In today’s episode, we’ll explore the incredible twists and turns of her storied life, taking her from country NSW to New York City. Plus, how she’s managed to be her own boss for nearly thirty years!  

[21:00] there was nothing really that I didn't think that I could do. I wanted to leave home, so I left. I wanted to go to the US, So I did. I wanted to work in nightclubs, so I did. I wanted to model so I did. And we just kind of like made the decision. And then I'd figure out how to do it.

 

This is Property Investory where we talk to successful property investors to find out more about their stories, mindset and strategies.

I’m Tyrone Shum and in this episode we’re speaking with Ludwina Dautovic, founder of the Room Xchange. We’ll talk about the incredible twists and turns of her storied life, taking her from country NSW to New York City. Plus, how she’s managed to be her own boss for nearly thirty years and filling a gap to solve the Australia housing crisis.

 

Dautovic has already had some career. She’s worked around the world in nightclubs, founded multiple companies, worked in TV production and hosted a record-breaking podcast. Her latest endeavour The Room Xchange was created to solve the problem of Australia’s housing crisis. There's over 13.5 million  unused spare bedrooms in 10 million homes across the country. It’s Australia's first verified house sharing platform and is already a multi award winning company as an Australian Small Business Award finalist in 2019. Unsurprisingly, Dautovic’s typical day is never the same.

[6:58] I think we're still at the moment because of post COVID, we lost a couple of years in COVID. So, as you can imagine no one was opening up the front doors to House Share at that time. So, in a way we’ve had to go back to sort of like the starting phase, but not the startup phase, if that makes sense. We had to rebuild the data, rebuild the brand and make it more compatible with what's happening now. So, there's still a bit of having to do the mundane and day-to-day things of marketing and social to then having to make business decisions about ell finances and targets and data and all the things that go along with having shareholders and the challenges that you have as a leader and CEO. 

[7:43] But when you still have a pretty small team, we've all sort of got a few multilayers in terms of what we do. But I would say that, generally, there's at least a couple of interviews a week, I get a lot of media, which has been wonderful. But we've come at a time where something like the Room Xchange is really needed, because we're in a rental crisis. So there's a lot of conversations that I'm having around that have my own podcast show as well as the interviewing there. So, it's usually about three or four interviews a week all up communicating with my advisors. And I'm talking a lot with government at the moment, we've made some major inroads with the treasurer of Victoria and various different aspects of government to put submissions in next year for the budget to get some regional areas piloted, as in specific geographical test ranges for the room exchange. That's been great. 

[8:39] A lot of networking.  Well, at least one networking event we'd like to get out. I do a lot of networking on LinkedIn too. I have to say, I think I've pretty well nailed that one. But there is a key to anyone is listening, if you just send out cold messages, and you expect me to respond, it's not going to happen. You've got to have a bit of love, a bit of connection, a bit of care around that. And if you do that, well then that comes out. So it's a cross section of things, but I'm very regimented in my day. I know from this side of my day, exactly what I'm going to be doing that day, but also the big things that I want to accomplish through the week. And I'm very calendar driven. So, if there's something where I need a chunk of time to put a document or proposal together, there's two hours that actually get wiped out in my calendar, so no one can come in and book a call and take my time for me. I'm also very aware of when I'm at my most alert, and when I'm not and so I I categorize my activity throughout the day, depending on that. A couple of days I go into Footscray.  I've now got an office in there that I can go to a couple of days a week at the cotton mills which is amazing. So just gets me out of the house. But mostly I work from home because I do like the convenience of it and I've always done it and I manage the separation of home and business very well. So I don't find it a difficult thing to do. But I do like to get out sometimes as well. It's good for my mind.

As busy and varied as Dautovic’s days are now, her road to get here is just as unique. 

[10:31] I grew up in a little country town, in New South Wales, little as in 500 people, like really little.

[10:45] It was an interesting upbringing. My brother and I were the only coloured kids in town. And I say that, because that's how we were referred to, plus a whole lot of other things. So my upbringing, it's very small town with— I've been talking a lot about it this week so I've actually been reflecting a lot on it. It was a very unusual upbringing. I wasn't raised with my Indian culture, I had a wonderful mother and wonderful stepfather, both white parents and my brother Tony and I. it was just kind of,it was an upbringing where the parents did the best that they could with the resources that they had. 

[11:18] But it was part of that time when I don't think there was a real recognition of the importance of culture, particularly when you come from a different environment. So I was always kind of on the defensive as a kid, constantly afraid, very wary, very shy, very quiet, which is really interesting, considering you who I became after I left home. But I think that's probably why music was my thing as a kid. I loved music, classical music, and I played a bunch of instruments and wanted to get into music conservatory. But it wasn't on the cards for me. So I finished school at the end of year 10, which you could do back then, because I started school early. I was only 15 and started working in a supermarket. But I started modeling when I was about 10. So I've always done some kind of work, there's always been something that I've always done in some kind of performance as well, particularly with the music. 

Dautovic’s upbringing was full of interesting experiences which have shaped her into the woman she is today. However, looking back, some were definitely better than others. 

