Real Deal REInvestor Network

In the book “Acres of Diamonds” by Dr. Russell Conwell, you will find an inspirational story of an extremely successful man who came from a poor economic background. He is not very famous but once you take a look at what he has done you will wonder why he wasn’t famous. Dr. Russell Conwell talked about how we must begin where we are & what we are in order to advance to the next level. The biggest obstacle I feel that we face is ourselves. If we don’t improve ourselves in the inside, how are we going to improve the world? The thoughts that we think about the most will ultimately dominate our focus to the point where our reality is created. Dr. Russell Conwell was a great leader because through out his whole life he was always recognized as a person of righteousness. A New Yorker man who was head of a great corporation mentioned that Dr. Russell Conwell has done more good than any man who has lived since Jesus Christ. Can you imagine that? I noticed that his work ethics were above admirable (16 hour every day!). He used a sword that was symbolic to him to remind him of his WHY. The sword it self has a story of its own, but I find it remarkable the way he used this sword to impact the world the way he did. Through out his life he was always known of being a great leader. He empowered others & had the ability of communicating very effectively. Out of all of the accomplishments that he did, what I find the most fascinating is the fact that he thought of money as an instrument for helpfulness! For example, the money he made from his speeches of “Acres of Diamonds” was given in form of a scholarship to a student of need to advance their studies. This impacted me the most because his action of helping others with his talents is truly impressive. He would also help the poor families in the churches by giving them food. I feel that God blessed this man so much because his actions were geared towards helping others. What are you doing to help make the world a better place to live in? What will your legacy look like?

 

 

 

 

P.T. Barnum wrote "The Art of Money Getting" in the 1800s and it's still valuable advice today.  He discusses human actions/motivations and frankly, those haven't changed over the past 150 years.

 Economy does not consist of pinching pennies on necessary items, then spending wildly on unnecessary items because you feel as if you have the right for luxury when you have saved on necessities.  However, "true economy consists in always making the income exceed the out-go."   Barnum suggests that when you find yourself short at the end of a year (now that's something that's changed!  We judge income by the week, or the month, now), you should create a booklet and start listing all your expenses in 2 columns.  The first should be necessities and the 2nd luxuries.  He suggests that the "luxuries" column will be ten times as much as the "necessities" and that you can live very well without most, if not all, of the items in the "luxuries" column.

Next, Barnum mentions that the foundation of success and happiness in life is good  health.  He believed that in order to have good health, we should closely follow the laws of nature, as ignorance of them will not save us from their consequences; for example, sticking your finger in the fire will get you burned, whether you know it or not.  And, my goodness did he ever HATE tobacco, going so far as to call it, "a poisoinous, filthy weed" that because the appetite for it is unnatural, "a stronger appetite is created for the hurtful thing than the natural desire for what is harmless." 

Barnum was certainly going against the popular notion that there was nothing wrong with tobacco when he wrote his book.  He was a man with great insight.  He also had something to say about drinking alcohol, "no matter how bountifully a man may be blessed with intelligence, if the brain is muddled, and his judgement warped by intoxicating drinks, it is impossible for him to carry on business successfully."  I have seen this in the absolute halt of a career of someone very close to me.  When he takes clients out at night, he starts drinking and always winds up drinking too much.   It has certainly had an adverse affect on his career.

The next excellent advice Barnum gives is to do what you love and he thinks that parents should encourage their children to follow the career that is most suited to what their children love.  "Unless a man enters upon the vocation intended for him by nature, and best suited to his peculiar genius, he cannot succeed."  As an example, he talks about how some boys love to do puzzles and build things as children, and some do not.  He states that he would have made an awful engineer because he was one who didn't like to do those things as a child.

And after a person chooses the best vocation, they need to pick the best place to practice it.  You can ruin your chances for success by putting your business in a place not suited for it.  The place you choose needs to have both the infrastructure, enough interested customers and not too much competition.

Barnum's next point is that one should avoid debt, especially if you are just starting out.  "There is scarcely anything that drags a person down like debt.  It is a slavish position to get in."  When a person buys things that he cannot yet afford, he is letting interest work against him, rather than for him.  He is not talking about people who use credit to turn a profit or to buy something that will retain value like land, but those who use it to purchase unneeded items -- like clothes or expensive cars -- that do not make you a return.

"Money is in some respects like fire; it is a very excellent servant but a terrible master.  When you have it mastering you; when interest is constantly piling up against you, it will keep you down in the worst kind of slavery.  But let money work for you, and you have the most devoted servant in the world."

