Looking for new real estate coach.

[Christopher Pearson]

Hi, I am a young out of state investor looking for a new real estate coach. Ultimately need help keeping my mind straight on RE and my next and best moves. At the end of the day I basically am ready to pay someone to talk with weekly or monthly to help me and maybe even partner with. Much appreciated!

[Leo R.]

@Christopher Pearson let me re-frame what @Nicholas L. is saying: REIAs are an excellent opportunity to network, and therefore offer a great opportunity to find a coach.

RE: coaching: There are real estate coaching programs out there, but they tend to be wildly expensive (tens of thousands of dollars), and for most beginner investors, it’s very doubtful that it’s worth the cost.

If you’re looking for a mentor/coach, I suggest doing two things: 1) figure out what value you are going to bring to the coach (more on that below), and 2) clearly communicate that value to potential coaches.

No experienced investor will want to mentor/coach someone unless that person clearly demonstrates the value they’re bringing to the table. This is 100x more true if the person asking to be coached is relatively inexperienced (because inexperienced people take more time and effort to coach, and bring more risk).

The value the mentee brings might be in the form of coaching fees, investment capital, experience, access to deals, the ability to put in a lot of work, social media expertise, accounting expertise, marketing expertise, etc., etc., but they have to bring SOMETHING to the table--and they must be VERY clear about what that thing is, so potential mentors/coaches see a reason to partner with them.

Also—and very importantly—the value the mentee brings, has to be sufficiently valuable to the mentor (and if the mentor is a highly experienced and successful RE investor, they ain't gonna come cheap!) --this is because perceived "value" depends on a person's net worth. For instance, a thousand bucks holds totally different "value" to a poor person than it does to a millionaire. If you pay a “coach” who has no net worth a thousand bucks, you’ve just changed their life! …but, if you pay a coach who’s a multi-millionaire a thousand bucks, they couldn’t care less—a thousand bucks to them is pocket change, and they’ve got bigger fish to fry! Because of this, the more experienced the coach is, and the higher the net worth they have, the more value the mentee must bring to the table in order to make it worth the coach’s time.

This is exponentially more true for mentees with little/no experience--because successful RE investors know that "mentoring" a rookie is often code for "wasting my time trying to help someone who's constantly screwing up (because they're a beginner) and getting nothing in return". Why should a high net-worth, highly experienced investor put their time, money, experience, reputation, and resources on the line for someone with no experience? ...you'll have to answer that question if you want to create a partnership with anyone worth partnering with!

All too often, we see folks on the forums with little or no real estate experience who want to "partner" with a coach/mentor, but who have no idea how to make it worthwhile for the coach (and, not surprisingly, they never find a coach).

So, my suggestion is: if you’re looking for a coach/mentor, first and foremost, communicate what value you are going to bring to them (and it needs to be more specific than “I’ll pay”, because again—if the coach is a high net worth person who makes $1000/hour in their sleep, it’s probably going to take more than a small coaching fee to entice them). The first impression you want to make on potential coaches is clearly and convincingly showing the value you're going to bring to them--so they have a reason to work with you.

Good luck out there!