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You are probably wondering what the heck Simple Passive Cashflow dot com is? Well... on the one hand, it seemed to work well for SEO and was catchy (also made for a great logo on an American Apparel super soft tee) but seriously this site is just my method to make passive income via real estate. Yes, it’s a N=1 kind of thing for you statisticians out there. This is my path and does not mean it’s for you or your situation. This website is not the bible for real estate and not even the model for buy and hold investing, but at the very least use this site as another data point and get some of my lessons learned.
The Real Estate Universe
The Real Estate universe as you know is pretty big... you got flippers, wholesalers, rehabbers, bird-dogs, tire kickers, buy hold, all sorts of strategies that take up various places on the "Passive-Active Spectrum.. I have a pretty busy W-2 job being an Engineer staring at my Microsoft Outlook Inbox most of the day. I don't flip, wholesale, or do any other active real estate activities. (What’s the deal with flippers and wholesaler calling themselves "Investor". In my opinion, are jobs should be called real estate "traders." We don't call stock “day-traders” – “day-investors” do we?) (BiggerPockets seems to be mostly active people rant)
ERRR, anyway I guess I'm a tab jealous of active real estate guys since some of them are pretty are awesome and very experienced at their craft however I don't have the patience or time to do what they do. Hi my name is Lane, and I am a lazy, passive investor because it fits my personality, current lifestyle, and in the future, I don't want to replace my current job with another one licking the stamps on my wholesale letters or swindling buyers who don't know any better. Ok oK, I know I’m being a little harsh but just saying.
Who This Site Is For
As I mentioned I am fortunate to have a full-time job, and I don't have the time to find those amazing deals that you hear about that allow you to source... 100% ROI, no money down, this weekend only for a limited time! I want to introduce this concept of the “Time-Money-Experience Triangle”. (Triangle, not to be mistaken by the triangle that ‘Link’ from the ‘Legend of Zelda’ is always searching for or the “Scope-Schedule-Budget Triangle” that I manage at my day job that I search every day for on my computer screen... man it seems like the Legend of Zelda guy has a lot more going for him, he’s always on some adventure. But back to the “Time-Money-Experience Triangle”, you have to recognize what skills you have, your resources, and what you lack. If you have another job, there is no way you are going to do it all by yourself. Leverage your time and money. Don’t be that so-called “investor” who works in your business not on it, in other words, the guy who spends his weekend painting and fixing toilets when he should be finding deals and working with banks for lending. If you are that guy, “when are you going to be an ‘investor’ and stop being a landlord”. Yes,
You can read more about me in my "about me" section.
This site is for three types of people:
1) Folks who have pretty well-paid jobs. Let’s face it, the reason you came here instead of googling W-2 work ideas on you free time is saying something. You are not the guy googling “How can I increase my leadership qualities to manage diverse employees with different backgrounds” or “How to talk my employee to giving me a raise” or “How can I better network at my year end Christmas work party”.
2) Another group that should read on and subscribe to free articles are straight up rich people who are tired of getting those paltry return on bond and mutual funds.
3) If you’re a government conspirator who believes the mutual fund and stock market is a big Ponzi scheme, you can join too, just be on your best behavior.
The Why
Whatever category you fall under come on and join the party! We all share a vision as being financially free as Uncle Tony (Tony Robbins) defines financial freedom as having the "freedom to do what you want where you want". What is fundamental to achieving that goal is that passive cashflow is the end game. You should "start any journey with the end in mind”. <insert corny metaphor of plane knowing where the destination is but not knowing what the exact path is, complete with a diagram of not to scale airplane and a dotted line illustrating a wavy flight path> I would like to introduce a term called FYM which stands for “Fuck You Money”. Have you ever seen that commercial with the creepy orange number following the man or woman around supposedly representing the amount of money that person needs to acquire to retire? It’s sort of like that but under the SimplePassiveCashflow definition of FYM, the "number" is more of a "cashflow number" that sustains your lifestyle and the “Fuck You” part comes in when that day where you get pissed off at work and be like “Fuck You, I don't need to be here”. You know at work there is one last samurai-ish 65-year-old co-worker who has 50 years of service (illegally working when he was like 15 years old) with the grumpy attitude who says that he could retire at any time and does not help anyone. That guy obviously wasted his life away with traditional wealth-building methods but he is at a point in his life where do does not care, and you can be like that guy (except without all the wrinkles and the fact that people might actually like you). Imagine coming in to work because you want to, because you choose to, and actually want to hang out with your co-workers. For some, you might just merely tolerate the day job for the stated W-2 income to qualify for bank loans and the fact that you get free coffee and you get to use the toilet for free because every flush is approximately 10 cents worth (trust me I did the math I'm an Industrial Engineer, I took into account the water and lifecycle cost analysis of the crapper and your time to clean the thing). In all seriousness, you might like your job, and that's great for you, the important thing is to do what you want, on your terms because of your financial freedom.
