Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.
— Oscar Wilde.
This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just getting this new blog going, so stay tuned for more. Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates.
Uncle G
For this post I wanted to change things up a little. I think that it is important to learn from others and be able to grow off of their success. One real estate investor that I would strong recommend learning from and about is Grant Cardone aka Uncle G.
The blogger that I follow the most is Grant Cardone, I found him at first when I bought one of his books on investing in real estate and I soon learned that he had many more books, a podcast, and even a blog. I was pulled into his blog because like me he to invested in real estate on s scale that I can only hope to be on some day. Grant Cardone’s audience is anyone who wants to learn about investing in real estate. His blog has a post almost every single day. He believes in volume of content when he posts he has multiple channels of contents some directed at young people trying to get a start in real estate and some at older people who are wanting to use real estate to retire. Grant Cardone has a couple different types of titles that he uses for his blog posts one if “Young Hustlers” and another is “Cardone Zone” both are very memorable and incising for people who read as they are easy to remember. The content that is put out on this blog is defiantly informative and educational. Especially as he is using his influence to get people to understand how to invest in real estate. The blogs that are put out typically about a page long but it depends on the discussion see the blog typically goes with a podcast or a video that Grant films. This kind of blog I would have to say is a written informative blog.
When you first reach the blog, it loads into a screen full of all of the most recent articles and just titles of the articles. Once you find one that you wish to reach you click a read more button and it loads the full article. You do have the ability to scan the articles and it is easy to just skim through and get the main idea as most articles have a series of main ideas bulleted that the article covers in depth. At the bottom of each article you have the ability to leave your email and a comment. I believe that this blog is in a great format to read quickly on the go. They use headlines a lot in the main portion of the blog which makes it easy to find the articles that you want as each contains key words that embody the article as a whole. The font that is chosen for the article is alright it is easy to consume and not to fancy where characters can be misconstrued for another letter.
Grant Cardone is very original and is quite the character. Grant Cardone owns 1.7 billion dollars of real estate and has a net worth of over 300 million dollars. So, in his blog he has a strong sense of confidence and puts out content on what has actually worked for him in his real estate investing career. In his blog he does give credit to other ways of investing by having people on his podcast and writing about what made them successful. In the blog there is a very well-shaped topic of real estate investing but there is also a ton of other content about becoming a better version of yourself in your career and life. Each of the articles on the blog strongly embody the personality of Grant and he uses I a lot with words that make it clear that he is passionate about what he says.
In the blog I would say that they should include a better format to the initial appearance it feels really busy and could user a more controlled focus such as selecting a topic that you want to read about. I would also suggest beefing all of the articles up a little bit such as adding a little bit more detail. Overall, I feel that the blog is very well put together and I do enjoy reading it content quite a bit.
The blog is promoted on most social media channels out there. Grant Cardone has a heavy presence on Instagram and even has his own app that allows you to watch his content. The blog does have adds from outside companies but the heaviest amount of adds are for Grant Cardone’s store and other products that he sells. Grant Cardone has multiple business and it is safe to say that his main source of income does not come from his blog but rather the real estate the he invests in. A big way the Grant Cardone promotes his blog is through his pod cast, social media, and his books.
My Top 5 Whys
In todays world most everyone works a nine to five and most everyone wants to be able to leave their nine to five behind. So, people spend a lot of time trying to plan their retirement, save what they can, and some really smart people invest.
The question that these people face though are what to invest in. What is the best investment vehicle to be able to get free of a nine to five? There are many types of investment from starting a business, to the stock market. The most common I would say is people investing in a 4o1k. There is one investment though that is responsible for a good majority of millionaires today, and that is real estate. There are many kinds of real estate and different ways to invest in real estate.
However, for now it is important that you understand why real estate investing the best way is to invest and get out of what call the preverbal rat race aka your nine to five. Most people can’t get rich selling their time so you need something that will work for you while you are at work or better yet while you sleep. There are many good reasons to invest in real estate. I want to go over my personal top five and by the end of this it is my hope that you to understand why you should learn how to invest in real estate.
First, real estate has a predictable cash flow. Cashflow is the net income made after all operating expenses have been paid. In my opinion a good investment property should provide you with a cashflow of 6% or better. The point of investing in real estate is to be able to make a profit after all operating expenses allowing you to make extra income outside of a nine to five.
Second, Real estate appreciates in value. For quite some time now real estate has appreciated at 6 percent a year. This includes the market crash in 2007, according to the National Association of Realtors. Real estate is a great investment for short term but especially long term. Many investors will hold their property for twenty years and double to money that they invested into the deal. Meaning that some who invest in a 5-million-dollar property can sell it for ten million dollars.
The third reason is that real estate can be improved as a quick what some people call value add. This is a good way to improve the deal if you want to sell the property fast and flip it for a quick profit. As well, by providing a value add you can raise rent increasing the money that you make monthly and annually. That is just another great benefit of real estate investing you have the ability to make a profit in the long or the short run.
