Originally posted by @Damon Cameron Jr:
Hello All,
I am a 20 year old getting finances in order and mindset to begin investing post college (get w2 income for qualifying through banks). If you could go back to your 20 year old self what would you tell yourself or actions you would do differently? I am interested in seeing the responses from Investors in the game with all levels of experience!
Thank you!
I bought my first rental at 21 while I was in college and that was one of the best decisions I've every made so you're definitely on the right track. To answer your specific question:
1.) Buy sooner - I could've bought that duplex at 20 instead of 21 and had #2 by the time I got my first.
2.) Don't waste $50k on a useless degree - I worked full time throughout college to pay for school and the business I ran taught me a lot. Managing employees, hiring/firing, selling projects, dealing with customer issues, etc was an extremely useful experience and prepared me for RE. Taking business courses at an average college to get a bachelors degree did nothing but waste money. This is probably my only genuine regret so far, I would be much further ahead if I'd put that money (and time!) into rentals.
3.) Don't worry about what everyone else is doing - When you're college-age it's easy to get sucked into making the same poor decisions that most everyone else is making. It seems to be a norm to be completely irresponsible and have a lot of fun for 4 years at the expense of the next 40. You don't have to completely sacrifice your social life by any means but if you can make a few wise investments & gain experience in these next few years it can pay off tremendously for the rest of your life.
4.) Be mindful of who you take advice from - People love to give guidance to people younger than them so you'll get this a lot in the next few years. Pay attention to those who are where you want to be in life because there will be plenty of people who are not where you want to be who will try and give you terrible advice. This is true everywhere, even on BP.
5.) Learn from someone who is where you want to be - As a corollary to #4, go to local RE meetups and provide value to someone you want to learn from. Trying to figure out how to buy rentals (or build new, or wholesale, or flip, etc) on your own is hard, learning first hand from someone who is already successfully doing it is much easier. The key to this is helping someone without expectation of anything in return and building a genuine friendship over time.
Being successful (in most pursuits) is a matter of simple/intentional/consistent actions over long periods time. Figure out what you're trying to accomplish, decide on an avenue for getting there and take action (and ignore those trying to bring you down along the way).
Dan