Another concept called the Cross-Over Point” is the point at which your investments begin to earn more money than the cost of your living expenses. At this stage, one has the freedom to leave their full-time job for other meaningful ventures. Now that you have had 2 seconds to digest that concept, I would like to introduce to you the 2.0 version which includes two new factors: 1) Decreasing motivation (a negative exponential equation contingent to an increasing investment return) and 2) Constantly increasing expectations or also know as the "the boss be getting on my nerves" (a linear climb).
This graph of the “Cross-Over Point 2.0” that describes your work-life struggle:
Application of These Concepts
Look I'm not saying that I don't like my job, but I cannot see myself being there forever such as 20-30 years. Age discrimination does exist and even though you are now a high performing yuppie, some folks won’t want to hire you after the age of 50. Life is too short. I do know a lot of people hate their job not to mention their commute. I was in a job where the company was very conservative and “that bus” came around and ran people over continuously. It sucked. But little did my boss and my bosses know was that I quietly made more money (salary plus passive income) than both of them at the age of 28. The epiphany occurred one day, why the heck would I want to work 50% harder (deal with 100% more BS working for jerks) and get paid just 8% more (12% if I negotiated my strengths or sucked up to my boss). As a result, I transitioned jobs, took a small pay cut, and started drinking Simple Passive Cashflow Lattes every morning.
I’m not advocating getting a bunch of rentals, quit your job, and then spend every minute drinking Margaritas/Pina Coladas on the beach. Now when you have the freedom (after spending a few unfulfilling days with Margaritas/Pina Coladas), I hope you devote your time doing good the greater good. When I don't have to work, I plan to teach young people about real estate and personal finance. I am thinking of going around to high schools, but no one in their right mind would hire a grown man to teach young people especially for free (I mean take a moment - that’s creepy - like Jared the Subway guy creepy - for those of you what don't know who Jared the Subway guy was, he was this 3000 pound guy who ate Subway a lot and lost like 2000 pounds, however he still looked like he weighed 1000 pounds but everyone liked him as a celebrity and he used this celebrity status to lure young boy and girls and yeah I’ll leave it at that...another Pied Piper story of luring little boys and girls into a cave). But anyway to get around this barrier I need to write a book - not only any book - but a New York Times bestseller (but I guess I will settle for that crappy e-kindle version). So schools will be like (hey this guy has a book) and then bang… life mission to help others accomplished. To write a book is a daunting task, so I figure with each blog post I am slowly getting better at writing and chipping away my target page count. The more subscribers (it’s free people!) to this blog helps me prove my point to publishers that people actually read this stuff.
So this is the point where I wrap things up and bring this full circle so you get off your computer, raise your hands in the air, and mimic Mel Gibson in the 1995 movie 'Braveheart' by screaming "Lets get rich" ) That’s why I'm going to try and leave you proudly lazy people with an action plan in each article so you just don’t go about your day as normal but take gradual steps every day. As Arnold Schwarzenegger says "Just do it!" well he does not really say that he says things like “Don’t Be Economic Girlie Men” so please take action. It drives me crazy how everyone reads so much and doesn’t do diddly squat. I host a local Meet-Up and someone will be like (that is a fascinating spreadsheet you are sharing...would you please give it to me". And I say, "Sure, why don't you send me an email to remind me". You know no own ever freaking emails me! So anyway I think that’s enough for now. Hope you like the content here, and future podcasts/articles will be a bit shorter and less introductory-ish.
SPC GET ‘ER DONE PLAN
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