In this episode, we hear stories about Daniel’s time in South Africa, childhood figures that influenced her to go into property investment and much more!

Timestamps:
5:14 | Growing Up
10:45 | Realising Childhood Dreams
19:29 | Working From a Young Age
26:15 | Investing For Security

Resources and Links:

 
Transcript:
Mish Daniel:

[4:23] (this is from part 2 audio) I was 44 years old at the time and I had just got my, my businesses, my life into a position where I could retire. So, I was kind of getting everything ready for a really relaxed future, doing, just doing whatever I wanted to do, and I made the decision to give it all up.

 

 

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 the founder of Revolve Commercial, Mish Daniel. Growing up, she faced unimaginable challenges, but despite this, still established multiple successful businesses. We’ll explore how she launched her own property investment company and tapped into the commercial property market.

I’m Tyrone Shum, and in this episode we’re speaking with the founder of Revolve Commercial, Mish Daniel. Growing up, she faced unimaginable challenges, such as being held at gunpoint in front of her children, or getting attacked and having her legs broken but despite this, still established multiple successful businesses and a property portfolio.

(Rewrite) I’m Tyrone Shum, and in this episode we’re speaking with the founder of Revolve Commercial, Mish Daniel. Growing up, she faced unimaginable challenges, such as her community being bombed, or being held at gunpoint. We’ll explore how despite this, she launched multiple successful businesses and built a property portfolio.

 

**End intro music**

Daniel has valuable business experience and knowledge. So, when she noticed a gap in the Australian commercial property market, she decided to launch Revolve Commercial.

 

[0:47] It's been quite a long and interesting journey. Revolve Commercial is a company that I established, let's say about a year or two ago, however, getting to where we are has been the, the long story. So, we started out in around about 2017 and have taken quite a couple of turns. And in January of last year, we decided to launch the label, Revolve Commercial, and Revolve Commercial is essentially a commercial specialist buyer's agent. So, we only do commercial properties nationwide and we also help clients who cannot afford to buy commercial properties. If they want to join me on some uplift deals, and some joint ventures, I invite them to come along and join me as well. So they can get to learn how commercial property works and, you know, enjoy the benefits.

 

[2:14] I think there are more and more people that are talking about commercial, and the benefits of commercial. I still feel as if there's massive fear around commercial and we'll probably talk about that later because my years of experience in commercial when I, when I arrived in Australia kind of went, why are people doing this?

 

In her everyday life, Daniel has a very busy schedule…

 

[2:45] The first thing that I do when I wake up is drink half a litre of water, stretch, preferred and exercise for at least anything between, I would say 60 minutes to probably about three hours, if I can. I say between there because either take the dog for a good stringent walk while I listen to very good Property Investory podcasts or others. Otherwise, I'm a keen, keen cyclist. So, I would do between 30k and 45K's in the morning, and then come down, come back and have a look at what's to be done. First thing in the morning is to touch base with my entire team to find out where they are and what we need to do. And respond to clients emails and all the urgencies.

 

No matter how busy her day is, Daniel loves to go on a bike ride…

 

[4:04] I'm a, I'm a little bit of an all rounder. So essentially, I'm a mountain biker. So I've been doing mountain biking since I was a kid. In fact, I learned how to, how to ride on motocross, motorcycling. So, my brothers were, all had motorcycles in motocross and I learned how to ride with them at the age of about nine years old. So, I started learning motorcycling before I learned cycling and, and, yeah, I've built a couple of those as well but we won't talk about those now. And on arriving in Australia, eight years ago now, a friend of mine convinced me to get a road bike, very reluctantly. However, I managed to get a really beautiful carbon fibre and we, we do now have a range of bicycle. So, we do a lot of just sort of touring, quite a lot of touring. And then we do a lot of training on the road bikes and, and when they are brave enough to come off road with me, we'll do mountain biking. Good speed, anything with two wheels, give me two wheels and I'm happy.