[12:21]  I think that sort of helped me to sort of come out of myself a little bit and had some kind of ownership of self. But beyond that, there was a lot of insecurity, a lot of confusion. And just kind of just going day by day really close with my siblings, there’s a great relationship there, lots of love in the house. But just a very unusual town. A very unusual town. I go back now and it's like when I see some of the kids that used to give me a really hard time. Thankfully, they've come back, and they've recognized the error of their ways. But at the time, when you're very young, the impact can actually be quite devastating and harsh. I don't know if you've experienced that. Where you grew up if you experienced a similar thing. And it's still interesting. Even up until just a couple of weeks ago, I experienced something which wasn't a direct form of racism, but it was indirectly, and I'm a little slow on the uptake. Sometimes I don't know if you are, but I go away and then I went "I think she was just actually being racist." And sometimes it can just be kind of really subdued and subtle. And I was just like, ‘Oh, gosh, the poor thing. She didn't even know what she did.’ And I kind of had empathy for her because at that stage, It just doesn't faze me anymore. But it's just interesting how it's kind of those little heat buttons I call them. They say, ‘Oh, where did that come from?’ That was from there, from back home

For Dautovic, the mixed bag of childhood was left in the past quickly. Her sense of adventure was just too strong. 

[17:53] I was 16 when I left home. I had $200 in my pocket and a place to stay for a couple of weeks. [18:03] I wonder often if it's because I was a firstborn, and also too with the challenges that we face because of my childhood story, if that actually created this level of self sufficiency and inner strength within myself.  I look at all experiences, whether they're good or bad, and the the impact that they have. The impact can be good, even though it was a bad experience, right?  And I can see that a lot of that has given me the ability to just be able to decide and do things for myself. I think the decision of leaving home when I was 16 was a key turning point in my life. Because if I had the courage to do that, that was also my first big reference point is the way that I actually language it. So anything sort of beyond that there was like, ‘If I can do that, then I can do this!’ 

Ludwina Dautovic   

[18:52] And then obviously, the next reference point became bigger and it became bigger, and I sort of went on from there. So, I went to Sydney and I had somewhere to stay in Cronulla. And then I got a job at McDonald's just to do something. And then I went to some modeling agencies and started getting some work and then I started working in the hospitality industry. And that was another huge turning point, because at the age of 17, and I know that I was underage, but ‘hoo, ha, it was the 80s.’ I was working in a nightclub in Sydney, it no longer exists now. But at the time, in the 80s, it was where all the big celebrities used to come. And because of my personality type, I was put in charge of looking after them. And what I mean by that is because I grew up in a little country town and probably only saw three movies before I left, I hadn't had this kind of like big worldview. I was like 'oh you're a person, if you're going to be nice to me, I'll be nice to you and if you're not I won't.’ So I wasn't fazed by the celebrity, there were no mobile phones or social media or anything back then. It was just I just enjoyed their company and they enjoyed mine. And so I had the opportunity to spend a lot of time with very successful people. 

Duatovic started to hone her business skills on some of the world’s most fascinating people in the most exotic places. But in her mind, it was just work, and in a way they were just customers. 

[20:18] I was also very good at sales, I was able to get people to spend a lot of money, I used to make a lot of money and tips. And then when I was 19, I went to the US and I spent a good six months in New York, around this circle of people as well. So I was just keen on the level of confidence that I created by being in the company. Look, I don't think I was consciously aware of it at the time Tyrone, but sort of looking back as I get  asked these questions, it's like, ‘Yeah, I think that was that sort of making connections.’ And, as a result of it there was nothing really that I didn't think that I could do. I wanted to leave home, so I left. I wanted to go to the US, so I did. I wanted to work in nightclubs, so I did. I wanted to model, so I did. And we just kind of like made the decision. And then I'd figure out how to do it. So I have this same friend of mine— Chris said it and he's given me permission to write a book using the title and I've bought the URL. ‘Just say yes, and figure it out later. That's kind of my motto. So I decide what it is that I want to do and then I'll work out how to make that happen, as opposed to realising that I don't have the resources to do it. 

Every job has it’s perks, but some jobs are on another level. Dautovic’s nightclub career seemed to have it all. 

[22:29] I worked in again, the coolest bar in New York at the time in Manhattan. 95% of the patrons were celebrities.

[24:16] You'd remember George Michael? Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah, he was a mate. Yeah, spent a bit of time with George. Mel Gibson used to hang out at the cauldron quite a lot. Crazy Crazy man. That one.

[24:49] Look, he had a bungalow in Clovelly, which, at the time, we lived in Clovelly. So my housemate and I, he would come to the Cauldren when he came to Australia. I always knew everyone that came to the place, but meeting celebrities at the time in their life where they hit their peak is really quite interesting. And that happened. At the time I met Mel and his wife, he was coming with his wife as well. George Michael was just on the cusp of coming out. So he was just sort of moving away from wham at the time. I met Andrew originally once as well. But you know, Julian Lennon. The first celebrities I met were Daryl Hall and John Oates. I had no idea who they were and I'll never forget it because my boss said to me, ‘you’ve got country written all over your face.’ And I was like, ‘Okay, I don't know who Hall and Oates are. ‘So I've got three records, Charles. But yeah, when I met Julian Lennon that was actually quite significant. And that's where I met my friend Carmine. Carmine was also the musical director for David Bowie and all of Rod Stewart's tours. And then Carlos Alomar, who wrote all of almost David Bowie's lead guitar riffs. I've met him when he was touring with Bowie. So  it was kind of that era.

