Starting Out
Market News & Data
General Info
Real Estate Strategies
Landlording & Rental Properties
Real Estate Professionals
Financial, Tax, & Legal
Real Estate Classifieds
Reviews & Feedback
Updated about 8 years ago, 11/15/2016
New Investors
Good morning everyone!
My name is Kelan, and my fiancee's name is Liz. We are completely new to the real estate investing world. A quick little blurb about us: I am currently a Physical Therapist, and Liz is a Realtor. We live in Des Moines, Iowa, and we have two beautiful children together!
Being that Liz is a Realtor, we feel like we have an edge when it comes to beginning a real estate investment company. Our goal is to create financial freedom for ourselves, and to be able to support our kids throughout ours and their lives. We are tired of compensating our time for money! We are ready to invest into the next phase of our lives.
We recently attended the Fortune Builders 3-day seminar. Any people here have experience with that, or any good/bad feedback regarding the seminar/"mastery" program they try to sell? To sum it up, being beginners, there was a lot of good information that we obtained, BUT.....we did not give in and buy into the program. Hence, we are beginning to do our own research, and taking the steps towards building our investment company.
In general, we are looking for tips, pointers, advice, really anything that can help is get started. Liz is actually working with an investor, and beginning to look at doing more Wholesales. We are also interested in rental properties, to get that "Passive" income. In the end, we would like nothing more than to incorporate wholesales, renting, and flipping into our investment company. We have to start somewhere, so any suggestions/advice would be greatly appreciated. We would love a little guidance in regards to putting systems into place to become successful, while making sure we have ours butts covered when in comes to legalities, along with any other information about starting a real estate investment company.
I apologize for the long introduction, hopefully it didn't bore you all. I look forward to hearing some of your thoughts! Take care, have a great day!
Kelan and Liz
Hi @Kelan Krohe! Welcome to the site! It's great to have you here. Feel free to ask any questions in the forums.
Welcome to the field! Feel free to reach out if you need help getting started. We broke into the DSM market in 2014, have plowed some serious soil since.
Hey Kelan and Liz!
Welcome! I think as you dig around BiggerPockets, you're going to find a treasure trove of info here. I've never been to a seminar, but sometimes I feel like the time spent in BP.com forums and listening to the BP podcast (listen to that if you haven't yet) has been like a master's class.
One of the sayings that stuck out from a podcast that I think has been helpful for me along the way (relative newbie myself, just a handful of SFR houses) has been "Imperfect action over perfect planning". That's not to say don't plan, quite the contrary, but if your analysis says a house would be perfect if only it were $1,000 cheaper, or had another 25 sq ft, go for it. Or if you're looking at houses online, but not scheduling viewings (which will be a lot easier with that RE license), go for it!
All the best, feel free to reach out if I can help!
Hey Kelan welcome to BP!
Wecome @Kelan Krohe I am new here myself and find this site to be unbelievable helpful. Good luck to you two!
@Kelan Krohe Welcome to BP and congrats on this exciting new chapter for your family! I know the beginning is a heady combination of thrill and terror, so just breathe.
You're definitely in the right place, just make sure you set up good keyword alerts and use good keywords in your posts to ensure more people see them. And if you see people that you find informative or helpful in an REI niche that you are interested in, reach out to them personally. The vast majority of people here are very helpful and gracious, and if you find someone that is not interested in talking unless you're cutting a check...well, all the easier to weed out the less scrupulous that lurk among us ;)
My advice for you, seeing that you have interest in a number of different investment types, is to have an honest conversation about what you can reasonably expect of yourselves right now. Do you have the time to devote to wholesaling (hitting the pavement to find deals, advertising, networking, it's a tough gig, though it can be lucrative)? Do you have the time, energy, and experience to do your own rehab work on flips that need more than just a cosmetic upgrade? Do you have the capital and loan access to begin building a portfolio of rentals now to generate 'passive' income? If so, how passive do you want/need that income to be? Do you have the time/energy/inclination/skill to be a landlord or do rehab work or would you prefer to delegate that to others in exchange for a lower ROI? If you are still working full time, the honest answers to these questions (for now) may narrow down your feasible first steps pretty quickly.
How much control do you need feel? Do you need your properties to be in-state even if the returns are better elsewhere? Are you comfortable taking on debt? How much? While a good investment should pay for itself (either in tenants paying down a note or in sale profits) it can still be a big psychological hurdle for many people.
A lot of new investors get their feet wet in wholesaling or turnkey and then incorporate other REI niches as they accumulate capital, leave their jobs, have kids leave the nest, or just have more time and energy for whatever reason. Be brutally honest with yourselves and know that the answers to these questions can and will change later. To be successful in the beginning means getting right with your constraints, your needs, your challenges, not just your goals. Don't fall into the trap of being so excited to get moving that you sacrifice more than you can afford to - be it time, money, or simply jumping into something you have no knowledge of just because it seemed 'too good to pass up'. But, on the other hand, don't let 'analysis paralysis' keep you from taking any steps at all. It's quite a tightrope walk, I know ;)
Anyway, having said allll that, if you have any questions about turnkey in general, the Birmingham market, or what we do at Spartan, feel free to reach out any time.
Best of luck!
Clayton
@Clayton Mobley Thank you so much for your input/suggestions, everything you mentioned makes complete sense. We appreciate you taking the time to reach out, and help narrow down a direction to move forward. We may definitely reach out, and "pick your brain", as I see you founder your Spartan Invest company, and we may have many questions regarding starting/building our own company!