Let’s go right back in time and take a look at Daniel’s childhood…

 

[6:19] I grew up in South Africa. And I was born in, in a place called Durban, which is on the east coast. My parents moved up to Johannesburg is, is sort of where everything was happening at the time. And it was a big, bustling, busy city. I hated the place and I vowed that the minute I'm finished school, I'm going to get out of there.

 

[9:43] Okay, so I'm the youngest of five kids.

 

[10:05] But it was interesting being the last of five. My parents were very, very busy with my, my older siblings, and they didn't really, they didn't, they kind of knew that I was there, but I was actually very quiet as a child. Very, very introverted, and, and very creative. So, I used to, I used to build quite a lot of stuff, but I used to build my own little, little toys, and model bicycles. I mean, in those days, you know, you didn't have Kmart, and everything that was made in plastic. And I had these, these dreams that I wanted a better lifestyle from a very young age. And I used to build these little houses out of cardboard and plastic, and dill sticks. Magnificent houses and play there, as a kid, you know.

 

As a child, Daniel was influenced by her father and from an early age, displayed that she was interested in property investment…

[12:41] My father, my father started out as a, as a carpenter. And so I spent quite a lot of time structuring and building with him, and learning about load bearing walls, learning about cantilevers, about roofs, about pitch roofs, flat roofs, mansarde. So, I kinda, I kind of feel as if I went through an entire apprenticeship with him. And on, on Sundays, we used to go a pastime, because there wasn't very much to do in Johannesburg, it was just a big dusty city. So, we used to go and have a look at show houses. And I just loved it, because he always used to say to me, 'look beyond the walls'. And I'd say to him, 'what do you mean dad?' He'd say, 'well, what can you do if you make an opening in this wall? What's on the other side? What can you create?' You know. And he taught me from a very, very young age, to look at, at structures differently. So, he always used to say, 'look at what others aren't seeing'.

 

[11:52] As a kid, you don't know what you're given the, the the talents that you're given. And in retrospect, I look at it and I think, gee, there was one little house that I built that, funnily enough, many, many, many, many years later, I drew it out. And I actually built that house. And then that was my, that was my dream home. And I must have been probably about, I was probably my late 30s, and I built that home in the top street, up against that mountain overlooking the most magnificent view. So, and I had, I had created that little house when I was a kid.

Though, growing up, Daniel faced challenges that many of us couldn’t imagine…

 

[14:26] Unfortunately, my oldest, my oldest two siblings died at a very young age. So, they would have been probably in their 60s. In fact, my oldest brother probably would have been about 63, 64. So, there was a seven year gap between myself and him. But, you know, being brought up in South Africa, yeah. Others wouldn't like me to say this, but I do believe that we were pretty much brought up in a war zone and fatalities happened.

 

[15:35] I think a very good friend of mine has encapsulated that very well by saying 'South Africa is beautiful chaos'.

 

[15:49] And it really is. I mean, it's the most beautiful country. Like I said, rich with culture, the food is just magnificent, flavoursome. Many, many different international cultures. You know, so, it really is beautiful, but it's total chaos. So, I can remember some instances when I was growing up, where there was, you know, we really, we were, we were brought up in the Cold War. Because what was happening is the leading party, which was the National Party, was really at war with the underground, which was the, the now residing ANC. And I remember, at, at some points my, my parents wouldn't let us watch the news, because there was so much bloodshed that was happening that they, they, they wanted to, you know, protect us from, from seeing all that stuff.

 

[16:43] So, our childhood was kind of not really in the know of what was going on. However, at the age of 12 years old, I started realising that there was something that I knew that I don't know and I wanted to know what it was. So, I started kind of looking and seeing and finding out information. Wasn't very easy to find out information as, as a child about, you know, politics, and what the other side was doing.

 

After finishing high school, Daniel kept her vow and left Johannesburg at age 19. After travelling for one year, she settled down…

 

[6:44] I moved down to Cape Town. Cape Town is a beautiful city with lots of mountains, crystal clear waters and that's basically where I started my life.