[26:28] Look, I just enjoyed their company and they enjoyed mine. And I learned a lot from it, and I have lots of great stories. And my kids go Yeah, and I know that they tell their mates and my brothers, because I was able to get my brother's a lot of backstage passes and go to concerts and stuff like that. So, when we're all sitting around the fire in a country town, around the big bonfire, having drinks with all their mates and go, ‘Yeah, my sister got me into this concert.’ And you know, it's kind of all that. So it's fun.

At this point you might be wondering just how Dautovic got into the business world, let alone the world of property. It’s a transition that was unexpected for everyone, but at the same time made perfect sense. 

[0:37] I guess, in a nutshell, is apart from working in hospitality in my early years, I've actually been working for myself for 28 years. So I've never had a day job. I think I would be classified as unemployable. And I just love the idea of creating a concept, seeing if there's a market for it, testing it, developing it, and then selling it. So I really like that creative process. I think it fosters the creativity part of myself, but I also love the tech side of it, because I'm quite analytical as well. So it sort of feeds both sides of who I am.

[1:37] When I first started, there was no internet, no mobile, no digital. So it was all back in the analog days. And after I had both of my children, I was 27 when I had my second one. So my late 20s, I decided I wanted to make a TV show, just out of the blue, like why not. And I had no experience in production. I left school at 15, left home at 16. I just had a lot of hutzpah and gumption and just decided it's what I wanted to do. But what I did have was the ability to ignite my vision in a way that other people would come along for the journey. And then I would find the people that had the skills that I needed to be able to fulfill that vision. And so that was really the first key moment that I realized I had that ability. And then from then on, you know, TV production and video production was a big part of my early career, I had quite a lot of successes with that, particularly in a program where I was sponsored by Apple and Optus to run the program in schools that ended up running in over 300 schools in Adelaide, Brisbane and Melbourne over a period of about five years. So that was pretty phenomenal. That was called Media Minds, again that was back before digital came in. 

[2:54] And teachers had to teach media in grade five and six, but they weren't actually learning how to teach media at university. So I came in and I essentially created a program that covered up all of the curriculum standard framework for media. And it was a wonderful experience for the kids. So that was an interesting, next part of that journey. And then of course, digital came in. And then at that point, I was in my early 30s, mid 30s maybe. And I was going through quite a lot of personal changes and growth in my life. And that was at the time when life coaching became a thing in Australia when it first became released. And from there, I thought yeah, this is something that I'm going to do next. And so I went into that ended up then utilizing that skill and my previous business and marketing abilities to then worked with women in business. So women and business back then was just a newly starting phenomenon, I guess. 

While everyone has challenges to overcome to reach their goals, usually the hardest obstacles are outside of the mirror. Dautovic was faced with a different kind of fight. 

[3:56] You kind of have to remember that when I first became a mother, the conversations were, should you be working outside of the home. And so as women started to develop businesses for themselves from home, particularly, there was a lot of my skills that I had learned with juggling children as well as my businesses, I was able to support them. So then I started a national women's events company, as you do, to get clients in and that was an amazing experience. We had networking events running around the country. And then cancer became part of my journey at about five years into that, which I'm now 12 years cancer free. So I'll just say that but I don't mean to be flippant about it, but that's another conversation in and of itself, but I was only 44 at the time and when that occurred, I spent three, four years having surgeries. It was kidney cancer, I lost my kidney but then had to have a few repair surgeries as well. 

[4:59] In that time I had a lot of rest time. And in that rest time, I love learning. So I started to learn a lot about tech, because Tech was just coming in. And I also wanted to do something that would help to keep my business brand alive that didn't require me to look good, feel good or go anywhere. So I started podcasting in 2010, I did my first audio podcast. And that was back in the days when I had to teach people how to download a podcast on iTunes, hit number one half dozen times, I think I've got screengrabs of it for evidence and new and noteworthy. And then people started asking me, well, you know, how do you do it? Can you teach me? And then I started to realize, you know, if I hear something three or more times, it's possibly something in it. So I created a podcast masterclass, then I had to have another surgery, and then I wrote a book on digital marketing. And the following year, I had to have another surgery. So launched that book in digital and print worldwide. And then after that, I started to pick up and then started working alongside some pretty significant people in the tech space. My reputation through interviewing leaders in the tech industry, through the podcast, opened up a big platform for me and doors, as I imagined it says for you as well, definitely. And the knowledge that I gained, and plus the connections and the relationships, then started to really develop my mind in ways that I had never really thought of before, and led me more into then started to invest in tech, and then work within tech companies as an advisor.

In our last conversation with Dautovic, we explored her journey from country NSW to New York City. This journey involved a lot of bar work and celebrity encounters. Now, let’s delve into how she transitioned into the business world and developed the necessary skills.

 

[1:54] We had a bit of an unusual lifestyle, because we made the choice to home-school my kids as well. So, and this is back before digital and tech and everything. So, the main reason why I ended up becoming self-employed was so that I could work and be at home with my kids. And then my kids ended up getting quite involved in the production company that I had and interestingly, my son became very interested in that sort of career and that's where he's heading now in his life. And my daughter was probably more like very tunnel vision, and she sort of like want to study one thing each year. Whether it was flowers, or signs, or cooking, or makeup, or whatever. And then we just have this interesting concept of this is what she was studying this year. And she's very driven, very single focused.

