Our BOOMM Success Stories showcase doctors and other healthcare professionals who have broken out of the medical mindset and expanded their life beyond the identity and traditional definition of a doctor’s life.
We want to show you that you are not alone and there exist an infinite number of variations to success, freedom and happiness.
This month’s BOOMM Success Story
is Dr. Elaine Stageberg.
This is a story about living in two entirely different worlds - and my invitation to you to see life through the lens of a world very different from the medical mindset.
When I began my training in medical school, I was a little bit older than the traditional student and I had just gotten married. Both my husband and I owned homes, so we converted my home into a rental in the post-2008 crash. We got bit by the real estate bug and decided to buy another investment property. We bought a very distressed property for $35,000, did a sweat equity rehab, and completed a cash-out refinance to get all of our money back - and then some! The start of my journey as a medical student coincided with my early experiences as a real estate investor, and that duality had such a significant impact on my mindset.
When I started out, I was by no means an entrepreneur or real estate investor. If anything, I didn’t like entrepreneurship because my father had been a struggling entrepreneur, and so I associated entrepreneurship with instability and worrying about money, whereas I associated a medical career with a high stable fixed income.
One of the many things that makes medicine very structured is there is a very clear hierarchy. While there are many positive aspects of that hierarchy in terms of patient safety, teaching, and culture, there are many negative aspects as well. The most junior person in the room could realize the wrong procedure is about to happen but might not feel empowered to speak up. There’s the negative workaholic culture that’s been passed down in medicine for generations.
At the same time, I learned that real estate investing is generally a meritocracy. Whoever gets the work done, whoever creates and brings the most value, is the one who gets ahead. There is a ruthless search for value in real estate investing; if you are the one who does the hard thing of buying property, managing renovations, doing property management, and taking on the risk of debt, you are the one that benefits. It became very clear as I was simultaneously growing as a real estate investor and going through medical school and residency that there was this whole other world that felt so much more free, open, and collaborative. Real estate investing is a joyful search for value creation and yield.
People who become physicians tend to have a constant yearning for learning and challenging themselves. That’s a characteristic I learned from my experience in medicine and what I consider to be the single greatest mindset characteristic of physicians. When I figured out that in real estate, the person who is the most creative or gets the deal done is the one who benefits, I discovered this very fun game of learning how to improve my mindset.
Typically a physician trades their time for money, whereas an entrepreneur trades their ideas, expertise, and connections for money. I wanted to know more about the entrepreneurial freedom and meritocracy of real estate investing, so I started asking how I could be around the most creative people, the people who are taking the risks, the decision makers and game changers. Through podcasts, books, masterminds and in person, I learned as much from these people as I could. It was incredible to see what’s possible and dive deep into such an empowering mindset.
I carried this new, open, empowered mindset into my work as a physician; even when there were challenges or things that are out of my control like a call schedule or difficult patient or administrative burden, I thought about ways to make it meaningful, to find value in it, to tell an empowering story. I’ve gotten that from the mindset work I’ve done as a real estate investor.
As time passed, the contrast between these two worlds became stronger–the freedom in growing my real estate and business knowledge, versus the many constraints in practicing medicine. While I carried the values-driven mindset from real estate investing into my life as a physician, I was beginning to see very clearly that real estate investing, running a business, and being an entrepreneur was the right path for me. I felt empowered by the freedom, by the control over my time, and the opportunity to create value for others.
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Elaine Stageberg, MD, MHA
Elaine Stageberg, MD, MHA is a psychiatrist, mother of 4, & Owner of Black Swan Real Estate. She owns & manages a portfolio of over $330M in assets under management. Through real estate investing, she reached financial freedom in her 30s and now helps others to do the same. Black Swan has delivered exceptional returns to hundreds of passive investors through their unique investor-focused private equity funds which enjoy no sponsor fees whatsoever, 100% return of capital to investors before any splits, and long-term returns and tax advantages, all coupled with socially conscious investing and at least 5% of profits donated to charity.
Contact Information:
507-369-8703
Calendly: https://calendly.com/elainestageberg
Facebook Group, Real Estate at Scale: https://www.facebook.com/groups/realestateatscale
Website: http://www.meetblackswan.com
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/81014287/
If you know any doctors or healthcare professionals who have broken out of their medical mindset to expand their identity, freedom and happiness and would share their successful experience, please send us their contact information to: [email protected]