 

[8:17] You know, if you speak to any Capetonians, they'll tell you that Cape Town's got soul. So, it's a very, very colourful city. It's, it's, it's rich with culture. It's got a lot of music, arts. It's a beautiful city. It's a lovely place to be in and you've got the seaside, you've got mountains, you've got all the outdoors, outdoor sports, and just down the road, about 20ks, no it's a little bit more than that. About 50ks down the road, you're surrounded by the vineyards. So, and you've got the plains and you've got you know, so it's, it really it's a city that gives you everything from you know, and especially if you're an outdoor person, if you enjoy your, your wines, your brandies, your, your, a couple of good adults indulgences. Stunning, really beautiful. We used to go on, I used to go on, on a mountain bike rides in the vineyards, which was in through the mountains for like, eight, nine hours a day. It was just magnificent.

 

After Daniel moved to Cape Town, she saw what her parents tried to protect her from as a child…

 

[17:38] I got involved with, with groups that were fighting, quietly, fighting apartheid, and my eyes were really open to the bloodshed and the war that was happening. You know, so at any given time, you never knew, you know. I mean, for instance, some friends of mine were, went to church, and some, some, they call them Eppler. Attackers walked in and mowed everybody down in the church, you know. A couple of months later, a couple of friends were, were a well, in a pub that I used to go to, same sort of thing happened. So, there was a lot of this, you know, we kind of just lived with what was happening, and you just dealt with it. And you lived with eyes in the back of your head, you're always looking behind you and, and the level of, of security is just unbelievable. So, I'll tell you a little bit later about the security and, you know, the stuff that we were forced to live with, but I think South Africans became a very resilient nation because of, of how we were living, you know. You adapt to your circumstances and we became very resourceful as a result of that.

 

[19:40] It almost becomes like a norm where you, you, you'd never expect it, but when it does happen, it's like, damn, it's happening again. And I'll give you an example. There was the Hard Rock Cafe, was a cafe that we used to go to in, on the waterfront. Beautiful place and it was bombed now, and everybody says, 'gee, I could have been there', or 'wow, I've just left there, I just survived it'. You know, and it's like, lives have been lost, people have been killed, and nine times out of 10, we know a lot of those people that were in the line of fire. So, whenever these attacks happened, and we were always hearing about Joeseph was shot in the James Street attack, or, you know. So, as a community, it kind of brought us together and, and it made us, I guess, looking after each other a little bit more, you know. Where you're always looking out for your neighbour, you're always looking out, like I said, looking over your shoulder. And you never know, when there's some sinister idiot, that's just going to, you know, plant a bomb, wherever you are.

Coming up after the break, we will dive into when Daniel started investing in property…

 

[1:11] I decided I needed to basically put my own insurance in place. So, I started buying properties.

 

We will hear about Daniel’s best and worst investing moments…

 

[17:24] I guess the biggest lesson is, is, is not having the right education.

 

And that’s next. I’m Tyrone Shum and you’re listening to Property Investory.

 

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The events that happened in Cape Town heavily affected Daniel…

 

[20:56] There's this, there's this incredible level of fear. And, and we were, we were always trying to protect ourselves from that. So, I mean, by the time I left South Africa, I'd been attacked four times. I landed up in a wheelchair, my, both my, my feet were broken in, in an attack. It took me three years to learn how to walk again, let alone run, hence me, hence me being, enjoying cycling more than then running. However, they changed my life forever. I mean, I used to hike up that mountain virtually every second weekend. I couldn't do that anymore, you know, changed my life. I've been held up at, at, at gunpoint, shot at with AK47's. You know, and I think when I tell people these stories, they, they think I'm, you know, making it up. I ran factories, and we had seven gunman that came in and held us up at gunpoint, you know. And another time, I got a phone call, I went to pick up my kids that were all of a year and three years old, and I was busy driving back to my factory to go and, and close up the factory. And I got a phone call from one of the staff members say 'Mish, don't come here, don't come, don't come. There's a, there's a shootout happening in the driveway'. And it's like, 'gee, thanks for letting me know'. And this is life, you just get used to this.

