Why some persevere and others don't.

Question

In listening to podcasts (famous four questions), the question is asked why do some succeed  while others fall to the wayside. The answer in most cases is perseverance. Keeping your hand at the plow and going forward. The follow up is never asked,"why do some persevere while others don't?"  I have found that the things that keeping me going forward in real estate, my spiritual life, family life, etc. is that I am continually feeding my mind with the things that grow me.  Whether I'm reading the Bible, listening to books, podcasts, etc., I am getting positive reinforcement to continue to do the little things that will help me to achieve my goals.

Steve Vaughan · Answer

For me it was my why. Much more than just money or a certain target monthly income.  We must align our mission, vision and purpose.  With our why in place, we are unstoppable!

Many times over the years I have wanted to quit and go get a normal j.o.b.  Another stupid house with yet another helpless dramatic tenant, ya know?  My why has kept my hand to the plow.  It is in the valley that the soil is the most fertile.  It also inspires change.  Mediocrity is our worst enemy.

ID your why and you will persevere!   Money ain't it.  Go deeper!

Jay Hinrichs · Answer

@Donald Howaniec

since this is a real estate site I can only comment on what makes people succeed at Real Estate at least from what I have seen in all my years.

their is great wealth in America RE is just one little slice of it.. Most of the wealthiest folks I personally know made their money building some kind of business and then selling it... IE  Garbage, Wine industry, Court reporting and   all sorts of niche's that don't look glamorous,  Or the high flyers in the TECH industry who many by the time they are mid 30S are rich by anyone standards.

For Real estate specific... everyone measures their success differently. .you see this on BP.. some will say once I get to 5k a month positive I can retire.. the other number which seems to be pretty universal is 10k a month.. And once someone reach's that they have it made and they are winners.

So it takes drilling down to establish what is a win and what is not.. And its personal to each person.

If you have been in RE and are still in it a decade later and making a profit then you have won.

if you get into the business and flame out in 24 months then obviously it did not work..

what makes the difference.

The differences are where you are in the RE cycle.. some markets were or are much better for letting the newbie get into the game in the first place.. IE trying to Crack San Fran.. or Manhatton Real estate can be tough.. but if you were in Vegas,, Atlanta , PHX at the bottom. you could pick up properties for 10 to 30k a door no problem.. so region and were you had knowledge led to luck of the draw..

then the ability to frankly just do it.... I know I had identified ATL. as a unbelievable buy opportunity in 2010.... one of my existing partners was stuck on watching Fox news and he just would not pull the trigger on anything.. I did my best and could only buy 54 homes.. When if this partner would have backed me I could have bought 1,000  and beat the hedge funds to it... by the time we really got going the hedges came in and knocked us little guys out.. so its timing and liquidity.  then the Nike saying just do it..

Plus experience to execute...

David Dachtera · Answer

So, once you get the money, then what?

I'm reminded specifically of a scene from the animated "A Christmas Carol" with Mr. Magoo playing Scrooge. He's at his desk opening money bags, counting coins singing:

Ringle, ringle!Coins when they minglemake such a lovely sound!

There's also a tune from the musical, "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" (which title is itself rather an amusing anachronism):

Potiphar was counting sheckles in his den below the bedroom, ...

If that's your thing, I'm happy for you, but by the end of the story, Scrooge's tune had changed:

Coins when they jingle are meant to pass around.

There HAS to be more to it than money - for me, at least.

As Tony Robbins put it, I won't work that hard just to get slips of "paper" (it's mostly cloth, actually) with pictures of deceased notables on them ... or "credits" in checking account, ...

He also says that money is not an "ends" goal. We don't want money just to have it. Hence, the question: once you get it, then what?

What is the ends goal? What will the money do for you?

The appearance is that our society values money, but this is a misperception. We want what we think the money will do for us.

It's rather like an addiction, really: addicts don't want alcohol, drugs, pleasure, etc. They want what they think their addiction does for them. In many cases, substance addiction is propagated by the fear of withdrawal pains, or the fear of losing the addiction's perceived benefit, or some combination of the two.

