Excited to Join the BP Team!

[Zachary Brown]

Hi Everyone! 

New investor here excited to get involved in the community and start finding great deals! As a newbie, one of my challenges is determining the value I'm bringing to the table as I know the best way to get folks to do their best work for you is to be able to offer them value first and help their business succeed! Based on what I've learned so far, I'm at the phase of creating my Core Four team, Real Estate Agent first, and building out from there (lender, contractor, PM). I'm meeting with a couple agents in my area this week and next and want to be able to go into those meetings with value, not just as a sponge soaking up all of their expertise as that's the value they bring to me. Appreciate any advice/tips that you have to be best prepared for those meetings and excited to start engaging with everyone in the BP community! 

About Me - I'm a lawyer working in the IT Industry in the Cary, NC area and have been here for about 9 years. I met my wife here and we have an 8 month old baby girl named Bella! My REI goals are to get started with my first LTR property ASAP (using the BRRR method) so I can build a portfolio. I'm open to other strategies as well as I've seen many folks talking about STR, Mid-term Rentals (MTR?), fix and flip, etc. BRRR with LTR seems appealing as my goal is to put in place additional income streams with minimal work required on my end (once they're in place). I'm aware that is going to require getting a team of rockstars in place who can make those dreams come true (while also growing their businesses as well of course! Let's all win together!) and it seems to me that here is where I start to find that team and learn what I need to know to be an informed, responsible, and successful investor.

My Fears Currently: 

1) Time - Not having enough time to devote to being a real estate investor. My job, while it has lull periods, can be very taxing and so managing a portfolio of properties could become overwhelming if I don't put the right foundations in place. I'm afraid I won't be able to devote enough time to successfully find good deals, rehab the properties, manage the properties (or the PMs), etc. 

2) Fear of the Unknown - I know right now that I'm knowledgable enough to be dangerous and so my fear is that I'll hit the pitfalls that I don't know to avoid. Obviously the only remedy for this is learning and experience, so I'll be mitigating this with my aggressive type A personality which will drive me to learn quickly and forgive mistakes along the way.

Appreciate any advice y'all have and very excited to get involved with this community! 

[Zachary Brown]

Quote from @Jacob St. Martin:

Hello Zachary! First, it is incredible that you want to take control of your financial future for you and your family. Real estate is definitely the way to do it. It is good that you are able to address the fears that are holding you back because once you find a way to overcome those, you will be off to the races! Here are my thoughts on them. 

Time: Based on what you have told me in your post, you are right to be concerned about time. I have heard that being a lawyer is very demanding and I am sure adding a baby to the mix makes things even crazier! Additionally, the BRRRR method can be very time consuming. However, there are ways to invest in real estate that involve little to no time and can produce returns better than what you could get elsewhere. The three main methods to do this are traditional LTRs, syndications, and partnerships. LTRs can be passed off to a property manager and are relatively passive but will probably only get you 10-15% at best but this is even hard to find in many places now. Syndications are typically for large multifamily properties where you would be fully passive and hands off and investing in a bigger fund. You would likely get returns of 10-15% at best. Partnerships on the other hand can offer much higher returns and you can work out with your potential partner how involved you want to be. If you are interested in either of these let me know! I have a friend who is doing a capital raise for his syndication, and I happen to be looking for a partner on an STR deal where the capital partner would get an expected return of 20-30%.

The Unknown: There are really only two ways to overcome this, jump in headfirst on your own, or partner with someone more experienced. 

Feel free to reach out if you have any other questions and I would be glad to talk! 

Thanks Jacob! Appreciate the insight! I’ll PM and we can connect further.