Hey everyone! Happy new year! It's been such a long time since my last post... say 3 months too long! But I do have great news and updates on the journey.
There is a book written by American entrepreneur and investor Peter Thiel (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Thiel) called Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future. The basic idea is that the beginning of any success is going from nothing to having one (1) and building off of that.
I'm glad to say that I have a house under contract and will be getting that #1 property soon! That "let's start a real estate empire with #1" property! As long as nothing goes wrong, I'm expecting to close by the end of January.
Now I'm not really in uncharted startup territory... Real estate and owning property isn't exactly a new concept and I'm also using traditional/conventional financing at 20% down. But for me, personally, I have come to the realization that this one property will have to be run as a business otherwise I won't be able to get on the right track for future growth.
What do I mean by that?
When I say it needs to be run as a business, I mean that all the financials will have to be tracked and I need to have a team in place in case something goes wrong. It can't be treated as a normal investment, like a normal stock purchase is for me... that buy it, set it, and hope for the best.
You see, I can't control the stock market and my understanding of why company values go up and down are limited. I'm trying to learn to be a better stock investor, and not a speculator. So that's why I'm in the real estate game.
Currently we're looking to find tenants for the property, and that means it should be income producing on the 1st year of service. That also means that I'll have a running list of expenses and reserves that I need to account for - think new roofs, windows, etc. Income/revenues and expenses/capital reserves?? Sounds like a business to me!
Now what?
So now that I have #1 - I'll update when it's actually closed and on the market to be rented out - my goal now is to get at least 5 more in 2016. I'd also rather use OPM (other people's money) to finance these purchases so I'll be looking at other ways to make it work out.
I'll also start updating more often to keep myself accountable to this blog haha.
E-mail/message me if you have any questions!
