Deconstructing the Myth of Financial Independence:

A Deeper Look at ‘Pieces of the Puzzle’ Theory

Operating on ‘Level III’ Thinking

Written by Robert Feol, for the Baltimore Real Estate Investor’s Association

‘Chance Favors the Prepared Mind…’

- Louis Pasteur

Sitting at my camp in the Adirondack Mountains, having done my radio broadcast from the actual property(not a studio), and based on the massive response I have been receiving from the listeners, has me thinking today about the true cost of financial freedom, which I believe, is THE reason that people look at real estate investing as an avenue of exploration. True, you may have someone who is ‘looking for a career change’, or ‘another source of income’, or ‘to keep themselves busy’; but in my experience, and comparatively speaking, people recognize the potentially lucrative nature of real estate investing, and explore it with that end in mind.

Now, the fact that I was able to actually purchase a vacation home in my favorite place on Earth is a true mystery in itself, as I was never the guy who was supposed to have a vacation home to begin with. Suffice to say, knowledge of solid negotiation, owner financing, creative deal structuring, multiple parcels on one property, and a bit of ingenuity with newspaper advertising, and voila… here I sit and write this. Oh, and about 700 deals under my belt too…an important part of the equation, for certain, but had I not done that first deal so long ago, then I would not be writing this, and would probably be teaching music at a summer camp for the Memphis City School District. Which brings me to the point of this essay.

For people who are looking at real estate investing as a long term investing strategy, the road which lies ahead of them can seem daunting. After all, owning one rental property may seem like a massive hurdle to the new investor– how then, could they ever own FIVE rental homes? Five homes can come across as insurmountable, to say the least, to a new investor, and at times be discouraging. But, what if I told you that there is a secret way that an investor can suspend disbelief AND in doing so be successful? And what if I told you I would share it with you here?

I am firmly convinced that to succeed in the world of real estate investing, you must FORGET ALL THAT YOU HAVE LEARNED ABOUT FINANCE, BANKING, AND REAL ESTATE. You must unlearn your reality that creates artificial boundaries of success measurements. And, more simply out, you must begin to accept that everything you are told on television is a lie.

Radical, yes? Perhaps. ..but if you allow me to illustrate the above ideas in practical terms, you just might find yourself *cough* actually agreeing with me. For simplicity’s sake, let’s review some fundamental ideas in the world of real estate investing, basic ideas and elements that all investors, regardless of experience, must grapple with. We will assign arbitrary levels of thinking to each analysis, i.e., Level I, Level II, and Level III. Think of each level as progressively more complex, and therefore, more profitable than the previous level. Your goal then, ideally, would be to become a Level III real estate investor. Can you do it? What level are you on? Let’s find out!

Theorem 1: To invest in real estate you need cash or excellent credit.

Level I Investor: I (do/do not) have cash or excellent credit, therefore I (can/cannot) invest in real estate.

Level II Investor: I have good credit, so I should go searching for the best rate and get the ‘best deal’ from a bank where I can hopefully(crosses fingers) get approved for a loan.

Level III Investor: The banks, and the fractional reserve banking system based on fiat money, is a total and complete farce to begin with, supported by the Federal Reserve, which has is nothing Federal about it, as it is a conglomerate of private bankers. Why would I beg for their permission when I can use private lender’s money, give them a better rate of return, and control my own investing destiny? Private lenders are what I need to find to fund my acquisitions.

Theorem 2: You need experience to be successful in real estate.

Level I Investor: I (do/do not) have experience in real estate, therefore I (can/cannot) succeed as a real estate.

Level II Investor: My cousin, who is bankrupt, invested in real estate…maybe I can ask him his advice and see where he went wrong, and try to learn from his mistakes since I have no experience and am unlikely to succeed without help.

Level III Investor: That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. How can you get started in real estate investing if you need experience to do so? What, all successful real estate investors were born with knowledge of doing deals? Hmph…here is a better idea…why don’t I seek out other successful investors and ask for some direction, while I real books and attend my local REIA group meetings? There’s a SOUND plan…

Theorem 3: You are allowed to own only 4 houses. That’s the rule.