 

[23:06] We got to a point where we had three security companies that were looking after us. So, I had security companies that, at the office, at work. We had a security company who used to look after our homes. And often if we, for instance, if my, if my partner was, was who worked on the other side of the mountain, was working late, I would tell her that she has to phone me when she's leaving. And, and I know that the drive was 20 minutes, if she's not back here by 20 minutes, I'll be phoning her again. And often I would get the security company just to escort us into our home. You know, if we felt like there was, that there was something that was out of the ordinary, we'd phone for an escort. You know, so and that becomes the norm. You know, that's how it is, surrounded by armed guards.

 

From a young age, Daniel was always driven and hardworking…

 

[24:49] As a kid, I always wanted to work. All I wanted to do was work. So, I actually started working in a shoe, shoe store at the age of 12 years old and, and the legal age was 16. But I managed to win that one. I was very convincing and in fact, I became the best salesperson. And then I went on to doing all sorts of other casual jobs and, and continued with school, obviously. However, I always wanted to pursue the creative side. And my, my, my now late sister was a professional photographer and she, she convinced me to go into advertising. So, I started my first job as a graphic designer in advertising in an agency called Young and Rubicam, which was retail advertising.

 

[25:49] So, and I learned my foundations. I basically did a, an apprenticeship with them for about three years and then went on. However, while that was happening, I always thought there's got to be something bigger, there's got to be something better. And when I, when I left them travelled, as I mentioned, came back, went to Cape Town, started and then I was freelancing as a graphic designer, and just decided that I need to settle down and do something bigger and better. So, I started my own promotional clothing company. Now, you'd wonder how I jumped from one to the other, but my mother was a dressmaker. And while my father was teaching me about construction and buildings, my mother was, insisted that every single one of her girls learned how to, how to, how to make clothing, and we all had our own sewing machines.

 

[26:58] I hated it, but, but in retrospect, it turned out really good for me. And as a kid, what I used to do is, I used to take menswear, and pull it apart and restructure it, put it together and make it this, these creative clothing, turn them into really creative outfits. So, I used to do that in buildings and instruction as well as clothing. Anyway, while we didn't really have the money to go out and buy outfits for, for end of year parties, and that sort of thing. So, I used to make it and when I moved down to Cape Town, I got involved in promotional clothing, because I had the clothing background, and the promotional side was the creative side. And it was very, very new. We were, we were one of three agencies. We were one of the first and we did incredibly well. So, I just developed that into a very profitable business. And long story short, I ended up with 400 staff, and I was running three businesses. I developed that, I took that into an embroidery business, a screen printing business, a manufacturing business, and we called it a vertical business. Which means that we would design, we would manufacture, we would procure, so we'd hold stock, and we would do distribution. So, it was end to end. So, an entire operation.

 

In order for her promotional clothing business to become successful, Daniel tapped into a niche market…

 

[28:55] I realised that in order to make a business like that highly profitable, I did contract work. So we contracted to big corporate companies like Caltex, Caltex national. Now bearing in mind that Caltex is very different in South Africa to what it is over here. The average Caltex service station would have anything between 40 to 120 staff members, and those staff members would have 22 garments. A full kit, full fit-out of 22 garments, which would be summer as well as winter, which is jackets, trousers, shirts, jerseys, hats, caps, rain gear, summer gear. So, those were massive, massive contracts. I mean, we were manufacturing 22 million garments across various different styles.

 

[30:02] South Africa is a very labour, labour intensive, labour rich country. So, because it's, it's, you know, you've got the the great divide. So, the cheaper labour would do anything for work. So, they would wash windows for work. So, when you go to a service station in South Africa, everything's done for you. You pull up, somebody comes along, they put petrol for you, they'll open your bonnet, and they'll, they'll, they'll fill up your water, they'll check your oil, they'll check your tires, they'll pump, they'll pump your tires for you. Everything is done for you, you know, they get paid for that. And then the other thing that they had is, they had retail shops at the service stations, and way ahead of virtually other countries that I've seen around the world. So, you could go to the retail shop, and you could buy anything from, they'd have a Woolworths distribution in there, they'd have, it's a mini Woolworths, they'd have a bakery, a pizza shop, curry shop, you know, something like that. So, you could go to your local service station, and they were massive, huge service stations, which is subsequently started as a see, Australia's getting more and more of those now. So, it's obviously working, where you can go and do a whole shop in, in when you're filling up for gas.

