How-To Guide - Is Real Estate Investing Right For You?

If I knew then what I know now, I never would have voted for the war.
Ken Lucas

For me the greatest source of income is still movies. Nothing - stocks, financial speculation, real estate speculation or businesses - makes more money for me than making movies.
Jackie Chan

I have 1900 units, why do I need a 401K?
Robert Kiyosaki, recent interview Time Magazine

To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.
William Shakespeare

From Robert Kiyosaki to Donald Trump, from Robert Allen Carleton Sheets, from Dolf de Roos to Diane Kennedy, investing in real estate is touted as a way for average people with time, money and patience to build wealth.

But is investing in real estate right wealth vehicle for everyone? If this were a one-size fits-all-world the answer would be yes. But, then, stocks would be the perfect investment vehicle for everyone and the discussion would end there. I have had investment real estate since 1994. I have had tenants attempt to squat in my properties, I have been sued, I have had a unit vandalized, someone drove into one of my buildings and I gave gone through my fair share of property managers.

If I knew then, what I know now, would I have bought my first property? The answer is yes. Real estate has done more for me than the stock market has with less overall financial risk despite the headaches and they have been many.

Five Ways to Know if Real Estate Investing is Right for You.

1. Are you a good manager of your personal resources or do you have significant amounts of short term debt? If the answers are no and yes, in that order, do not invest in real estate until you address these issues. Real estate is illiquid. Once purchased, the hold time on your new property may be significantly longer than you anticipate. This means that your potential exposure to unplanned expenses on your property may be longer than anticipated. Significant amounts of short term debt or the inability to plan your finances in anticipation of expenses may turn your real estate investment into a financial nightmare.

2. Are you a team player and can you captain that team? Investing in real estate means partnering with others to ensure your success and recognizing that your partners may know more than you. You will encounter brokers, property managers, attorneys, handy men, plumbers, electricians, contractors, roofers, inspectors, mortgage brokers and appraisers. If you are a control freak, prefer to work alone or cannot be direct in your communication when working with people, real estate investing may not be right for you.

3. Do you understand the kind of investing you will be doing? Will you be investing for cashflow or speculating for appreciation? Do you have the analytical tools necessary to help you work up a pro-forma for the property you will be buying?

4. Do you truly understand that wealth-building in real estate occurs over many years and that you have to "survive" your first couple of properties to build wealth? Over 20 years ago I started baking bread. The guide book I bought featured a "loaf for learning", a basic loaf that I could practice kneading, mixing and still turn out an edible product. Your first properties will be "buildings for learning". As you move beyond the initial learning curve, you will move on to create wealth. In certain markets, real-estate can produce appreciation returns beyond expectations and create the illusion that real estate produces instant cash. In my life I have seen two such markets. Frankly I would not want my future financial well-being to rest on my ability to time markets. Sophisticated investors have as their core investments, cashflow properties, properties that perform during hot or cold markets.

5. How do you react to unpleasant business news? Is your overall reaction anger that dissipates into a sense of helplessness or do you become a problem solver? Being able to solve problems is the key to having a successful business and investing in real-estate is a business. Real-estate is also a people business, by this I mean your tenants are people and the service personnel who will work on and market your properties are people. If the failings of others afflicts you with moral indignation and heartache, real estate investing is not for you. Tenants will fail to pay the rent and you will have to evict them, your property manager will charge you market or above market for repairs and will fail to market your properties properly in order to keep them full.

While real estate investing is a great way to build wealth, investing in real estate isn't for everyone. It is easy to "catch the fever" and jump without looking, the first step is to make sure that you know yourself; these five points of consideration will assist you to that end.

The next step is to educate yourself about your local market, financing options, price and rents. You can start by finding a local Cashflow or real estate investing club. If you join a local real estate investing club make sure some of the members actually own investment property. That way the club won't just be a club of "wannabes".

Next assemble your team of property managers, accountants, brokers and agents. You will do this by interviewing prospects. Once you decide on a team, you will still have to trade the members out from time to time.

A Real Estate Investing Idea For Total Newbies

All right, you've seen the infomercials for people like Carleton Sheets, or you read an ebook by somebody like T. C. and Vickie Bradley, and you're hot to trot out your wallet and get rich with real estate investing...just like everybody else.

Whoa, Trigger.

Not everybody IS getting rich with real estate investing, no matter what the hype leads you to believe.

First, let's understand a couple of things. There ARE people getting rich with real estate investing. Many of these people have followed the lead of Carleton Sheets or T. C. Bradley or other real estate investing gurus. Those are facts.

Here is one additional fact. If you don't know what you are doing, you can lose your shirt in real estate investing...like a lot of other people.

That's not to say you can't learn, and it's not to say that people like Carleton Sheets or T. C. and Vickie Bradley can't teach you. What it does mean is that you can't listen to one tape, or read one book and run out the door asking for somebody to please take the contents of your wallet! You have got to take the time and make the effort to learn the facts, steps, and inside information necessary to become successful in real estate investing.

However, I realize that those dollar bills are burning a hole in your pocket and you want to get started NOW, so here's a simple way to begin your trek to the top.

Let me tell you how Lois got her real estate investing empire started in Austin, TX. She looked around until she found a small, but well-maintained 4-unit apartment complex in a nice Austin neighborhood. The price was right, so, not having the credit herself to swing the deal, she got her dad to cosign with her. Once the place was hers, she moved into one unit (no more rent to pay), the rent from another unit covered the monthly mortgage, and the rent from the other two units was hers to keep.

Not exactly a get rich quick plan, but it was a start. Since she still had a full time job, she used the extra money from the apartments to pay off bills and loans, including the mortgage, at an accelerated rate. This gave her leverage to buy another unit, and the rest is history. She now is an Austin slumlord...! Seriously, she has done well in this simple way and has grown her initial real estate investment considerably.

In his article, "Buy High Yielding Turnkey Real Estate Investments With Your Signature Alone!", Bill Young, a former bank mortgage officer and real estate investor since 1980 gives valuable pointers in getting started in this sort of deal, sometimes with no down payment required. You can find a copy of this article at http://real--estate--investing.blogspot.com/2006/03/real-estate-investing-buy-with-your.html

While wheeling-and-dealing in real estate investments can make fortunes, there is a learning curve required to make the kind of money professionals like Carleton Sheets and T. C. Bradley do. If you are a total newbie and just HAVE to get into real estate investing, you might be well advised to follow the example of my friend, Lois, and start with small, occupied apartment units, perhaps using some of the space as a residence, as she did, and using income from the units for investment growth.