Growing up in Tucker, Georgia, Samir Patel didn’t see anyone living the life he wanted for himself. What he did have was the world at his doorstep, because of his hometown’s diverse population, full of immigrants and political asylum seekers from across the globe. That exposure instilled in him a desire to pursue a worldly path, but the rest he made up as he went.

From a young age, Patel knew he wanted to lead and do big things, so matriculating at the prestigious West Point Military Academy in New York was just the ticket—a global-minded university geared towards developing the whole person, with a focus on leadership, academics, intellectual rigor, and athletics.

But while Patel’s 15 years of active service and continued employment with the United States Army Reserve are a crucial part of the 38-year-old’s story, he’s also had a high-powered real estate finance career that kicked off long before graduation or deployment. As a college sophomore, he found that he was “just reading books, and not really achieving anything.”

“I felt this itch to really accomplish something, not just do well on chemistry tests,” he said.

That’s when he decided to tack entrepreneur and business owner onto his resume, and with the help of a family friend, Patel purchased a hotel in Waukegan, Illinois. Alongside his military career, Patel flipped houses; managed the hotel; took big risks (which sometimes failed); and eventually started his own company, Trophy Point Investment Group, a $50 million private real estate fund that uniquely serves veterans in ways that traditional banks can’t: the risk of a loan defaulting or selling is minimal.

Now, things have come full circle, and Patel has become the person he wishes he’d had in his corner when he was a young entrepreneur. After a whirlwind 10 years of running his own company, Patel wanted to take a break and earn a master’s degree. In 2019, he enrolled in Robinson’s M.S. in Commercial Real Estate program.

Largely self-taught, Patel says he “loved every minute of the program.” He learned from guest speakers and felt validated for some of the business practices he’d already been using. “I was soaking up so much knowledge and experience from all these people,” he said.

Before graduate school, he was already teaching real estate entrepreneurship part-time at Robinson. He gives undergraduate and graduate students real talk on both real estate investments and life, sometimes mentoring them and inviting them to work alongside him, like one recent graduate who he advises and financially backs when there’s a property he wants to flip.

Patel also recently established a foundation dedicated to his father, with the goal of helping veterans and funding education, two things he says are “near and dear to [his] heart.” Through the foundation, he’s endowed an academic scholarship for graduate and undergraduate students majoring in real estate.

“I was a recipient of a scholarship at Robinson, so I felt very strongly about giving back in that regard,” he said.

He didn’t have the role models he needed when he was starting out, but now Patel is that person for others. In every class, he reminds his students that to excel in real estate investment, “it’s not necessary to come from a rich family, but it is necessary to make the ask and to be a good part of your community, because that’s how you can raise the money and even the playing field.”