The fourth reason is that real estate is tax deductible. Tax codes allow various deductions for the normal expenses incurred in owning real estate, such as interest paid on the mortgage. Taking advantage of these tax deductions can offset income and reduce your taxes overall.
The last reason one should invest in real estate is the gains are deferable. Basically, what that means is that the gain on the sale of an investment property to be transferred from the property being sold to a new property being purchased, meaning that payment of any tax on the sale of the property has be deferred.
With all of those reasons it is clear that investing in real estate is the best way to get free of you nine to five a build wealth that will provide for you and your family for many years better than any other investment. Of course, this is just my opinion and yours may differ so please feel free to leave a comment and tell me if you agree or what your opinion is.
Take your Time
With everything that is going on in today’s world people can get lost in the moment or rush into situations. The daily grind gets to people, real estate is one of those things that people like to jump into thinking that they know everything that they need to succeed. One thing that seems to always hurt these people is the fact that they rush and want to spend as little money as they can. After all that means more profit, right. Take for instance you are trying to get out of a deal, and you don’t want to pay for a broker so instead you decide to sell you building on your own. That is a great way to end up losing money and to the experienced real estate owner quite comical, since more often than not these building will sit on the market forever and someone later down that line will get an amazing deal on it because the owner just wants it gone.
Another thing to keep in mind is whether or not you want to manage the building. That takes people in to that dangerous and feared Tenant, Termites, and Toilets. People think that if they don’t pay a management company to oversee the daily upkeep, they save a fortune but instead they end up spending more time working that living their own life.
With all the tv shows now a days showing these people flipping properties and doing what is called a value add. Or better put they update some dated features it is important to remember that you should hire a professional. When you walk a property, you can tell if the work is done quality or if it had been sloppily thrown together in an attempt to save money. I remember being ones of these people thinking that if I did the work, I would save the money. In reality I had to have the work done twice because it looked like Fred Flintstone went through working with his cave man tools and what the building really needed was someone more like Bob the Builder.
If you only take one thing away from this, I hope that you realize that when it comes to real estate you should rely on others there will be more knowledgeable and qualified people that will make you a more successful and well-rounded investor. Take your time and ease into real estate, after all its not going anywhere it’s a pretty grounded investment. If you do it right you can use real estate to get free of you nine to five.
Why Real Estate
People will spend their whole lives working for someone else and be ok with the fact that they have a career and that they are making enough money to get by. However, as far as I know, we only live once, and life is too short to spend it working towards someone else’s goals and not your own. Think about what you would do if you could quit your job and not have to worry about money. Would you start a new hobby, would you take that trip that you have always wanted to? The list keeps going, but you get my point. Since I was you, I have watched as countless people worked towards getting free of their nine to five. The only way that I have seen be truly successful has been real estate. That is not to say that there is no other way, but from my own experience, real estate has been the most effective. Growing up, I watch as my family did what’s called flipping houses. This can create a substantial profit if done right. Unlike the way that I want to talk about flipping homes take a lot of time and effort. Here is a link to an excellent introduction to flipping homes https://www.lendinghome.com/blog/how-to-flip-a-house-in-8-steps/. The type of real estate investing that I really want to talk about is investing in large complexes that comprise of roughly 16 or more apartments. There are quite a few reasons to do this but the main one is that when you purchase a large enough deal you can afford to get someone else to manage the deal for you. It is one way of avoiding the so-called three T’s of being a landlord; tenants, termites, and toilets.
The best way to illustrate this is to examine a potential investment. There is no one better at explaining the upside to investing in large real estate is Grant Cardone. He has been investing in these deals for 20 plus years and has over 4,000 apartments. He said in an interview, “I can go online today and find a 49-unit property priced at $35,000 per unit with an 8% cap (the return on investment based on the income a property is projected to create) for $1,750,000. If you pay cash for this deal at $1,750,000, you would make $140,000 free cash flow per year after expenses. With $450,000 down and financing $1,300,000, the debt payment would be $78,000 per year. This would make you $62,000 cash flow per year.” Here is that link to the interview if you would like to continue reading https://www.businessinsider.com/an-investor-who-owns-4000-apartments-explains-why-multi-family-real-estate-is-the-best-investment-hes-made-2016-7
With a property like that, the majority of people would be able to quit their job and do whatever they wanted. There are many more steps in the process of getting started. My goal with this post was to get people thinking about the possibilities of thinking larger as well as to invite you to do your research and decide for yourself what you think about investing in larger apartment complexes. So please do so and leave a comment with what you think.
Who is Alex
Who is Alex? As you know my name is Alex I am avid real estate investor who is accruing knowledge as I go. Both from mistakes and successes. I hope to help those that are looking to begin invest or have already started to take what I know. This blog will be the place that I leave thoughts on different types of real estate, books on real estate, and anything else that has to do with real estate. I welcome anyone to comment and send me emails on what has worked or had not worked for them. I want two way traffic so that we can build a community or regular people looking to invest in real estate. I look forward to meeting and chatting with you and hope that together we can become better investors.
BirchKey RealEstate 