Each morning, Naples, Florida eXp Realty agent Juan Alvarez wakes up and paints from his home. He’ll use whatever medium suits his mood or the day: acrylic, watercolor, pastels. This creative outlet makes sense for a man whose busy mind and ideas have taken him on an unconventional career path where he is currently a real estate professor and broker for eXp Realty.

Juan Alvarez’s journey took him from Puerto Rico to Connecticut and now, sunny Florida.

Alvarez’s amazing journey began in the mid-1980s when he arrived in the United States from Puerto Rico. His intent was to get his masters in microbiology and, after two years, return to Puerto Rico to work in the pharmaceutical industry.

While he did get his degree from the University of Bridgeport, he never returned home. Instead, he went to work at Bristol-Myers Squibb in 1986, working as a lab technician for the Clairol line of hair products in Stamford, Conn.

“I did it for eight years,” says Alvarez of his stint in quality assurance. “I thought I would stay for 30 years and get the gold watch.”

He Caught the Real Estate Bug After Buying His First Home

Instead, through his own first-hand experience of buying a home, he got a taste of real estate. Everything changed.

“I was able to build some savings and I wanted to buy a home,” he said. “It was my ‘aha’ moment. I started gaining knowledge about buying homes.”

There was more to it than just buying homes. As a Spanish-speaking agent, he saw opportunities to connect with Spanish-speaking clients. He quickly dove in as an agent and investor.

One trait Alvarez has consistently tapped into is his ability to watch trends, identify opportunities and take risks. He started with a major brokerage in Fair Haven, Connecticut, farming a niche market of beautiful, old Victorian homes. He then opened his own brokerage – Casablanca Realty – which served New Haven County’s Hispanic market.

He Became a Newspaper Owner/Editor/Publisher

Things were rolling along until one day in 1993 a friend asked Alvarez to take over a grassroots newspaper, La Voz Hispana, telling him, “I think you can (run it) better.” Alvarez bought the paper, became publisher and editor-in-chief and built it from a circulation of 3,000 papers a month to one of the most-read Hispanic newspapers in Connecticut.

“It was scary and fulfilling,” he said. “Politicians from Hillary Clinton to Joe Lieberman were constantly talking to us. We covered the state. We got death threats. It was crazy. But, once you get newsprint on your hands, you can’t leave.”

After seven years, Alvarez did leave, once again taking a huge risk. This time, he took over as executive director of the Hispanic agency Connecticut Association of United Spanish Action. It was nearly defunct, morale was low, and it had little funding. But in true Alvarez fashion, he infused it with energy and ideas, eventually winning a grant of $1.5 million from the U.S. Commerce Department to implement a networking technology to connect all 12 state agencies.

“I like to think big,” he says. “The paper was a huge undertaking. This was even bigger. It’s relevant to what’s happening at eXp.”

Alvarez’s favorite medium is pastels, but he also paints in watercolors and acrylics.

In 1999, the idea of law school appealed to him, so he enrolled at Quinnipiac. But the prohibitive expense gave him an idea. He learned GMAC Mortgage would provide tuition reimbursement. Why not, Alvarez thought? He could do mortgages by day and law school by night, all expenses paid.

Except a few months into it, he learned GMAC wouldn’t reimburse the tuition unless the program aligned more closely with the firm’s mission. By this time, Alvarez was deeply successful with GMAC, becoming the top producer for its home equity mortgage program. He ended his pursuit of law school and helped GMAC open an office in Naples.

“The day I decided (to take the Naples job), we had back-to-back nor’easter’s. (I said) I’m done!”

Real Estate Headwinds Moved Juan in a Couple of Directions

While grateful to escape the Northeast’s unforgiving winter weather, there was a different storm brewing in the real estate business. It was the beginning of the 2008 market collapse. Alvarez decided to turn the grim landscape into a business, as well as a way to help people who were in trouble. He opened a company to help people short sell their homes.

“I got in very early — before the market crashed. It was a chaotic situation. People coming through doors with their stories. It was emotionally draining. It was sad,” he said.

After a few years, Alvarez got back into real estate sales full-time, regaining his brokers’ license with another major brokerage, in which the idea of opening an office in Puerto Rico was briefly entertained, but dismissed.

With that, Alvarez left and went back to school, getting a master’s in international real estate from Florida International University. He segued into teaching real estate classes as an adjunct professor at Florida Gulf Coast University. It was during his time there, developing a curriculum and researching real estate, that he learned about eXp.

“It was serendipitous,” Alvarez said of his discovery of eXp. “I got totally attracted and obsessed with finding out everything I could.”

He stumbled upon a phone number for eXp and called it. Alvarez said the person who answered patiently responded to his many questions. Then Alvarez asked, “Who am I talking to?” The answer came: “Glenn Sanford, Founder and CEO of eXp.”

That encounter quickly proved to Alvarez that eXp was where he needed to be and he joined in March 2017.

In addition to working his listings, Alvarez is deeply active in eXp, serving on the Agent Advisory Board and becoming a key member of the ONE eXp initiative, a program that supports diversity and inclusion. He is also the founder of the eXp Latino Workplace group, an internal organization to support the Hispanic agent community.

“I understood the advantage of partnering with a forward-thinking, innovative and visionary company where I would be able to have ownership and contribute to the growth and development of the company. That’s why I’m here.”