just they just want to take advantage of an opportunity and make money on it, which is not necessarily the truth, but at least not not all of them. We also need to get back to it and to make sure that that community, that neighborhood is is beautified and you know that our property values stay and stuff like that and help out people. You know, we can’t it can’t always just be about you. So when I say real estate really opens up a lot of opportunities, you know, just out of one conversation, all this happened and taking action, you know, and realizing that, hey, if if someone that’s been doing it for a long time that has all this to prove it is trying to coach me, then I’m going to listen.

Gina Diaz: [00:15:15] But if someone who is trying to coach me virtually and, you know, has done it in a different state and wants all this money, maybe, maybe. Let me let me think about that, because nothing’s better than the people that are doing it in the neighborhood. You want to do it. And that’s kind of what we teach and what we help people do, especially women, so that they can get their foot in the door and get started. Because a lot of people don’t have, you know, a fall back plan or maybe living paycheck to paycheck. And then you realize that, hey, you could be doing this, too. And, you know, a lot of our real estate investors have a regular 9 to 5, and then they do this on the side on the weekends. It’s totally possible. Like real estate is your own schedule. You do what you want to do as much as you want to do. And make as much as you want to make. So that’s kind of like how we are doing it and how I’m doing it and why I love it so much and helping obviously my investor colleagues like closing their deals and making sure they get the right deal and helping them negotiate. It is another aspect that I do as the attorney.

Max Kantor: [00:16:28] Yeah, I mean, totally. It sounds like you guys are doing a lot of great work for the community and educating the community about the world of real estate and how they can become successful in it, similar to how you became successful in it. So if people want to learn more about case law, want to learn maybe more about you and we win. Do you have a website, social media where they can get in touch?

Gina Diaz: [00:16:52] Yeah, for sure. So my social media is just add ideas for Facebook and my website is com. Um, so they can always, you know, find my information there and either send me an email or call me. And I always put my cell phone number on everything because investing is a 24 over seven. Real estate is a 24 seven type of industry. So I don’t want someone to like lose a deal because they couldn’t get a hold of the attorney, you know, on a Sunday at 5:00. So I always give my cell phone number to my clients. And, you know, just I always tell them, be respectful. Don’t call me on a Sunday at 8:00 because you want to know, you know, what’s going on with your case. Let’s let’s wait till Monday. But if it’s something urgent like you’re about to get this deal, and unless you sign this contract right now, you know you’re not going to get it. Please call me and we’ll get it done together. So I’m very available for people. And obviously I’m not the only attorney in my office. We have other attorneys and a full staff and we help with all types of deals, whether it’s traditional closings, creative financing, wholesaling assignments, you name it, we can help you with it.

Max Kantor: [00:18:06] Definitely. Well, Gina, thank you so much for being on the show today. I mean, you guys are doing great work and you’re very passionate about what what you do. So I appreciate you being on the show today and talking about everything you’re doing for the community.

Gina Diaz: [00:18:18] Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Max Kantor: [00:18:21] And thanks to you for listening to another episode of Chicago Business Radio. I’m your host, Max Kanter, and we’ll see you next time.

Intro: [00:18:30] This episode of Chicago Business Radio has been brought to you by Firm space, your private sanctuary for productivity and growth. To learn more, go to firm Space.com.