At 18 and planning to be a missionary in Africa, Britnie Turner attended what she calls a leadership and survival school. Little did she know at that time a real estate career awaited.
“A man spoke about how to use [real estate] cash flow to fund your missions instead of having to ask for donations,” recalls Turner, the founder and CEO of Nashville-based Aerial Development Group. “I was so jazzed about this idea that I bought my first house a few weeks later.”
Fascinated by the thought of building a business that could aid her planned advocacy efforts, Turner decided in 2007 to learn as much about real estate as possible.
“I moved to Nashville in 2009, lived in my car on and off, and worked for free for nine months in exchange for learning the business,” she recalls.
At that point, she founded Aerial.
“Needless to say, it was more than a struggle to get it off the ground,” she says.
In those early days, Turner says she recognized the opportunity to not only positively impact Nashville’s neighborhoods in meaningful ways through development, but how to also “truly live my passion for making social impact both across the globe and in local communities where we build, and harnessing the power of capitalism to continue to make change.”
Originally published by the Nashville Post