 

[2:50] And, you know, she's 28 and has ridden a motorbike halfway around Australia on her own. She's a life model, which is what she does. She models for artists. She also does some work in the medical field helping doctors with testing. And then my son works in film. He's a very traditionalist when it comes to film, like traditional film and shooting on film. And so, a lot of the learning that I did was also kind of integrated in their learning and then they would incorporate their education [with] what I was doing in business. So, they learned a lot about business as well when they were younger. And a lot of the soft skills and practical skills [such as] learn[ing] how to drive a manual car and learn[ing] how to travel and budget and those kinds of things that I think are really important that the kids do learn. So, really just our household was just about learning. It was always a learning environment. So, that just became part of it.

 

Even after being her own boss for nearly thirty years, Dautovic is still learning.

 

[4:25] I recently, as in a few years ago, I did the Clifton Strengths report, and I highly recommend it for anyone. My corporate coach at the time, or I still work with her, she recommended I do it and one of my top five strengths is a learner. And it was really interesting to know that my number one strength is achievement. So, I was like how can that be a strength? And I was like, wow, that's why I feel so good every time I achieve something even if it's small or big or whatever. They really energise, like really energise me. If I had a big gong in this house, it would get whacked every time. Relater, so obviously with people. And maximiser and communication. And they are my five strengths.

 

[5:14] So, it's actually really good to see it in that way and to understand myself in that, as long as I'm doing these things, I feel fulfilled in my life. And when I don't, then I go back to it. It's like, okay, ‘what can I do today just to achieve something? Even if it's small, just to pick me up a bit. What's something that I can learn and study? Is there a piece of art I can finish?’ So, I feel like I've completed and achieved something or things like that. So, learning, just always, and still to this day, it's just always a part of our household even now that my kids have moved on. But they're always learning something, which I really love to see. The nature of learning for them has become embedded in their life. It's not something that okay, they learned when they went to school and then they stop learning after, [no] they continually are learning.

 

 

When making the decision to home-school her children, Dautovic made sure that she stuck to the curriculum while also incorporating some natural curiosity.

 

[6:34] There were a few assumptions that I made. First one is that they may not always want to be home-schooled. So, if they did want to go back to school at some point, then what would be most important [is] that they were at least up to speed in terms of the yearly curriculum that they will be put into. So, maths was something that they had to every year. We made sure they're on top of that, but they'd get a year of maths done in three or four months for that year. So, that didn't take much for them. The rest of it was incorporated a lot in curiosity and just learning whatever they wanted through play. Children [and] adult as well, we learn through play, right? Games, but just in just play in normal life. Like when I think about my art, like the amount of constant decision making that happens every time I'm painting [and] every time I put my brush onto the canvas, there's a decision that's being made. The colours that I'm choosing, the composition that I'm deciding on, even firstly just figuring out what it is that I want to paint, where's that going to sit on the canvas. This is a constant flow of decision making, all the time that goes into that, and I'm playing when I'm painting, right?

 

[7:56] When I'm having a conversation with someone, to me that's playing. So, I love these back and forth [and could] probably do it with you all day to be quite honest, Tyrone. I love the questions that you're asking me. So, with the kids, it's like, well, what do you want to do? Like I said for Tiana, she'd just pick a topic and then you get out there, go to the library, then go to have conversations with people. We'd find people who were experts in that field, they'd get mentored by them, they had books that they would read — which is kind of like how would an adult go and learn something — and that's how they would go and learn, right? And so, some of the work, some of the sciences and writing maybe was a little more structured, but both of my kids are gonna always have a huge passion for reading and writing. So, that was just something that they did as long as they were reading, then the writing just would flow from that. And we also were part of a very big home-school network.

 

This home-school network hosted a variety of activities that allowed for the children to apply their learned skills.

 

[9:05] Sometimes we had circus days, or sometimes they would go to a university and a chemistry professor would put on a day's workshop for our kids and we'd go — there's all these resources that are available to us everywhere. Even more so now because of the internet. But essentially, it's just looking at what are the resources around you? Well your children needs to be balanced. Socialisation, of course, is one of them. Let me just say that every school holidays, every time after school and on the weekends, we had kids at our house all the time from the kids in the street, or the kids would be with a home-school network. We do that one day a week, then we'd have family camps three [or] four times a year. But there was a whole lot going on all the time.

 

[9:45] Something that you have to think about but then, you know, you can choose a very structured environment like school at home, or you can choose a bit more of a natural learning kind of approach. But it's always in the back of your mind thinking well if they do want to get back to school, which my son did — he did year 11 and 12 — and then my daughter did year 10 for a couple of terms and then just found it very noisy and frustrating, so she stopped. But my son went to university as a mature age student. Tiana's self-employed. What do you want to do kids. You and I could go to university now, just by some, if we pass an entry test we could go to uni. So, there's always different ways to do things but you have to definitely cultivate your lifestyle around it as a parent.

 

Moving towards the property side of Dautovic’s journey, let’s hear about how she created The Room Xchange.

 

[11:16] We always had this thing about living within our means. You know, we'd have a house where the rooms were occupied, we wouldn't have houses where rooms wouldn't [be occupied] because you'd be paying for them, right? So, you know, our first house was a two bedroom, single front terrace in Richmond. And then our second house, we renovated [and] sold that and we had one child at the time, and then I got pregnant. So, I went to, you know, a slightly bigger place with a yard. We bought a place in Newport in Melbourne [which was] a big corner block with three bedrooms and [it had] several fruit trees. That was awesome [with a] big backyard. One of the rooms was used as an office, we had our room and then the kid shared room until they were nine and eleven. And then we thought, well, we need something a little bit bigger. So, then we realised that, you know, the backyard was big enough, we could probably subdivide. And so, I did a bunch of research and my husband and I had this kind of interesting conversation around it. He said, ‘well, how are we gonna build a house?’ You know, because we were just young and starting out, we didn't have a lot of money. And I said, ‘well, look, if I can figure out how to build a house with no money, can we do it?’ He said, ‘yeah, go for it’, and I figured it out. So, I'd say yes, and figure it out later, right?