No one wants to be homeless and impoverished.

No one wants to feel trapped by an addiction, either: substance addiction, greed (money addiction), etc.

So, once again, once you get the money, then what?

David J Dachtera

"Success is not a destination. Failure is not an event. Success is a process, failure is a choice."- DJ Benedict

Bhekizwe M. · Answer

mission & purpose, freedom, money,making a (positive) difference in other people's life...its a bundle

Thomas S. · Answer

Motivation. For me it's money. There is no other reason to work hard. Those that fall by the wayside do not want it bad enough to persevere.

Might as well collect section 8 if money does not motivate.

Our society values money more than anything else, those that value it the most will work the hardest, persevere through all obstacles and make the most.

James DeRoest · Answer

I'm not sure you're correct. Working hard does not equal success, it merely means you did a lot of work. The effort does not always equal the reward.

When I started my working career, I worked in a large city, and met more than a few millionaires. (This is 25 years ago now). And I kinda studied them a bit, and here is what I deduced.

1. The lottery winners. These were the people who started doing something that was immediately successful. They made some widget, sold lots of them, and grew a business very quickly from that.

2. The long haul guys. These were the guys who focussed on their businesses, and grew a little each year, they were always profitable, maybe not hugely profitable, but by the time they were in their 50s they suddenly realized what they had achieved; multi million dollar businesses.

I distinctly remember a guy in the second category. His wife had run away with a woman, and he was now divorced. She got the house and kids, he got the pokey apartment. One day he was offered $10m in cash to walk away from his business, which he did more than happily. It was interesting listening to his realisation of what he had built, and what it was suddenly worth to someone else.

(For what it's worth, the ex wife suddenly discovered she was straight after all, and rekindled their love. Her lesbian lover was shown the door quicker than you can say "your ex husband has $10m in his personal checking account". (I'm not joking either.))

But it doesn't matter which route you take, they both had the same thing in common, they made money, and they always made sound business decisions.

Success wasn't about feeling good about yourself, it wasn't about reading the Bible (no offense, I say that as a pastors son), it was about making good decisions all the time.

Something I hear constantly from the $15ph people "I work hard". Success isn't about working hard, it's about making clever decisions. You can be the best hospital janitor ever, but you will only ever earn $9ph.

I have a personal wealth apparently, but I'm in the 1st category. There has been no building of my business, the only thing I did was see an incredibly depressed housing market, and bought distressed properties at an even bigger discount. I had the time and money to capitalize. I got lucky.

My souvenir business during the summer on the beach, again, I got lucky. No amount of positive attitude is going to get you more sales. What gets you more sales is clear thinking and working to make even more money.

Michael Lam · Answer

Hi @Donald Howaniec

I can best understand "why others don't preserver" by asking this question.  "Why are their winners and losers?"  You win because you worked hard at your craft.  Your better than the competition because you worked harder and smarter.  The harder you worked the "luckier" you got.  Sometimes the ball does bounce your way, but without strong work habits, you won't recognize a good bounce vs a bad bounce.

You lost, why?  Because the competition was better than you.  If you loss with grace and you accept it, then you accept that the competition outworked you, worked smarter than you, was hungrier than you, had more passion than you, has stronger purpose than you.

If you lost and made excuses...like "they had help, they got lucky" then your thinking is the exact reason why you lost and gave up.  Winners does not yield to excuses.

I'm a strong believer in this saying,  "You either get better or get worse, you never stay the same".  In anyone's endeavor for a better life you need to work at it to achieve it.

With the strong foundation of excellent work habits and perseverance, you can achieve unlimited success, regardless of any perceived or real disadvantages you may have.  Want to hear a great story, read up on Jack Ma (worth ~$25 billion), he's one of the BEST EXAMPLE of perseverance and never giving up.  http://www.businessinsider.com/the-inspiring-life-...

There is no short cuts in life that won't come back to short-circuit your success.  Work hard and the rest will come.

Why some persevere and others don't.

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