The Level Up Podcast w/ Paul Alex
From Homeless to 9 figure real-estate Mogul Saving Children Around the World: William Fonseca
09 Dec 2025
Chapter 1: What challenges did William Fonseca face during his early life?
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I'm right in the path of this place where all these people are trafficked. You see a lot of kids that are taken for the sex industry. And it takes me back to that store where I worked as a stock boy for $25 a week would tie me up and touch me in a walking cooler. And I didn't have anybody to go to. Homeless on the final stretch of my three years.
They reached out of the window and offered me a piece of paper with an address and scripture verse. Knock on the door of this place and this guy opens the door. Trying to convince this cat. Then I need five bucks to eat, and this guy wants to feed me, but I want the five bucks because with a $5 rock, I can just, boom, cure myself for the next five seconds. That's an everlasting year.
You're chasing that devil. The guy tells me, if you give me a year of your life, I guarantee you that God will restore you 100% and then more. They took me into the shower. They bathed me. Never seen a human being so loving. All it took was somebody to give me that unconditional love. I've decided to dedicate my life to helping others.
Hey guys, and welcome back to Love Love Podcast. This is Paul Alex. And today we have another phenomenal guest, guys. But before we get into it, I just want to say thank you for the 4 million downloads that we had this previous month back in... What month are we in, Emilio? September. September, yeah. So we're in September right now, going into October, guys.
So we're expecting about 5 million this month. But... Because of you, we've ranked top three in all categories and number one in business, guys. So we're going to be bringing in phenomenal guests to hear their stories so you guys can get inspired to level up in your life. So today's guest, he is a Miami local. Actually, he's seen the Wynwood District area through all its stages.
And I can't wait to interview this guest. He goes by the name of William. And William, welcome. Welcome to the show, brother.
Thank you for having me.
No, absolutely, man. Thank you. So, William, let my audience know who you are and what is it that you do right now.
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Chapter 2: How did William's faith change the course of his life?
So let's talk about your humble beginnings, okay? How did you end up getting into real estate?
So... Mainly it's just the environment you're raised in, your community, access. Kind of like not satisfied with no, it's like no is a very powerful word, not satisfied with the interpretation. But if you tell me no, then I need to find out why and why takes me to being curious.
So mainly my career started in that type of neighborhood, neglected neighborhoods, just because my colleagues decided to go to Coral Gables in upper scale neighborhoods and that didn't make any sense to me.
Yeah, and at what age did you get into real estate?
So I'm an electrician by trade. So I got into the construction business at 17. I did an apprenticeship program. Not very good at going to school at all, at all. I just couldn't, I could not dissect in school a teacher trying to teach me how to use a calculator when I didn't need one. So for me, it was like, no, you're going to stress me out. So I'm just going to get out of school.
So I did an apprenticeship program that led me to the building industry, and that took me into the development.
Wow. So at 17 years old, you got into construction. Did you graduate high school?
Yeah. I graduated out of night school.
Night school.
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Chapter 3: What motivated William to pursue a career in real estate?
You can... mimic it, but it's so dangerous and it's so dark. And you meet humans that are actually, I call them the gremlins, come out at night. I mean, it's like, wow, the environment, the dynamics just change.
Yeah. Yeah. So you've seen both sides of the world.
I've seen not having anything coming from a middle-class family where my dad had two jobs. So my dad was a union delegator for the hotel industry in Miami Beach when Miami Beach was a different scene. A brother going to medical school and the firstborn, everybody's going to focus on the firstborn. I'm the black sheep of the family, the middle one.
and then the younger sister, and we're being cheated out of this whole scene, and everybody's focusing on paying my brother's tuition. And, hey, we're out in the cold, and who are we? You know, chopped liver. So coming from that environment to taking that leap of faith to going out and becoming an entrepreneur and experimenting with the private sector and launching that campaign to –
And taking me to being homeless is like, wow, if you were to make me another offer to change time, no, not in a million years, buddy. I would not take you up. What an experience. It's actually a component that makes me who I am. So I don't come from a wealthy family. I come from a middle class family.
So they're going to cut the light today because we've got to send $20,000 up to my brother's medical tuition, that kind of environment. And what are we? I've got to put rubber bands on my socks because they're slipping down because the elastic is torn out, that kind of a scene. So, I mean, I come from that environment.
to taking that leap of faith to, if you can't handle the conditions in my house, I'm the head honcho. And if you don't like it, well, you got to leave. And I'm going to take you up on the word. And you're 17 years old and you're leaving home. And what's the effect that's going to happen when you're 17 years old and you're leaving home?
All you're going to do is crash and burn, crash and burn, crash and burn. So that's non-negotiable for me. There's no money. There's nothing that you can offer me to change that because I wouldn't for nothing. It's part of who I am today. And those are my wounds to others, but that's where I found success, in the rut, in the gutter. I call it the hump.
That's where success lies because without the hump, you can't tell the story to have a beautiful result.
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Chapter 4: How did William transition from construction to real estate development?
So I gave myself the opportunity to choose between the street or that roof where it didn't rain and I wasn't gonna starve and I could get new clothes and clean clothes. Pretty sure they came out of the Goodwill. God knows where they came from, donations or anything, all the Rolexes, all the cars. You're making all this money on a monthly basis.
You come from a housekeeper to cleaning toilets, and this is not any better than what it is because now I feel like I've made a commitment, and I'm here, and how do I bail? So on one of the nights, I decided to go to the basement. And I go to the basement, and there's this studio, recording studio, and I looked at the walls, and they were full of plaques. They were all gold records.