 

[12:20] And so we built this gorgeous house, which we still own, and we rent that out. And we rent where we live in Wayne's Landing. And so, we went from there and then we decided to rent after that. And that was a very specific decision because the house that we grew up [and] raised the kids in was feeling smaller as they were getting bigger. And my husband started working from home or wanting to start working from home as well. So, we needed more space. So, we went to that and then we rented our next place. And then when my son left home, and this was really interesting. So, he was 22 when he first left home and when I started seeing that spare bedroom in the house that we were renting empty, I started seeing it as a cost centre. And I don't think that we look at spacing housing in that way. Now there are options. You can do Airbnb, which we did for a year and it was a heck of a lot of work for 50 bucks a night. But I love the experience of having rent random people coming into our house and experiencing the variety of people that came, but I didn't like the four hours it took to get the entire house hotel ready, right? So, it is a lot of work. It's a lot of work. But, you know, thanks to Airbnb, it was the beginning of something.  

 

From here, Dautovic continued to have guests in her spare room.

 

[13:37] My daughter had a friend who was travelling, and we were doing some renovations on a rental property. He needed somewhere to stay, and I said, ‘Look, why don’t you help Harry do some painting and then you can live with us? And we'll feed you and house you. Just help him out on the weekends. Just eight hours over the weekend, and then we’ll feed and house you’. And so, that happened and then over the course of the next few years, Tiana's random friends came and it just kept happening. And it got to a point where I wasn't doing any, well, barely any housework. I just cooked and they helped us out throughout the day, and we'd feed and house them. And then some of my friends started saying, ‘well, you know, can we find someone?’ And then again, when I heard that three times, it was like, really might be something here. And that's when we did the research. And then Harry said, ‘I think this is a potential to be a global platform’. And I went ‘I think it does to’, and he said ‘good, you're the tech person, you do it’. And that's kind of when it when it started from there.

 

The business had a focus on different ways to use spaces within your home.

 

[14:47] That room is costing you whether you're renting or whether you have a mortgage. If you would have had a commercial property, you wouldn't have space that you didn't need because it would cost you money and it would affect your, you know, your profit. So, why do we do that with our homes? And we just have tend to have gone through this phase over the last 10 years where, let's just get all the space that we can and let's have the theatre room and the rumpus room and the, you know, the triple garage or wherever else that we have — but there's only two people and maybe one baby on the way. And that's like, what? Yeah, that's crazy. And so, it's like, well, what if that room could be, you know, in the early days it was really about just using the room to get help at home but then post COVID, we've tweaked our model and now we've realised that, you know, because it’s the first time ever that there's been a rental crisis in the 30 years that I've been in property, this is the first time that we have a rental crisis. How in the heck did that happen? I don't know. But there are 13.5 million unused spare bedrooms in 10 million homes across Australia. That is existing housing stock, Tyrone. It's infrastructure. It's there. Now, they just so happen to be in homes where people live, who don't typically see themselves as a flatmate. So, it's not about flatmates. It's not about individuals coming together and renting a house together because mind you, there's very few of them available at the moment.

 

[16:14] This is about people who live in a home that — most of ours are homeowners — they bought the home, they've got all this stuff in the house, they're feeling a little insecure about oh yeah, I've never thought about renting it because I don't know who I'm going to get. So, our platform, what we've done is we've provided all the security and the confidence for homeowners to go, well, every user has to have a digital ID by Australia Post and we've integrated that through an API in our technology, we cover the cost of that. They’ve got to provide a government ID, photo ID, it has to match the information on the profile. If it doesn't, they can't connect with anyone. Everybody has to do that. Profiles make it easy for compatibility. So, you want to feel like for you, Tyrone, if you want to feel whatever your personality and your partner's personality type is like, you want to feel like you can come home and still be that right? So, you don't feel like you have to change in the company of the other person that is there, and vice versa. So, profiles make it easy to be matched based on personality values and lifestyle. So, you feel like you're coming home to a friend and that person then adds value to your life. It doesn't remove from it, right? And then the third thing is that you can choose a traditional rental model. Mind you, a spare bedrooms worth $10,000 t0 $12,000 annually in rent, or up to 300 hours of household help, which we call rent offset.

 

[17:31] So, you can choose rent or rent offset, or a mix of both. It's completely up to you. So, to give you an example of how it might work, my daughter has just left home for the fifth time. And now, you know, the bedroom — it's a master, we have two master bedrooms in our house upstairs. We have one obviously and the other one was hers — And so it's a very, very large bedroom, fully furnished with an ensuite, and a walk in robe. And then there's a second living room upstairs as well. And so, we're renting that for $250 a week. Now, whoever rents it, if they're happy to help me out two hours a week to sell a bunch of stuff on Facebook marketplace, I'll knock off $50 a week rent. A rent off set, right? So, think about it. You know, if they're happy to — this is above what they would normally contribute as a housemate. So, obviously everyone contributes to cooking and general cleaning around the house and things like that but if on the Saturday, if my housemate and Harry and I are all doing, you know, two hours each of the big clean each week, we might say, ‘well look, if you're happy to do the whole six hours, take off the two hours you normally do and that four hours will offset on the rent’. You know, you can negotiate that. So, they're happy to do that and they can save money, and we're happy because we get more time back.