Level I Investor: I wonder if I could ever own even one house!

Level II Investor: I guess I should make the first 4 houses I buy good ones, because after that I probably can never buy any more investment homes.

Level III Investor: What a stupid $%^&*% rule? Who made up this idiocy? Who is anyone to tell ME, living in a capitalist society, how much of anything I can own? I will find my own way – I hear there are people who own THOUSANDS of homes, so do they not have to follow certain rules? I wonder if I can talk to one of them and figure out how they didn’t have to follow ‘the rules’…

Theorem 4: To own rental property, you have to love midnight calls from tenants who need their toilets fixed.

Level I Investor: I hate midnight calls from tenants, and I don’t know how to fix toilets, so if I buy an investment property I might fail!

Level II Investor: I hate midnight calls from tenants, and I don’t know how to fix toilets, but I guess I can learn and ‘tough it out’ for 30 years until the home is paid off. Hopefully, I won’t go bankrupt in the process.

Level III Investor: I hate midnight calls from tenants, and I don’t know how to fix toilets, but it’s a good thing my property management company takes midnight calls AND knows how to fix toilets! Obstacle…ELIMINATED!

Theorem 5: Investing in yourself and your real estate education is of paramount importance to your success, and is directly correlated with it.

Level I Investor: HOLY $%^&! This ‘guru’ wants $697 for a bunch of binders and a cd set? I don’t have THAT kind of money! What a scam! These REIA groups are rip off artists! I’m out of here!

Level II Investor: HOLY $%^&! This ‘guru’ wants $697 for a bunch of binders and a cd set? I don’t have THAT kind of money! I’ll just figure it out myself! What a gyp!

Level III Investor: HOLY $%^&! This ‘guru’ wants $697 for a bunch of binders and a cd set? I can’t believe he would give all his information away so cheaply!!! If I make this investment in myself I can add another tool to my toolbox, in my never ending question to become an all encompassing ‘transaction engineer.’ I better get in line before it is sold out!

Now, some readers might argue that there are many more levels and variations on these themes, and while I wouldn’t necessarily disagree with the idea of infinite possible variations here, I would simply say that in your daily experience as a real estate investor, and as a human, you are either assisting to either construct the reality which is reinforced to you each and every day through mediums such as television, mainstream news, radio, and newspapers, or you are DECONSTRUCTING THE REALITY PRESENTED TO YOU AND CREATING YOUR OWN REALITY.

My CPA and I recently had a discussion about the fact that whenever I am approached in business by someone, they always have an angle which involves using my abilities in real estate to their benefit, while disguising it as being for MY benefit. I think the same thing also applies to you in your daily journey with real estate investing – ask yourself this – ‘qui bono?’, or rather, ‘who benefits?’ The government, for example, keeps telling us that the economy is in horrible shape, while Wall Street bankers are seeing ‘golden parachute’ types of retirement packages with government bailout money! Is the economy really that bad? Or is there a method behind the madness? And the same thing applies to your real estate investing – are you REALLY only allowed, to own 4 homes, for example? Is that really the rule?

Are you assisting to construct someone else’s reality?

Or are you deconstructing the reality you are presented with, to build your own?

What level of thinking are YOU operating on???

“It is not wise for a blind man, riding a blind horse, to approach the edge of a deep pond.” (Chinese proverb)

When I returned from Don Derosas’ and Pete Youngs’ Investor Bonanza in Atlanta last week, I checked my voicemail.  My cell phone provider has a strange way of not letting me know I missed calls or have voice mails, so even though I tried to return all of the calls that I missed, somehow I still ended up with 14 messages.  In my kitchen, after setting my bags down, I began to scribe the names and numbers of callers who left messages.  I had missed several calls from radio program listeners, and began returning those immediately.

