Influencer Ferrari Jay Shares How Losing Her Father at 5 Shaped Her Drive to Build a Business Empire

When it comes to model Ferrari Jay, most people see a beautiful model with a self-built success story. What they miss, however, is the deep and emotional backstory: a girl whose father died when she was 5, whose mother chose everyone else, and who made herself a promise that became a prophecy.

“I didn’t have someone handing me money, guiding me, protecting me, or telling me I was capable,” she recalls. “But even as a young girl, I knew I wanted more for myself. A different future, a different life, a different story.”

Jay made her first dollar at 12, running a concession stand and selling hockey pucks at a local rink. At 15, she earned her Certified Nurse Aide license. At 17, while still in high school, she moved out of her mother's house, worked full-time as a CNA, attended school full-time and took first place in a bikini competition. At 18, she got her real estate license and became a top-producing agent.

By 2022, she had her Broker's license, opened her own brokerage and now co-owns a home-building division. She also runs property management operations, co-owns a ProteinHouse and has built a content creation platform.

The narrative around young, successful women usually goes one of two ways: lucky or connected. Jay fits neither mold, her origin story reading like a survival manual. She didn't start working because she had to. She started because she was determined to create a different life and never repeat the patterns she grew up around.

Here's what stands out: each venture emerged from a different season, all rooted in the same promise. "Each business I've built came from a different season of my life, but all of them were rooted in the same promise I made to myself when I was young: I would never live the way my family lived, and I would create a life far bigger than the one I was born into."

Real estate gave her the start. Home building fueled her love for design and community. Property management gave her stability after a childhood where nothing was stable. ProteinHouse connected her to health, people and purpose. Content creation is where her passion and purpose collide.

Saying she simply built businesses would be reductive. The girl who has nothing reverse-engineered her past into a formidable career in business, and now she's teaching other women the formula: your past doesn't define you. It prepares you.