 

Cleaning is not the only way that housemates can offset their rent.

 

[19:19] You might need your kids dropped off to school in the morning, or maybe picked up in the afternoon. Or perhaps you and your partner want to go out on a Saturday night, you'd have to then go and arrange a babysitter. Or maybe you're going on holidays, you'd have to arrange a house sitter because the person already knows your house and your pets and, you know, there are so many benefits to it. And the culture, the language, the food that they bring, the stories that, you know. I love my husband, but 30 years of marriage and conversations can be kind of the same. So, it's nice having a third person there who wants to talk about something else, you know, without having been an arranged dinner party or something. You know, it's just our kids are the stories of, you know, all these people that have come and lived and shared their life with us. One of our tag lines is sharing resources and sharing lives one room at a time.

 

What is the difference between this living arrangement, a traditional share house scenario, or even couch surfing?

 

[20:25] It's mid to long term. So, this isn't about short term stays. Although, you know, I'm happy to have someone just come for a month if they just need it for a month. In fact, with all the things that are going on with the flooding at the moment, I'm just about to put a call out if anyone needs, you know, emergency accommodation for, you know, a few weeks while they get their stuff sorted out, they can come and stay at my place. Or, you know, the longest we had somebody here I think was two years. We had someone who lived with us for two years, he was French Canadian [and] he was amazing. He just loved everything all being organised and tidy. Every single cupboard in my house was like, everything was perfectly folded. My husband's garage, I've never seen it like that since. But he just went in and completely organised it.

 

[21:19] But everybody brings something different. And I did an interview recently with two of our housemates who are in their 50s. One lost her husband about five years ago and so she was raising her 10 year old on her own. And she was an epidemiologist at a hospital in Sydney. So, she's working a lot. This was just pre COVID. And then … was starting a dance school in the eastern suburbs. And so, she just needed somebody that, you know, it was ideal because she could save some money and still get to work and still help out with the child and everything worked out really well. And then they were together through COVID, which was amazing. But one of the things that Angela said, who was the owner of the house, she had said, you know, she just said to the house mate, ‘what is it that you like to do? What are you good at doing that you enjoy doing? I'd much rather you do that and then I can hire a cleaner or I can hire somebody else to do something else. But what do you enjoy doing?’ And she enjoyed spending time with her son and enjoyed, you know, the time in the garden and things like that. So, that's the stuff that she focused on and that's what we recommend. It's like, what natural skills do you have as a person? So, if I was a housemate, I'm an artist. So, it's like, well, you know, I could give you some art classes if you like.

 

 

It sounds like this type of living situation would work best with somebody who you’re compatible with. But, how does Dautovic ensure that the housemates are compatible?

 

[23:14] We've been told that the profiles pretty much give them a 75% confidence that there will be a good match. So, first, they've got the fact that they've got a digital ID. So, they know that they've been checked, and then they read the profile. And then we've got an inbuilt messaging system which is private. So, even at that point you can send them a connect request with someone, and then that person will look at your profile, if they think they'd like to talk to you, then they'll accept it, and they'll start messaging with you. So, even at that point, they still don't have any private details about you. They don't have your surname, their email address, phone number, nothing. And you can even use a preferred first name on your profile if you like. And that's on the public profile.

[23:55] And then from there, it's like, well, you're gonna meet in a coffee shop, or you're gonna have a phone call, or do FaceTime. Whatever it is that you feel confident with, and then go from there. The other thing is that we've had a bunch of people who kept asking us if we could help them find someone. And so, we've recently launched a matching service as well. So, we have a bunch of households who are now paying us to go through that whole process and sometimes there might not be someone on the platform that really suits them. So, we will recruit them. We have ways of actually finding you. We have ways of finding people that are ideal for these households and then it's based on the no match no fee. So, if we don't find them a match, then I'm paying. If we do, then they're paying. It works out to be roughly the equivalent of two weeks rent. We charge $499 For that matching service. And we do three way video interviews and we, you know, give them the opportunity — I know when it works because I can't get a word in after five minutes.

 

[25:00] And then we have another service that we’re about to launch, which is a house share agreement service. So, if once they've agreed that they're going to move in, then we'll do another three way video call where we, and they'll print out the, our template. And then, we call them matches, our matches will then ask them questions and the difficult questions that they might not be comfortable asking each other at that point. So, things like, you know, what are the rules around having special friends over? Or what if I want to go away for a couple of weeks? What happens then? Or, you know, if either of us decides the relationship needs to terminate, how much notice do we need to give to each other? You know, what are the rules of the household? What, uh, you know, things like that we'll go through, and they'll write that down. And they’ll get a recording of the video that we do. And it's an additional service that we charge to do for them, if that's what they want.