"When a man is on the right path, he must persevere."  Do not be someone with BSO syndrome.  BSO is 'Bright, Shiny Object' and it means that every time you see something new and interesting, you drop what you are currently doing to pursue that opportunity.  Well, if you do that without mastering the ones before, you will never succeed.  You must stick to one right thing until you master it; then, and only then, you may consider moving on to the next.

This flows into his next point that whatever you choose to do, you should do to the utmost.  "Work at it, if necessary, early and late, in season and out of season, not leaving a stone unturned, and never deferring for a single hour that which can be done just as well now."  Procrastination has certainly gotten me into some bad situations and it's something that I have to work at overcoming all the time.  As Barnum says, "Fortune always favors the brave, and never helps a man who does not  help himself."  And what is procrastination anyway, but letting fear stop you from doing what you should be doing anyway?

 As you can see, I could write a book on all the excellent advice in Barnum's book.  For now, I will simply bullet point the rest of the advice that he gives and I will expect that you will READ THIS BOOK.  It's brilliant and is just as valuable today as it was when it was written 150 years ago.  Here are the rest of the points:

• Depend upon your own exertions/know your business exceptionally well
• Use the best tools
• Don't get above your business/you must work to succeed
• Learn something useful, and make your children learn a useful profession too.
• Be systematic/do your work promptly/use a schedule
• Read newspapers
• Do not invest in things you do not understand (heard this somewhere else, have you?  Can't thing where?  Let me give you a hint.  He's called the Sage of Omaha)
• Don't lend money without obtaining security for it.
• Advertise your business/people don't remember ads unless they see them repeatedly "advertising is like learning -- 'a little is a dangerous thing.'"
• Be polite and kind to your customers
• Be charitable
• Don't blab -- keep your business secrets to yourself.
• Your integrity "is more precious than diamonds or rubies."  If people do not trust you, they will not do business with you.

I hope this essay of mine will encourage you to read Barnum's book for yourself.  By the time I was done, almost the entire thing was covered in yellow highlighter.

All the best,
Christy Mellott
Millionaire in Training, MMMChallenge.com
www.realdealcommunity.com 

"Flipping Properties" by William Bronchick and Robert Dahlstrom is one of the other books I always recommend to beginning real estate investors.  

Bill Bronchick is a Colorado attorney who is also a very active investor and heads the Colorado Association of Real Estate Investors.  And Bobby Dahlstrom is an investor and a contractor in Colorado.  He's very experienced and approachable.  As a matter of fact, he has a booth at all of the CAREI meetings.  I had met him before I realized that he had co-authored this book with Bill, though I had read the book long before.

The book gives you an excellent overview of the process.  It takes you through what a flip is and through the mechanics of real estate transactions.  It shows you how to find deals, and gives you examples of ads that have worked for them.  

It tells you how to analyze a deal and teaches you how to negotiate it.  It gives you the legal forms you need, and tells you how to find money to buy the properties.  It takes you through the closing process.  Then it gives you information on estimating repairs even including  a list of repairs and their average costs.

In addition to the deal process itself, the book covers liability and tax issues.  It teaches you how to get started, how to build a team, who you should talk to and how to really succeed at this business.

This is a book that you can find on Amazon.com or just about anywhere.  I think it's one of the best books on flipping properties, if not the best.

Now, go buy a house! 

You may not think this book belongs in book reviews for a real estate site, but if you're interested in time-saving tools, this has been a great one for me.

Leanne Ely, the creator of the "Saving Dinner" cookbooks has put together a series of cookbooks that include not only 6 nights dinner menus for each week it includes the grocery list that you need to purchase for the week.  Seriously, it's the missing link of cookbooks.  

Each week in the original cookbook includes a fish, a vegetarian, a crock pot, a beef, a pork and a chicken menu, so your family gets a variety of meals.  The dinners generally take a half hour or less to prepare.  Better yet, even my exceptionally picky 7 year old son loves the food!

The author has written several other cookbooks that build on the original "Saving Dinner."  These include low carb, vegetarian and holiday options.  If a cookbook is too much work, she'll even email you a weekly menu with the shopping list.  

You can check out the cookbooks on her website, savingdinner.com, or on amazon.com.  Her menu mailers are available on her website.

So, for those of us who are in charge of cooking for our families, or who know someone who is, this is a great time and headache saving resource. 

