Developer Thierry Joubert, champion boxer Jean Pascal and reality TV host Mactar Mbaye decided that conventional schools teach too little about real estate, so they launched their own course in Montreal.
“Real estate made a difference in our lives,” Mbaye, star of a house-flipping reality show in Canada, said in an interview. “It’s why I have everything I have in my life today.”
Mbaye teamed with Joubert, right, and Pascal, a world champion light heavyweight boxer, to raise $32,000 last summer from a boating event called Cruise Estate.
They used the proceeds to launch a foundation that offers 10 people aged 14 to 21 a free six-month course where the trio and other professionals teach various aspects of real estate, such as mortgage financing.
Mbaye, who grew up in a family of nine children, gained prominence after his YouTube house-flipping channel attracted attention from the HGTV network, which hired him to co-host "Hoarder House Flippers."
Mbaye said he and his partners share a desire to teach the intricacies of real estate financing and development.
“In school, we don't learn those things, and yet they are the most important things in this world,” he said.