 

[25:54] And we seem to get that a lot with our elderly households, people that are elderly that are living on their own, we encourage their carers or their family members to get involved. But, you know, just people who haven't house shared before and they don't sort of feel confident in that process of going through it themselves. They can hire us to do that. They're not missing out on anything because the rent will, you know, cover the cost of it once they start renting. So, there's that as well. But you know, we've really done as much as we can through the use of technology. I remember back in the day when you get to the pub, and you're looking for a house mate, and you saw an a4 poster with tear off phone numbers at the bottom. You might be old enough to remember that. So, you tear it off, and you go to the phone booth, and you call them up and ‘hey, I'm just down at the pub’. ‘Okay, I'll meet you down there’. And you have a beer, and you sound alright, you can move in tomorrow. No driver's licence or no ID checks or anything like that. You just use your gut instinct, right. But yeah, so, you know, but I guess because there's so much media and social media and fear that gets instilled in people, everyone thinks that there's a murderer in every street that you live. I've never met one, I don't know anyone who has been harmed in that way.

 

Let’s take a look at the benefits as a homeowner of renting out a spare room.

 

[28:19] I guess it just depends on what kind of, what's the purpose for the property that you're purchasing. So, if you're purchasing the property purely to rent the property out as a whole property, then, you know, we could, we're not a real estate agent. So, we don't do that kind of leasing process. So, just to be really clear what we're not. Obviously then go to an agent and get it rented in that way. If you're moving into the house, you are buying a property and you know that it's got one or two spare bedrooms, then you can consider, okay, well, I can get a housemate in. You also need to make sure that you talk to your accountant because it is additional income that you're earning on your home. So, make sure that you're aware of those aspects of it. But then again, when you think about the amount of money and help that you can get in terms of what the impact might be at the end result when you sell the place, you're way ahead in, you know, in the short term there. So, just have a think about that as well. We have a lot of, actually just in the last month, three different property investors who are building co living houses, who are approaching us to find compatible housemates that they can actually put into to these co living houses. So, that's another way that you can look at it.

 

[29:38] One of them in particular, in Brisbane, he's building a five bedroom place and he wants to have one of the rooms as a rent offset for someone to manage the household if that makes sense. So, they get to live there for free depending on the amount of time that they want to contribute to it. And then, you know, they can make sure the driveway is clear, take the rubbish out, keep the main living areas clear. And then they have an opportunity to also get some additional work if they want to check in and check out people that come as well. So, there's a number of different ways that you could use our service. Like, there's one of the things that we're doing, as I said, it's approaching government to, particularly in coastal towns where they are having a huge problem with finding accommodation for hospitality and service workers. Because a lot of the properties in those towns are actually listed as short term holiday platforms it's really reducing the amount of rentals. So, if anyone's a property investor and thinking about it in that way, you know, maybe there's something that we could talk about there. But there's just, you know, we have to start looking at different ways of building and different ways of living because the cost to buy a house is ridiculous. Unless we actually give our kids, you know, a few $100,000 to purchase their own home, there's no way that they'd be able to afford a mortgage in their life. You know, work has changed so much the full time job really is now broken down into a bunch of gigs or, you know, part time jobs. And, you know, there are some financial institutions who are kind of understanding that, but the traditional banks generally don't. More people are becoming self-employed.

 

[31:28] There's a whole lot of big changes that are happening across the board and we've got to look at, you know, different ways of making housing accessible and affordable. But at the same token, how can we also help to reduce the stress of households who are experiencing massive interest rate hikes right now? You know, like being able to rent the room that would relieve that problem immediately. So, you know, and then right now, we also have a worker shortage in Australia because it’s post COVID, and people are finding it virtually impossible to get cleaners or part-time childcare, gardeners, things like that. So, there's a lot of benefits across the board. You know, we recommend that people do a trial for like, a long weekend. You know, have the person come and stay before they forfeit their previous accommodation. You know, if you need that to finalise it off but generally, if people just come down to basic common sense, they can figure it out. You figure out how to employ someone. You take on a risk when you say yes to hiring someone. There's responsibilities with that, right? You know, we're making decisions all the time about people. It's no different. The only difference is people — yeah but it's my home and my privacy — well, what is it that you're needing to be private about? Is it that they, you know, perhaps you can actually, your life can become more fulfilling and more open and more joyous, as opposed to you feeling like you're losing something.

Dautovic has already told us her stories of meeting numerous stars. Now, let’s hear about the mentors that helped her along her journey.

 

[34:13] I could not have done what I've done without my advisors. And, you know, some of them are still with me from the get-go and, you know, some have come and gone because sometimes, you know, people are in your life for a reason, a season or a lifetime. And I'm just so incredibly grateful because when I was saying early on in our conversation that I have a vision and it's like, I've decided I want to do it and then I figure out how to do it. Making the decisions about how to do it need to be bounced around. Like they, you know, if I've not done it before, then I need to have the right conversations with the right people. And my advisors are great. Like my … he's got a legal and a finance mind and so, like, he'll often say to me, you know, if I'm upset about something and I have to send an email or I'm having a challenge with someone, he'll say write the email to me first. So, you feel like you've said it, and then I'll edit it and send it back to you and then you can send it right. So, you know, little things like that, that it just really great that helped to protect me. And also help guide and teach me along the way on how to better manage, you know, difficult conversations or challenging times. But I just, I really could not be where I am without them. You know, and then there's just people that pop into my world who are just people who were kind enough just to share kindness at that time.

