What is the secret to becoming successful investor, a three day seminar or a mentor?

[Toyin Dawodu]

The other day, I was thinking out loud to myself. The question on my mind was, how many people who read Donald Trump's books on Real Estate are now building skyscrapers? 

 The answer is probably, zero. One thing I do know is that Donald Trump's son, Donald Jr. and his daughter, Ivanka are building skyscrapers or supervising the building of some.

How many people who read the book, "Rich Dad Poor Dad" are now buying properties or investing in real estate? The first person who told me about the book was my lawyer who had read the book four years earlier. At the time he told me, he had not bought a single property.  I still have not read the book, but I have bought over 400 properties.  

This begs the question, how far can you really go from a novice to a budding real estate investor from reading a book or attending one of those three day seminars?

Please don't get me wrong. Reading books and going to seminars have their place. I have read a lot of books, and I have been to a lot of seminars.

However, my success came from someone holding my hand. I had a mentor at some point. But most importantly, I went out and started doing it. My confidence to do it increased because I  had someone to guide me and or answer my questions when I got stuck. 

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post and asked the question, "Why is it that 95% of people who attend seminars or read books about wanting to become a real estate investor never buy a single property?

The answer is simple. The solution to buying properties and becoming successful is not found in books only, but in getting into the trenches and doing it.

The fear of rejection and making mistakes are some of the factors preventing newbies from buying their first property. 

But a mentor besides you, will eliminate those fears. So the bottom line is, you need to become an apprentice to someone who has done it and who is doing it.  There are plenty of people on BP who have demonstrated success. As a newbie, you should ask to become their apprentice, even if you have to pay them or split your deals with them until you have the confidence to do it on your own.

This point was drive home to me again this morning when I read an article in the Wall Street Journal and one of the most successful deal makers in the world, Mr Schwartzman, founder of the Blackstone Group LP stated, "entrepreneurship in in finance is an apprenticeship, it takes years to get the skills required" You can substitute the word finance with real estate. 

However, real estate is still all about finance. If you don't get the numbers right going in, you will lose money when you exit the deal.

Making money is a skill, and real estate investing is no exception. If you don't learn the skill or have someone teach you, I don't think books or seminars are enough. What do you fellow investors or even newbies think?  Do you think newbies need mentors? 

[Brian Gibbons]

This is a very easy question
I think you have to realize that one of your biggest mistakes is going to be

Ready fire aim

If you go to any Rich Dad Poor Dad or Fortunebuilders or 

Phil Pustejovsky rah rah event or closing sales phone call, you can get a lot of mindset issues and
-Are you tired of procrastinating and wasting time?

Ready fire aim means that you get psyched up, go to an event, and you hear all this stuff about, 

-is this your time now, 

-are you willing to invest in yourself now, 

-are you going to stop screwing around now?

On BiggerPockets we don't get a lot of success stories from people paying a lot of money to these programs.

We do get a lot in the community of people that really try to post good information and help people, but it's piecemeal, and for new people it's confusing.

I go to a lot of Local REI a meetings and I trade business cards and so forth. I listen to speakers.

There's another common thought: 

-I'm broke, and I'll go talk to sellers now, 

-even though don't have any training, 

-even though I don't even have an attorney for my agreements, 

-even though I do not have a buyer's list, etc.

That's ready fire aim.

Most of senior people on BiggerPockets see this time again that people are poorly trained. And they talking the sellers.

So what's the argument, the cart before the horse?

I think the best approach is to find someone that can guide you through 10 deals, and pay for their time.

There are 2 words: coach and mentor,
a mentor is more like your grandfather helping you find your answers to your personal issues, facing fear, feeling worthy, getting ambitious, feeling limitless.

Now a coach helps you with skills, and a number 1 skill I think that people need the most is negotiating help. Negotiating the sellers and buyers. You do not need to negotiate with realtors.

Once you understand negotiating, 

-then you need a good attorney, that understands cash or terms, that understands title problems, that understands your local states issues like foreclosure rescue.

I've been posting on BiggerPockets longer than a lot of people, and I do enjoy coaching and not mentoring.

Depending on your market, you should be able to 

-go to an expired listing, 

-talk to the seller, 

-write up a the letter of intent, 

-take that to your attorney and have the attorney draft what "the meeting of the minds" is all about between you and the seller, and 

-for you to have an exit strategy, whether it sell it for cash or lease to own.

A motivated seller is a seller that truly wants to sell, and is waiting for you the real estate entrepreneur to offer them solutions.

Seller financing, or terms, is not talked about a lot on BiggerPockets, and I think you should give the seller cash offer and a terms offer.

Terms offer will generally get the seller more money.

But this is wholesaling heaven, where wholesalers are throwing lowball offers all day. That does not necessarily help the seller, especially with low equity between 80 - 95% loan-to-value.

Buying on subject to or buying on a wrap get you title, and then you can exit on a lease to own or cash.

If you licensed, and in Ohio, California, and Florida, I highly recommend your licensed;  real estate commissions in those states will allow you to act as a principal, and as long as your licensed, present creative solutions to sellers.

If you're in Texas, I highly recommend you read every post by @John Jacksonson, he was a student of mine 2002, and is nobody better in Texas for lease options, and doing lease option assignments.

Coaching can get you into action without thinking too much, without paralyzing yourself, and can give you a sounding board about your presentations and how to improve them.

Coaching can help you be more brave and more courageous about prospecting for sellers, knowing that you have someone to talk to about deals.

Coaching can help you face the fear and do it anyway.

I coach for 12 months each student, and I think this spring is a golden opportunity to give sellers a cash offer and a terms offer and have them pick one.

Is expensive to hire coach? Well I charge by the hour and I don't split deals.

Why don't I split deals?
You're hiring somebody to improve your skills.
Help you think better about what can you offer the seller and how can you negotiate better.
And I believe in my heart that splitting deals doesn't work, you need skin in the game and money in the table for coaching, then you generally work harder.

A good analogy is seeing a psychiatrist and having your daddy pay for it. You're not willing to do the work if you do not skin in the game.

Marketing for buyers is pretty easy, you just need a great deal.

Finding private money whether it's IRA lenders from self-directed IRAs or joint venture partners like doctors for 50-50 splits, it takes shoe leather and time, if you don't have the time, I would find a partner to go solicit private money and JV money.

Lastly a good coach can believe in you more than you believe in yourself. 

An accountability partner can help you succeed faster, but most people's lives are not that successful and you can ask people to be an accountability partner, to "get on you" when you are lazy, when you want to procrastinate, when you want to hide in a corner.

Being successful in business, I think what was valuable, is to read about what great entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates had to endure, had to suffer, for many years, before they became great successes.

I wish everybody on BiggerPockets a great spring, 

but it's time to stop thinking, stop reading, and go talk to sellers, and get a coach if that is what you need.

Best wishes,

Brian

@Dev Horn

@Ned Carey

@Michael Carbonare

@Rick H.