Now, callers from the show tend to fall into one of three categories, as follows:

1)     People who want to invest in real estate and need a consultation to see if it is feasible for them

2)     People who heard something about a seminar and missed the information but wrote down the phone number

3)     People who want free stuff

This particular caller was of the first persuasion, someone who was interested in looking at the prospect of making real estate investments.  She was asking some good questions, the kind of questions that told me she could in fact purchase investment real estate and be successful at it.  After about 30 minutes on the phone, she then asked if she could come in for a consultation.  I told her that I would be glad to sit down with her for an hour, but that there would be a consulting fee that would apply for an hour of my time.  When she heard this, the tone of the conversation immediately changed and she seemed very put off…we ended up getting off the phone, but I knew that I wouldn’t hear from her again.  And so, the following questions floated through my mind:

If I had waived the consulting fee would she have come in and purchased an investment property?

Maybe.

Was the consulting fee the reason I haven’t heard from her?

Probably.

So, the question you wholesalers are saying is ‘Robert, if you had waived the $149 fee you could have made 30 – 50 times that in a wholesale commission.  ARE YOU INSANE?’

Maybe.

You see, I have been working with a career coach who is insisting that I need to begin charging for my time.  He insists that my time is no less valuable than a doctor’s time.  The fact that what I do from a consulting standpoint is multifaceted and solves problems makes it even more valuable in some ways, he insists.  And, maybe it is the growth of the show on AM radio or just random events, but I find myself spending 10 – 15 hours each week doing consulting for clients who may or may not buy homes.  And that is alot of time to spend unpaid, for certain.

Now, selling homes is the least desirable part of what I do. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t like it – I do.  But I have interests beyond being a wholesaler, and so that makes selling homes the least desirable of my daily activities. Still, at this point in my career it does pay the bills though, so I recognize that I need to continue doing it until I am able to get effective systems online and in place so that we can still provide the level of service people have come to expect from DiscountPropertyWarehouse.net, without me having to personally oversee it.  So, it is important to note that while I would rather NOT be selling homes and be doing things related to education and consulting, selling homes for now needs to be a mainstay of the workweek.  Clients coming in for consultations is part of that.  So why turn away a client over $149, you ask?

The answer lies in two simple words: ‘perceived value‘.

You see, if a client(let’s call them a prospect at this point, as they are not, technically, a ‘client’) at this point is interested in buying homes and recognizes that they do not have the knowledge necessary to mitigate risk and point themselves safely in the correct direction, they will naturally seek out an ‘expert’ in the field.  This is no different than a Doctor.  Suppose you have a compound fracture of your radius(forearm bone) and it is sticking out of your arm.  You recognize the bone is in fact broken, yes?  But you ALSO know that you do not have the knowledge necessary to fix it, even though you know what is wrong.  So you see a Doctor, who then gets paid for his experience.  The doctor spends 30 minutes with you(after you wait) setting the arm and placing a cast on it.  Then you get charged like $2000.  Nobody questions his $4000/hr rate.  It is understood he spent many years in school for such knowledge.

Now I want to be bold here and make a statement that some readers won’t agree with, but I am not trying to suggest that real estate investors and doctors provide the same level or type of service.  I am saying, however, that a real estate investor who is highly skilled and experienced(read: hundreds of transactions) who also is interested in their clients’ success is very hard to find, and if they help people make money through safe investments or can assist in preventing monetary loss by assisting families in foreclosure, etc., then their time is probably worth something.  Maybe not $4000/hour, certainly.  But $149/hour might then be of some  value.

The problem with this though is that, in the real estate world, the barrier of entry is so low and the level of competition for (insert real estate term here, i.e.m buyers/deals/investors/lenders/etc.) so high, that new real estate investors are so desperate to make sales that they offer ‘free’ consultations and glitzy sales advice. ‘We’ll mentor you‘, the local wholesale ‘guru’ says.  ‘We’ll teach you everything you need to know – no need to buy all those expensive books and tapes, that’s just a bunch of horseshit anyways.‘

It is the prevalence of this sales mentality that makes the radio listener who wants to invest but balks at the $149 consultation fee reveal the possibility(not I did not say certainty) that she may be, in fact, an undesirable client to work with if only because her expectations are so skewed.  Remember, real estate investing involves using cash, credit, or other people’s money, and all of those involve a certain level of expectation and responsibility.  The $149 consulting fee here is ancillary, by the way - it is irrelevant.

