If You Chase Two Rabbits...

I was reading a post here on Bigger Pockets the other day about the success of a BP member, Justin S., who has been an investor since February of this year.  What an inspiring post.  I encourage you to read the entire post at... http://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/223/topics/42483-where-am-i-now-

Justin shares not only his successes, but also provides some valuable lessons that he has learned in the past 10 months. 

The one lesson that stuck out the most was the very first one where Justin strongly suggests... "FOCUS on one strategy. Do not try to learn them all, you will only burn yourself out."

And that is the topic of this blog post!

As a founder of a REIA in Baltimore, I can't tell you the number of times I witnessed new and sometimes experienced investors get all charged up because of the profits some other investor was generating.

It usually went like this...

Most investors don't really know what area of real estate they want to focus on when they first get started.  And just as often many investors with more experience (but not nessecarily more profits) jump from one approach or formula to another with little to show for their efforts.  Or worse yet, someone just spent $15K attending some gurus bootcamp and came back with so much stuff swirling around in their heads they have no idea where to start.

So... they show up at the next REIA meeting and hear a group of investors talking about the killing they are making rehabbing houses.  CLICK... goes the light bulb and off they go to rehab houses.

After a month or two they show back up, they are discouraged because their rehab is not going great and they hear another group of investors talking about the great cash-flow and cash-outs they are getting from their rental properties...

So... off they go to acquire rentals...

And the story continues until these investors get discouraged because nothing they are doing is working and they soon find themselves back in the JOB market wondering... what just happened?

I was lucky when I got started.  I was too lazy to learn everything and therefore only focused on one thing.  When I got started I was going to buy rentals and nothing else.  And buy I did.  It wasn't until we had over 30 rental properties that we decided to try our hand doing a retail rehab.  Just to see if we could do it. 

By then we could do the rental thing in our sleep.  We were good at it and our cash-flow and equity proved it.  It took discipline and at times guts to stay the course... when so many other investors where making a killing doing rehabs or wholesaling.  But when we decided to move to another strategy it was easy to do... as we just built upon our current knowledge base.

And that is the point of Justin's lesson learned...

By focusing on one thing, getting really good at.  Becoming the expert others seek out.  Doing it so well profits can't stay away... you will not only enjoy this business and profit handsomely from it... but you will be able to accelerate everything you do because of the strong foundation you build in the process.

I will leave you with the following... something my wife, Vicky, reminds me of often...

FOCUS...

If You Chase Two Rabbits...

Both Will Escape!