Today we’d like to introduce you to Camilo Araujo.
Hi Camilo, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I was born and raised in a beautiful city off the Caribbean coastline, a city called Barranquilla. There are many regions of Colombia, but I was raised where the smell of guava meets the salty Caribbean breeze. There is a certain kind of passion found on the coastline. We have music that comes from a mix of many rhythms; indigenous “gaita”, Spanish “paloteo”, and African “congo” could all be heard in the streets. All of these aspects of my home culture made me into a person who enjoys diversity and connecting different ideas, someone who enjoys a good joke and has an optimistic outlook on life.
Growing up very low-income in Colombia, we always had a hunger to climb to a better financial level. This hunger gave us an entrepreneurial spirit and a willingness to try almost any start-up business in a country where the economic disparity was and still is enormous. In Barranquilla, my mom realized that, for all of her hours of hard work, the wage gap was too wide for her to be able to give us, her children, any chance at advancing. So she took it upon herself to look for another place to build her family up, and this led her to the United States. At the age of 14, I was able to join my mother in the States.
As immigrants to this country, we learned that we would have to work twice as hard to get half as far. We had the entrepreneurial spirit and good humor that our home in Colombia had given us, but now we combined that with perseverance to make something for ourselves in the U.S. This combination of adaptability and determination gave my mom the courage to transition from cleaning houses to joining the U.S. army, and right out of high school I followed in her footsteps by joining the U.S. army myself. I worked my way up to earn a slot for AIRBORNE school and become a paratrooper. During one of our training exercises jumping out of a plane, another paratrooper and I had a midair collision that could have been fatal. I suffered injuries that led me to be medically retired from the army.
Transitioning back to civilian life proved difficult, but my story is characterized by adapting and climbing again. Once I had settled in Atlanta, Georgia, I dove into a period of studying the racial disparity in the U.S. and the civil rights movements, ideas that I had never understood before. I gained a new passion: creating generational wealth among marginalized groups and giving back to my Latino community. This learning process led me into the world of real estate, and I am now happily working alongside people, helping them go from renting to owning and writing a narrative of generational wealth among those who have been historically marginalized. I want to see my people, who work much of the land in the U.S., go from working the land to owning land themselves.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My family and I have faced struggles that are common to many people in lower-income or minority groups. There are so many compounding issues that come with poverty, race, or immigration status, and my family and I have had to deal with not only the most obvious obstacles but also the underlying ones. On the surface, I have faced some of the more obvious markers of financial struggle: wondering whether dinner would come, needing to move over and over again into neighborhoods whose struggles brought with them the danger of violence and gun fights, my mother having to choose between more groceries or saving up for a better apartment. I also faced some of the more obvious markers of being an immigrant: helping my mother clean houses on the weekends, learning English for the first time as a 9th grader in Florida, and even living apart from my mother for some years while she left to the U.S. by herself to search for work. All of these obstacles my family and I worked to overcome. And we have progressed together so much.
However, even now, the underlying difficulties that came with growing up without resources continue to surface in waves. Resources are not only a matter of having more money in the bank. The constant survival mentality took a toll on my entire family and our mental and emotional health. All of the anxiety I had growing up, I never had the tools to know how to deal with those feelings or the money to pay for someone to show me how. This is also the case for my grandmother and mother. All we had time to deal with were the immediate urgencies of having a home and food and physical safety.
Even now, with all of us making enough to pay our bills, the callouses of a survival mentality can surface in how we communicate with one another. When you are an immigrant, the roadmap to financial stability is one you have to make yourself. I have struggled to know who to turn to and where to look to take the next step upwards. And all of this sums up what I mean when I say working twice as hard to get half as far. I am still working to deal with the emotional consequences of growing up to survive. But in a way, it is a sign of progress that I am dealing with these things now. To me, it means I have enough stability in my life for those subtler struggles to have room to surface.
As you know, we’re big fans of Sequoia Realty Group LLC. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
As a Realtor, I wanted to build a group of entrepreneurs that provides economic opportunities and empowers minorities through ownership to create generational wealth. The real estate industry has systemically denied access and opportunity to certain groups of people.
Through excellence and education, Sequoia Realty Group is committed to eliminating substantial barriers to wealth and homeownership for the Latino and minority families in the Atlanta metro area.
Our main focus is to cultivate relationships and support one another. Sequoia tree forests share an incredible root system that allows them to grow in close proximity to each other but also share nutrients and physically support each other.
Generosity, abundance, integrity, and gratitude are the pillars and highlights of our daily lives and interactions. While other types of trees compete to acquire sunlight, Sequoia trees support the forest and the ecosystem around it.
I also have a Youtube Channel which is called “Viviendo En Atlanta ” which in English translates to “Living In Atlanta”. I created this Channel to educate people about everything there is to know what is like living in this beautiful city, pros and cons and how to invest in real estate.
As for what I am known for, I believe that I am known to be a realtor who cares deeply about my clients and the families that I work with. I truly do care to build relationships with my clients, sharing meals with them or walking them through their wealth-building journey. I want readers to know that if they are seeking ways to expand build wealth, no matter where they are in the process, I am willing and ready to sit down with them and create a pathway. I never had anyone around me creating the pathways – I always had to carve them out myself. And from what I have learned, I want to give back and come alongside people to help them carve pathways to financial stability and home ownership. So whether readers are wanting to sell or buy the property or are looking for investment opportunities, my business is here to help.
Can you talk to us a bit about the role of luck?
I am a spiritual person, and I believe that sometimes things become connected for reasons beyond myself. I have often felt like I just stumbled into relationships, online courses, books, or concepts that have guided me in my life. Those connections are often ones that I desired but did not know how to get to, and then all of a sudden, a friend will introduce me to a stranger, or a line in a book will strike me, and it will be just what I was looking for. I think the key is recognizing those moments as important, and acting on them, leaning in to connect and learn what you can.
Pricing:
- Consultations are free
Contact Info:
- Website: Free Consultations https://calendly.com/sequoiacontactenos/30min?month=2023-08
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/viviendo_en_atlanta/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sequoiarealtygrp
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_DVvim8evjKhVqTz4n-qvA
Image Credits
Joshua Borrero.
