How do you add value to other people?

Question

This is a question I've been asking this question for the past few year, and honestly I don't feel any closer to an answer. Yeah there are tons of things you can do for people, but I'm talking about truly adding more value than you ask for. So, what do you consider to be adding value? How do you add value to the people around you?

David Garner · Answer

First... great question!

For me, leading with adding value has been the cornerstone of scaling our business to 100+ doors.

Precisely how we add value depends very much on to whom we are dealing with. Everyone has different needs, so here are some examples from my own business:

For my prospective passive investors, I provide a ton of free education, articles, videos, workshops etc. This leads to new funding partners.

For existing investors that have funded deals for us, we give them a ton of timely information about our whole business. Keep them very up to date with all of our activities, as well as the market as a whole, and I make sure I am always available to speak to them personally. This has led to around 50% of new funding partners coming from referrals.

For folk that bring me off-market deals, I have helped them to sell the houses I did not want to (or could not) buy. This has led to me getting first refusal on the best deals as they come in.

For my relator, I have referred multiple investors, and her business has grown exponentially as a result. I still get first refusal on ay listing she gets that ft my buy box.

For my tenants, I carry out repairs immediately, and offer certain amount of considered flex if they have financial issues one or two months. Almost all our tenants now pay on time (in C Class neighbourhoods), and we had around 90% rent collection through covid.

I have referred other investors to my title company. They always rush through a closing if I need them to.

More than anything else, the little things like giving praise for a job well done, and thanking people for their service to our business goes way further than you might imagine in today's world.

In short, how you add value depends on what the person you are adding value for needs.

Find out what they need specifically, and do that!

I have found the best way to find that out is simply to ask!

Joe Splitrock · Answer

I have posted near 10,000 responses on BiggerPockets, helping thousands of people work through problems. I have never asked any one of those people for anything. Every friend of mine has been offered investing advice and help/mentoring on buying rental properties. I rarely ask for anything from anyone, but my life is filled with abundance.

The best thing I can say is always give without the expectation of receiving and give way more than you receive. Do that and your life will be filled with abundance.

Scott E. · Answer

Great feedback above from David. That'll be hard to top! But since you don't specify who you are trying to add value to, I will just generically add that you need to understand peoples pain points. Everybody has pain points, no matter who they are, how experienced they are, or how organized they appear to be.

What's a pain point of mine right now? I'm looking for $1-$1.5M single family homes between 3,500-5,500 square feet in zip code 85XXX and I cannot find deals to save my life right now.

What's a pain point of my mentor's right now? He owns and self manages 65 commercial properties in my area and doesn't have enough time to spend with his kids or family anymore.

What's a pain point of my general contractor right now? He is receiving more requests for jobs than he is staffed to handle. So he has started to turn down about half of the job requests he receives due to not understanding how to scale his business in this market.

Identify the person's pain point, then figure out how you can help alleviate that pain point for them.

Kerry Noble Jr · Answer

Ever read the book The Go Giver? I analyze everyone that I come across.....I see what they have going on see if I can find inefficiencies and tell them......this is what I can do for you.....to bring value

Karl B. · Answer

You identify a need, issue or problem/complaint a person is having and you offer to help them with it.

If you solve a problem for someone or take care of something the person simply doesn't want to do themselves: you're adding value.

And if you realllllly want to add value you can offer to do something you see that could be a potential issue.

When I worked in film I would always try to spot potential issues before they were a problem; Oh, look - we're running low on bags of beef jerky and I know that the grips will get pissy if there aren't any there for them to eat when they're on their afternoon break - better have catering head to Costco to buy some more bags of jerky snack.

How does this story translate to real estate? Something like - I see the sidewalks in front of your rental property aren't shoveled and the city tends to ticket properties who don't shovel. I'll take care of this issue for you. And you can do so by telling the tenants to shovel, to shovel it yourself, to get the landlord shoveling quotes, etc.

How do you add value to other people?

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