 

Caltex was just one example of the brands that Daniel manufactured for…

 

[32:31] We used to manufacture the licence to quite a lot of the sports brands as well. So, I picked up the Adidas accounts. High, high, high intensive sort of precision manufacturing and high pressure very, very high pressure. I mean, at some stage I think I was working probably 18 hours a day.

 

[0:04] (From this point, all audio is from part 2) I structured the companies in such a way that I had a lot of managers in, you know, in the positions. So, setting up all of those systems, every single, every single department was very well managed. So effectively, I was helicopter managing all of those departments and just my, my core people. But it is a, a big undertaking, yes.

 

 

Next we take a look at Daniel’s property investing journey and how it began…

 

[0:56] Just going back a little bit, at the age of 22, I realised that South Africa was, was well and truly on a, on a slippery scale going downhill. And I decided I needed to basically put my own insurance in place. So, I started buying properties, it was something that I'd been very familiar with. 

[1:53] So, we had quite a, you know, I had a good portfolio of that happening on the side while I was in the manufacturing. And then things really started hitting the wall.

 

[2:05] We had we, we've, I've got two beautiful little blonde girls, gorgeous little girls and I looked at my lifestyle, and I looked at what I'd been through, and I thought, you know, it's, it's unfair, because I can't see things getting better for these kids, to bring these kids up in that environment. So, it really, really was a tough decision, that and I knew that I'd have to give everything up, and at that time, the money was worth nothing. The exchange rate was 10 to one, which means that every, every 10 rands that we own was worth $1. So, either which way you look at it, we'd be, we'd be losing, you know, it was a massive loss. And then my factory was burned down, and a year later, I was, I was attacked, and I landed up in this wheelchair. And then we were held up and it was almost like the universe was speaking to me, and saying, 'get out of here. This is your time, just get out of here. Just take whatever'. And I decided that's it, I need to actually make this move. And my sister had moved to Australia about 15 years earlier, and decided that she wanted to get married. So, she invited me over to Australia to her wedding and I thought hell yes, I'm going. Well, I used, I used to come and, come and go quite a lot in between.

 

[3:38] But anyway, and I was sitting in a park in Chermside, and these two little kids came past pushing their bicycles, they must have been all of 10 or 11 years old. And I looked at this, and I thought, there is no ways that my kids are ever going to experience this kind of freedom ever in their lives. I'm moving here. And I phoned my wife back home and said, 'that's it, I'm not coming home until you say yes'. Because I've been saying for 10 years, I've been saying we need to move, we need to go, we need to actually go. And everyone back home was saying 'no, no, you're joking. You're not going to do this'. And I said, 'I'm going to do this. That's it. I'm giving it up. I'm actually giving it up'.

 

[4:49] And long story short, we arrived here when I was 45 years old with three suitcases. We couldn't get our money out of South Africa for six years. So, we really, really battled to get our money out, with the way the things were going, and I just decided, you know what, I will give away everything that I owned, because there's one thing that, that the government can't take from me, and that's what I've brought with me. And that is my intelligence, my experience, what I've learned. You know, years of experience and that's basically what I brought, you know, and that's, and that's how we've started doing what we're doing now.

  

 

We’ll continue to explore Mish Daniel’s journey in a future episode of Property Investory. We’ll talk about her strategy…

 

[26:06] Look, I think the most, the most successful strategy, right throughout my entire real estate career, across the, across the, the big blue lake, has always, has always been uplift.

 

The mentors that helped her achieve success…

[32:56] Look, I think my, my, my biggest mentor was probably my father.

And that’s next time in a future episode of Property Investory.