I love being able to update the BiggerPockets community about the meetup we started out here in Korea to help spread the BP message of investors helping other investors.

What started as a small group of friends (3 of us): @John Van Uytven, @Benjamin Hauser, and me, has grown into the Seoul Real Estate Investing Meetup with 319 members at last count. To see our growth, you can check out a few of my past forum posts from different months:

56 Members: http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/161...

165 Members: http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/185...

197 Members: http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/191...

247 Members: http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/204...

We've had 6 different BP-related virtual speakers as guests and our members are now working with at least 5 BP professionals (maybe more!) who are helping our members grow their portfolios (including me ^^)

I've had personal talks with both @Joshua Dorkin and @Brandon Turner to help give me direction on how to grow this meetup, so it's not just advice on real estate investment that we've received, but also guidance on how to increase the reach of our networks. Obviously, their guidance has worked ^^

And now for the latest news:

We've added two new bilingual speaking interns to help us better communicate with both our English speaking and Korean speaking members!

(TEAM - Together Everybody Achieves More)

Anyways, I'm super excited to talk about our successes as a group because I think it helps underline THREE VERY IMPORTANT POINTS:

#1 - Be Creative When Faced With Obstacles

You think you're having a difficult time investing where you live? Try living 6,000 miles away from where you want to invest! Talk about a challenge ^^ But our group members, with the help of BiggerPockets, are overcoming those obstacles.

#2 - You Don't Need to Just Buy a Property to Be Involved in Real Estate

I've said this before in my other posts, but my experience have helped drill home this one very important point - If you don't have money or experience and you want to get involved in real estate, find a way to GIVE VALUE to others. I started with ZERO Real Estate Investing Experience in 2014, but by helping to organize this meetup and delivering tons of value to our members and others, my real estate knowledge, networks, and experiences have exponentially increased. It's helped open doors that have allowed me, among other things to: help underwrite deals for others ($6 m condo deal .. and I was invited to fly in to help with due diligence), help build other people's due diligence system and learn about out of state investing in the process, and help newbies who are just starting out figure a few things out.

If you're stuck and unsure about how to get started, STOP WORRYING about how you're going to pay for your next deal (ME ME ME) and start thinking about how you can help others succeed (OTHERS OTHERS OTHERS).

#3 - The World Has Changed .. and the Internet is OPENING UP OPPORTUNITIES

Remember the day when online dating was seen as weird.. actually given how young the typical BP members are.. maybe not ^^ But I do. I remember thinking to myself - is anyone really going to put their credit card number online and make a purchase with this Amazon.com site? Now look at the world we live in. What single person doesn't have a Tinder account or Match.com ID? Who doesn't make online purchases?

Geography matters less and less. What does matter - the quality of your networks and local area expertise.

As these changes in our world continue to happen, what new opportunities will open up?

I'm not exactly sure.. but I do know that I want to be at the forefront of finding out.

Anyways, thanks once again to the BP community for helping to make this all possible.

Lots of love to everyone from Seoul, South Korea.

Special thanks to former BP Virtual Guests:

@Joshua Dorkin

@Brandon Turner

@Ali Boone

@Matt Faircloth

@Engelo Rumora

@Chris