Travis Makes Money Make Money with a Multimillion Dollar Real Estate Portfolio | Natalie Cloutier
French-Canadian real estate investor, designer, and developer Natalie Cloutier shares how she and her husband Rob went from broke 20-year-olds in a basement condo to building 50+ rental units and a multimillion-dollar portfolio using a no-money-down build-to-rent strategy. With a background in architectural technology and a focus on new construction, Natalie has turned sweat equity and creative financing into a full-time business, and recently distilled her approach into her book, “The Build-to-Rent Strategy: A Guide to a Successful Rental Property Construction.”
On this episode we talk about:
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How Natalie and Rob built their first home and basement rental suite with essentially $0 down using sweat equity and construction financing
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The mechanics of build-to-rent/“BRRR 2.0”: Build, Rent, Refinance, Repeat—and how it differs from the traditional BRRR strategy
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What work they took on themselves vs. what they always hired out (electrical, drywall, finishes vs. structural, foundation, and plumbing)
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Why they prefer smaller infill projects like six-plexes instead of large, high-risk developments with heavy permitting costs
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How they manage leverage, cash flow targets per door, and why they’re choosing to pause, de-stress, and reassess what “enough” looks like after a decade of grinding
Top 3 Takeaways
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You do not always need 20% down to get into real estate—using construction-to-perm style loans, sweat equity, and smart design, you can create deals by building rather than competing for existing inventory.
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Staying intentionally underleveraged and focusing on real cash flow per unit is often safer than chasing maximum refinancing or unit count, especially in volatile interest-rate environments.
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Your portfolio should support your life, not the other way around; periodically pausing to evaluate stress, health, and family priorities is just as important as growing doors or equity.
Notable Quotes
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"We didn’t have money, so instead of buying someone else’s house, we built our own and used our work as the down payment."
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"BRRR 2.0 is the same idea as BRRR, but instead of ‘Buy, Renovate, Rent, Refinance, Repeat,’ it’s ‘Build, Rent, Refinance, Repeat.’"
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"It’s not about how many units you own; it’s about how much money those properties actually make and whether the grind is worth it for your life."
Connect with Natalie Cloutier:
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