And I looked at the name on the records, And it was just, the whole wall was full of these gold records. I go, there's somebody here that's a musician. This is a recording studio. I'm gonna rip off all these instruments or maybe that keyboard and I could probably score a $20 rock or whatever. And every time I grabbed the guitar and every time I grabbed something and I put it on the door,
I wouldn't want to take it and I would go around the block and I would wind up in the same parking lot. And that was the opportunity that I gave myself. So we're all born with the same opportunity, but the result cannot be the same. So I gave myself the opportunity to listen to somebody and humble myself.
And when I looked at the name, I noticed he was a Puerto Rican salsa singer, famous salsa singer. And he took me under his belt. and he made me an offer that transformed my life forever. He said, if you allow yourself
to allow God to redirect your life and put you where you need to be because the knowledge that you've acquired in such a short time, just imagine if you do it for the kingdom of God. I said, this is a bunch of gibberish. This is a bunch of storytelling. I'm not going to buy into this, but I'm going to give myself the opportunity. And I started to look at failure as success.
I started to look at... all that situation of hunger and smoking dope and being homeless as part of the successful story. And I took that leap of faith and when that year clocked on, I said, well, what am I doing now? Am I going to seminary school? He goes, you're insane. You're not going to become a pastor. You're not going to do none of that. You're going back out there.
He says, what do you need? I says, well, I need an apartment. I need a car. I said, buddy, no apartment, no cars. You can come back here and you can sleep in this side of the building. They used to be called Winners. There I met a couple, Albert and Carmen. They fed me every day, every day. I used to go out to Flagler, grab the bus, and go out to make $7 an hour.
And I looked at the owner of that electrical company and I said,
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Chapter 5: What lessons did William learn from his failures in business?
And I invited her to a party. Party's on Sunday. It's at 11 o'clock in the morning. It's going to church. So we went to church. I usually get down and I meditate a little bit and I pray. And I thank God for this particular experience. And when I looked up, she had her hands raised at God. And she was praising God. And I said, this is the chick.
She's the one?
She's still the one. I took her to an auction, tax deed, because I bought a lot of tax deeds. And I told her, let's go to the auction. You've never been to the auction. I took her to the tax deed auction. And on the top floor was the place where you get married and applied for a marriage license. This is the opportunity of your life. Let's get married now. To this day.
I've been married with Maria. Very happily married.
How many years?
So I've got Maria since 2002, 2003. So. Yeah.
So about 23 years. My man.
Beautiful, beautiful relationship. There's no secrets. Very transparent. Knows everything. So there's nothing that anybody can go to Maria and say, look, listen, we know this about William because she knows it all.
So that helps a lot. 23 years of marriage. Man, that's a beautiful thing, brother. Beautiful. All right. And then now you were able to go ahead and rebuild yourself again. And you're on your path to building these thousand doors. Anything in between that you think you could think of that happened that dramatically changed everything for you? Did you get into any critical incidents?
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Chapter 6: How does William incorporate his past experiences into his current work?
They're momentarily. They're there for a purpose. And at the end of the day, it produces glory. So I know that when I'm on the hump, I just got to be cautious because The hump is a very tricky place. The hump is, there's so much treasures in the hump. The hump allows you to look from The top down to see what the surroundings, what took you to the hump.
People have a misunderstanding of what crashing and burning is. Crashing and burning is one of the most beautiful things that has happened in my life. That's where I got my strength from. I didn't get my strength from being successful. I got my strength from crashing and burning.
Obviously, my crash and burn was catastrophic for my life because it put me in a particular situation, which I'm grateful for that. But all dynamics, all situations that do occur, Paul, in my life have a purpose. It's all purpose-driven. I don't find myself with the largest. So I lost my hero on Earth, which was my dad.
that that you know you want to look at you want to look at your parents as as these individuals for some they're good people and for others they're evil for me my dad was an evil human being because i didn't understand him as a communicator so for years just because he was a bad communicator doesn't mean that the message was wrong or the message was wasn't the truth you just you
You rebel against that and you twist it to benefit you because everybody wants to tell the story as to you want others to view it. No, the more transparent you are in the hump, the better it is. You have control how long you're going to be in that hump. It's your personality, it's the me factor that doesn't allow you to leave that hump.
For me, it was like, how catastrophic can it be if I was nowhere and then up
on the hill and then boom you're back on the ground and even worse you're less than zero you have to understand that the foundation starts under the earth if you don't find firmness if you don't bore and find rock you're not going to be solid you're going to be always shifting so the hump is always going to be full of springs in the bottom you're always going to be shaking is to watch it when you think you're firm because you're going to fall and hurt yourself
what is that that catastrophic scene does for me it gives me the opportunity to view and allow me the opportunity to say what got me here stop think how do i wiggle out of this situation versus allowing my emotions that don't edify my emotions don't do anything for me it's just the storage it's a phantom it's a figment of my imagination it lasts a fraction of a second disappears the emotion is gone i don't i don't my life doesn't revolve around that particular scene what happens is
You tell a story as transparent as you can with the evidence that overlays the result. If there is no result, there's no evidence of result, It's not a good story. It's a make-it-up story. It's like Harvey the Rabbit. It's a figment of your imagination. It doesn't list. Boom, you made it up, and that's it. No, you need the evidence.
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