 

[35:52] And that could be wisdom, it could be something that they do for me, it could be volunteering something. Like, right now I have a group of women who are in their 50s who are just helping to introduce a change around to all their different networks because they believe it's just such a great thing. And it's like, I'm so humbled by that, you know, like, it's just amazing the things that people will do. And then there's the team that work with me on the, you know, the day to day tasks, and then, you know, my leadership team, and then my advisors. It's like, it takes a circle. That's what I call it. And I explained it in this way where, you know, just imagine a flat circle. So, I'm in the middle of the circle and then everybody is around me, you know, I'm not above them. It's not a hierarchical structure in that way. Some of them are closer to me because the leadership, some of them are a little further away. But we all have to work together for that circle to work. And in my mind, we're all as important as each other. Some of us have greater responsibilities but that circle can't work unless we're all integrated together. And that requires care, it requires understanding and empathy.

 

[37:09] You know, right now, my CTOs partner is about to have a baby in any moment. And then my lead developer, his brother has just been in an accident. You know, so it's like, you've got a, that's very difficult to manage as a CEO, but you have empathy and care for those people. [They] have to come first beyond before my needs right now, right? So, because we care for each other, the first thing we ask when we're, you know, connecting is like, how's the family? How's your partner? How are your kids? You know, what's going on? And, and it's just lovely that that's a culture that we've created. So, I know, it's kind of long winded answer to your question in terms of mentors, but mentors come in, you know, my husband being my solid partner in this and, you know, it's cost him. It’s been stressful, it's cost us a lot of money, it's cost us a lot of time. We're in our 50s, you know, it's not something that we plan on doing right now. But we didn't see it to be as big as what it was when we first started. So, you know, there's just, there's so many people that I mean it's a question I can't even think to answer right now other than my key advisors and my leadership team and just the people who work with me. I love them. You know, I really care for them.

 

Dautovic shares what she would tell herself ten years ago before her journey of developing The Room Xchange

 

[39:52] I don't think I'd be wanting to be experiencing life any differently to how I am. If it wasn’t The Room Xchange, it would be something else that was big. I don't like doing small things that perhaps maybe not the level of stress and impact that COVID has had on and all those things but regardless, anything would have been affected. I’m proud of where my kids are. My relationship with my husband, you know, 30 years of marriage is not an easy achievement. It's, you know, it's not easy. We were kids when we met pretty much. You know, that the fact that I'm healthy and I'm alive, it's something I'm always grateful for. And, you know, one of the greatest lessons I learned back then at that time because I kept getting asked a lot by, you know, a lot of woowoo people is what have you learned about yourself? What did you, you know, how are you going to live life differently? And it's like, well, you know, shit can happen anytime. That I’m certain of. It’s not the shit that happens to you that determines who you are, it's how you deal with it.

 

[41:03] And it was, you know, giving myself permission to rest when I needed to rest. Figuring out ways to still keep my mind active when I needed to. Making sure that the people around me were feeling okay because it puts a lot of pressure on everyone else when you're sick. I wouldn't change anything. I would not tell myself to do anything different, Tyrone. I'm 56 and I feel really blessed and fortunate and just keep staying strong Ludwina, you know. Keep working through and you push through, eventually, you'll get to the other side. And I think success is something that you earn. You have to go through the hard times to have the right to get on the other side. Because you know what it's like when people win the lotto, they wasted because they haven't had to work for it, you know. My major goal here is to create accessible and affordable housing. I think it should be right for every human being. I think if we do it smart, we can reduce a whole lot of social issues that should not be happening. And we'll have a much more happy and harmonious country and world.

 

[42:28] So, just maybe one last question for you is how much of your success that you've achieved right now is due to skill, intelligence and hard work? And how much of it do you think has been due to luck?

 

[42:43] No, no, I don’t think there's any luck. Yeah, no. Persistence, resilience, and definitely hard work. You know, some skills I have now that I didn't have when we started. I think that you just constantly have to be making choices and pivot all the time. You've got to be— self-awareness is the biggest thing, I think. I journal a lot and that just gives me this level of awareness around how I'm feeling and what's going on, and what's really true, and what's false feelings, you know, things like that. But, you know, sometimes I'd started five years ago with The Room Xchange, and sometimes I think, gosh, was I too early? But then I thought recently, no actually, I came at the right time because those first couple of years where I made the mistakes that I made and then we had COVID, well, not just the mistakes I made but also the learnings and the insights that I got. And then COVID came and then we had the time to pivot and rebuild and fix some of the technical debt that was there and then make some assumptions about what's happening after and then now that we've come after, it's like, what we now have formed into is what the market needs right now.

 

[44:11] But we wouldn't have — if I had started today with where we started five years ago, it wouldn't have been the right model for now. So, it's cost a lot — a lot of time, a lot of energy, a lot of money, a lot of, you know, a lot. But we are in such a strong place. And I think that, you know, for me as a founder and CEO five years on and here as dedicated and committed as ever, it comes from my resilience and my commitment to this and I really, truly believe in it. And, you know, the market is telling us that government's telling us that, you know, we can solve the government's problems around housing right now, you know. All they have to do is partner with us, use us a software as a service model and we've solved the housing problem, you know. There's a lot of solutions here, a lot of loneliness that's happening, a lot of elderly people ageing at home, a lot of women over 50 who post-divorce and don't have enough money to buy a house and may not get a rental property but they can rent with somebody else who’s the same age as them. They can match up with someone who's like them. Families who need support, who don't have their parents nearby. There's a whole lot of things that are happening in, you know, behind the front doors that this can help with turned and I think stronger communities just like better communities.

 

 

Thank you to Ludwina Dautovic, our guest on this episode of Property Investory.