Ray Cooper's book, "How to Sell a House Fast in a Slow Real Estate Market," is absolutely brilliant.  It's one of the three books I recommend that beginning investors read.  You might notice a trend - I only recommend books and systems by people who have actually done the trade they are writing about and who have been exceptionally successful at it.

Ray Cooper is a Realtor who has been selling houses for well over 20 years so he's seen up and down cycles in the market.  He has over 1,500 successful real estate transactions under his belt.  He's licensed in New York and North Carolina, so I suppose you could check his records, at least for a few of those years.   The book was co-authored by Bill Bronchick, a very successful real estate attorney and investor who runs the Colorado Association of Real Estate Investors (though I have to say that I believe Ray wrote the vast majority of the book -- it sounds more like him that like Bill -- I think Bill just lent his name because he's already a best-selling author)

So Ray tells you not only how to sell your house, but where to find buyers, how to stage your house, how to do an auction and when that might be appropriate, he also tells you how to evaluate the market in order to price your house properly.  It's very simple, but it's not information that everyone would think about using.  It has to do with days on market and inventory of homes which gives you the supply quotient.

I met Ray personally at a CAREI meeting where he was introducing his book.  I bought his program so I could have his cell phone and email address.  As a matter of fact, I didn't make the decision to buy it until after I was able to talk to him personally for a few minutes.   Ray is a powerhouse Realtor who is well worth listening to.  The book was written in 2009 so is very applicable to the current market and you can find it on Amazon.com for less than $20... 

Go get the book! 

This is a review of one book you can get on Amazon for less than $20 and of two programs that are considerably more expensive. 

If you are on a tight budget, start with Dwan Bent-Twyford and Sharon Restrepo's book "Short-Sale Pre-Foreclosure Investing."  You can find it on Amazon for less than $20.00.  You may even be able to check it out at your local library.

Dwan and Sharon have been doing short sales and wholesales for around 20 years.  Dwan has completed some 1,200 transactions, so she really does know her stuff.  She also has what I find to be a very approachable style.  And, Danny and Rick should appreciate this - the book starts with a section on setting goals, getting motivated and basically breaking out of your old thought patterns.  In 208 pages, they explain:

1. short sales, 
2. strategies to find distressed homeowners and distressed properties (some of them free) 
3. preparing your offer
4. dealing with banks
5. negotiating with 2nd or 3rd mortgage holders
6. the foreclosure process
7. what to do when the bank accepts your offer
8. exit strategies
9. closing
10. expectations for your first year, etc.

It's a great little step-by-step book that will take you from nothing to your first short sale deal.  I had to laugh because one of her more recent testimonials is from a man who worked his first short sale using her book and made over $100,000 profit (nice, huh?), and is now a coach for a different short sale guru.  Dwan & her husband do all of their coaching themselves, so they don't hire other people to do it for them.

The other two programs I'd like to talk about are almost identical because one of the authors was coached by the other.  These guys sell their programs from $500 to over $1000.  They also offer coaching from $97 a month to $997 a month.  And I don't believe they do their own coaching, at least not anymore.   The people are Chris McLaughlin and Nathan Jurewicz who offer the "Short Sales Riches System" and Josh Cantwell who offers the "Short Sale Success Blueprint."

Both systems are incredibly detailed, though I have to say that Josh's is more detailed and I just went to his website and found that he's offering his most current system for $47.  I don't know if this is a forced subscription, too, but for $47, it's a darn good deal.  http://www.shortsalemoneymachine.com/index_money.html
The contracts are almost word for word in each system (and yes, I read them over), so if you're interested, grab Josh's at that price.  Last time I saw Nathan and Chris's system, they were charging around $500, but I just went to their website, http://www.shortsalesriches.com/, and they're charging $997 for it now.

As an aside, Josh has changed the name of his system since I read and listened to it. 

You should also subscribe to Josh's email list even if you don't buy his program because he has regular webinars with Jeff Watson who is a brilliant attorney who specializes in short sales. His calls are always full of up to the minute information on things like the most recent FDIC regulations.  Jeff doesn't just regurgitate the latest thing that all the other gurus are spouting either.  He always gives well thought out advice. 

I would also recommend getting on Chris and Nathan's list because Chris McLaughlin, who is an attorney and real estate broker, sends out very informative emails about what's currently going on in the market.  Nathan's fun and all, but his emails are mostly sales pitches. 

I hope this helps.