If I charge $20 or I charge $350 it doesn’t matter, as there is no threshold here where the consulting fee has value in her eyes, since the person who questions the fee would question the value of it at $20 even more than at $149.  “Can you just waive the $20 fee?“, they would say.  And the fee being negligible at $20 would not imply value to a client anyway, so at such a low price it is a no – win anyway.  The $149 fee is almost more of a litmus test if a client is worth working with, because many people who are unwilling to pay $149 to meet with someone who can not only help them purchase highly discounted property but who can also help them determine what investment strategy might be appropriate for them given their current situation, which may including counseling them against taking on risk due to inadequate reserves and in doing saving them a great deal of heartache later, probably doesn’t need an hour of an experienced investors time.  Including mine.  So, before the reader hate mails begin to pour in, what am I saying here?  Let me tell you a story.

Last week, a client(actual client) was referred to me by a close friend.  This client had a peculiar situation that he needed some help with and he wasn’t sure what to do.  My friend told him if anyone could help, it was me(I don’t know if that was true, but that sounds impressive!).

Anyway, here is the situation: he and his wife have been renting a home for 18 months, paying $1200/month in rent, and have an impeccable rent history.  2 months ago they started to get letters from the bank saying it was going to foreclose on the homeowners due to nonpayment.  My client(the renter) wanted to buy the house, but had poor credit and couldn’t qualify for a home loan, but they had a 5k payment to put down towards a lease purchase or owner financing on the home, and they wanted to stay if possible.  The current(delinquent) owners indicated they would cooperate however was necessary and would like to preserve their credit.  The bank indicated that it would allow a short sale to take place, for about 110k less than the home was bought for 2 years ago.  This would allow the renter to have a payment almost identical to the rent they were now paying.  Obviously, the short sale was conditional on the bank being cashed out, which couldn’t happen since the renters could not qualify for a loan.

The proverbial ‘catch 22′, naturally…or was it?

I knew, based on the renter(my client) describing the situation on the phone, exactly what needed to take place and how I could do it so the client became the homeowner, the bank got cashed out, the owners got out from the foreclosure without it hitting their credit, AND I could get paid at the same time. Without me revealing the technical answer here answer, though, let me say this – the client wanted, after the phone consultation, to come in for a personal appointment.  I told the client that for me to ‘take the case’, and there were no guarantees(meaning nothing could come of this, since there are a number of ‘known unknowns‘, if you will), that for me to work on this would require a fee of $350 upfront, and that did not guarantee any success.  I also told them that I would understand if they did not want my help, because obviously the fee is hefty.  What did they want to do?

They told me ‘the $350 was a non issue.  When can we meet?’

The fundamental difference here is that my client in this situation(the renter) understands that there is a complex series of skill sets involved to make what he perceives as impossible, possible.  The radio show listener sees the $149 fee as a waste of money, coming from the angle that ‘anyone’ can buy investment real estate. so why should she pay such a ‘junk’ fee?  Her assumption indicates that I must just be trying to ‘rip people off’.

Two critically different perspectives.  Neither is right or wrong, but certainly stark in contrast.

Now let me share with you one more tale.  A few months ago, a client came into my office and told me a story which involved him buying 2 investment properties from a local Memphis wholesaler, only to run into difficulty refinancing because he had overpaid significantly for the houses.  He had invested 2k earnest money already, and had carried some debt service payments as well.  He was at this point out about $5000, and the hard money lender was about to foreclose, which was troubling as well.  Now, with this story being told to you(and remember this guy knew NOTHING about investing in real estate before he bought from this particular wholesaler), do you think that, if given the opportunity, he would have rather:

a) Repeated his mistake and done things EXACTLY the same way

b) Pay the consulting fee to someone like me and avoid that situation by paying way below market values after getting prequalified with a competent lender so refinancing was not an issue?

And, the question within the question is, would the new investor who now is about to lose their first two investment properties have seen any value in the $149 consulting fee?

When you get down to it, money and the value of it becomes such an arbitrary distinction such that it is entirely circumstantial.  Would you save $5000 by paying $149?  Of course you would.  And so would I.  But if you had a doctor say “listen, I want you to come see me every week and for $60 I’ll give you a B12 shot that will extend your life by 10 years”, you maybe wouldn’t immediately go for that, because the value is, well…implied, and you don’t see results immediately.  It is perceived value – which is why 100% of people would pay $149 to save 5k but not everyone would go for the B12 shot.

