Creativity is a necessary ingredient in real estate investing, which is one of many reason I’ve done it for so long.

It often means that a property is uninsurable, or has had a hazardous substance issue (like meth preparation on the premise - this substance's ingredients leave lots of dangerous chemicals behind and are exceedingly expense to remove from a location most often requiring special equipment and haz-mat clothing).

With this definition comes the frame that mentorship is not forever, and needs tow other ingredients to work well:1.

High interest rates are the environmental ingredient you need for good seller financing.

I now see the missing ingredient with so many failed attempts is ACTION.

Quality property management is one of the main ingredients to being successful with buy and holds. 

Leverage seems to be a key ingredient of real estate; however, this creates a taxable income (unrelated taxable business income) in an investment vehicle that has an otherwise tax-free environment. 

In another life (well, really only 5 years ago), I owned a food cart where we sourced the vast majority of ingredients from local farms. 

So my conclusion on the balloons is that in 1985 they made balloons with ingredients they don’t allow anymore and my 1985 balloon this weekend felt just like 1985.And now I’m sitting on the kitchen floor leaning against the cabinets typing this message.

I am playing devils advocate against myself here but the STL props tend to be small brick ranches (low turnover cost) and have low crime and low taxes... important ingredients to a good B class recipe.