What I have learned over my lifetime about Real Estate Investment

[James Lord]

I have been in the real estate industry for 17 years and in construction for almost 30 years (wow, I feel old now). I currently own a company which has over 24 properties and is acquiring more each month. I have flipped more homes than I can honestly count and have owned enough rentals to make most people's head spin over the years. Today, we flip, others we are turning into long term rentals. I teach live classes and webinars, both on what I call retail real estate and investing. 

I am often asked the number one thing I can share about real estate investing. If I had to boil it all down, I would say that a real estate investor is truly a problem solver rather than an investor in the traditional sense. Real Estate is the only investment I know of that if it begins to go south, you have the power to shift the direction and make it profitable again. I tell every new investor, be ready for change and always have a back up plan, if not two. 

Prices will go up and down, markets will be sellers or buyers. The way to fail is to dwell on what is wrong and stop looking for opportunity. Opportunity is always around us in America, it is your responsibility as an investor in real estate to find it. It is important to learn as much as you can, about all aspects of real estate. If you flip, learn about rentals, if you do rentals learn about lease to purchase and land contracts. If you look into all avenues you can easily find ways to transform bad investments into good investments. 

I am not saying having knowledge will make things easy. I am saying that having knowledge will empower you to dig out of the bad and take advantage of the good. Knowing what your options are, allow you to take a bad flip and make it a profitable rental, a bad rental and make it a profitable lease to purchase, if you own a lot and you are not building, lease to make a community farm, they are popular and can earn you cash. Real estate is full of opportunities. 

[James Lord]

@Marshall M. my biggest mistakes? Many. My biggest mistake has always been holding properties too long. We flip our properties very fast, my crew can knock out a full rehab in weeks. We do everything in house but I tend to take attention off less profitable flips and focus on the most profitable. You can't do that, your strategy should always be get all of them in and out quickly and if one is less profitable, find a way to make it better. Add some upgrades or remove some upgrades. Take a look around at your market and see what is selling at the most money and find the least expensive way to get there. 

Today we are focused on the single family home market. I am in Phoenix and our market is still hot even with what is going on today. We do focus more on homes that can be easily made into profitable rentals however as we tend to look at it make $10K today fast or make $50K over the next 10 years. That said, all depends on the property.