Consulting is the same way.

I see this time and time again in my travels as an investor and educator.  People WANT to change their circumstances and financial situation, but they cannot justify investing the money in which to do so.  Take for example, Investor Bonanza (www.InvestorBonanza.com) which I just hosted.  Don Derosa and Pete Youngs are EXPERTS in their disciplines, and yet they didn’t sell out of courses even though there were more students at the workshop than courses.  Granted, maybe some students already owned certain courses, but my point is that at the end of each presentation where speakers had educational materials for sale, I saw some students come up to the table, rub their chins thoughtfully, and walk away empty handed.  And they hadn’t ever done a deal, which was why they had come to this incredible educational even in the first place!!!!  What, did they not need the courses?  Of course they did.  The question was assigning VALUE to such items, enough to justify its cost.  And teh students who walked away emty handed could not justify its cost.

Our society has this paradox I want to tell you about, and it is a paradox I call the ‘college degree‘ paradox.  It is really simple.  What it says is that, ‘if you don’t go to college, you relegate yourself to some entry level position with no hope of upward mobility‘, but, ‘if you DO go to college, then you can get a job for 40k – 60k a year, or maybe more, with benefits!‘  Now it may cost you 200k in total tuition, but you can get that kind of a job if you invest in your education.  And that is the paradox – that it costs you 200k a year to be ‘entitled‘ to a 40k a year position.

To become a real estate investor with the skills necessarry to succeed, since you can’t go to college and major in topics like ’short sales’, you have to invest in your eduction through courses and seminars.  Now, course value and risk/reward ratios are beyond the scope of this article, but I will say that it costs MUCH less to become a real estate investor capable of earning a 7 figure income than it does to invest in a college education that costs 200k in tuition and gives you a 40 hour a week job at best(ask me how I know this).  The question is, why are people so willing to invest in college but real estate home study courses at times are assigned such little value?  And more importantly, if courses, which are tangible, have such little value, what value does preventative investment consulting cost?

For the family about to be forced to move because of the owners not paying their mortgage, consulting evidently has LOTS of value.  Yet, for the new investor who is exploring the possibility of doing their first deal, it has very little value.

My question to you, reader, is this:

If you were a new investor hoping to do a deal while mitigating as much risk as possible, would YOU pay a $149 consulting fee, or would you ’save’ money by not paying it.

And why?

Robert Feol explores the ‘new’ way of doing business, taught by some of his ‘colleagues’ in the industry!

2009 was  a rough year for me.  Really rough.  It’s not worth getting into, really. I wrote a great 1000 page, very descriptive and detailed tale of how this took place for this article, but for the sake of brevity/space,  I’ll summarize the story for you in one sentence, 2009 as follows:

On January 4^th 2009, my income from the wholesale real estate company I built for 3 years went to zero, unexpectedly– found myself with about 200k of unexpected debt from this – got to spend 12 months figuring out how to rebuild years of work by myself.

The end.

Now, I know that this is probably the best bedtime story you have EVER heard.  Grimm brothers, look out!  Here comes something really interesting! Be sure to tell your kids this at bedtime – insomniac children will surely be put to sleep by this, as well as spouses and rowdy domestic pets, including reptiles.

I have no doubt the movie will be made at some point into the future – think The Pursuit Of Happiness, with me as Will Smith and my dog ‘Little Fat’ as his son Jaden Christopher Syre Smith.  I will say that ‘Little Fat’ and myself combined do not have an ounce of the acting talent that these incredible actors possess, but I digress.  The year ended.  And that is good.

Now, some interesting thing happened in 2009, and while there were many things that happened, I will point out the following two as being of critical importance to this essay:

1) I found myself surrounded by a harvest of friends I did not know previously existed.

2) I found myself having to invest substantial monies into infrastructure, specifically to rebuild the infrastructure I had already paid for such as websites, media, etc.

Again, not interesting, no?  I am sure you have heard such common stories before.  Robert Feol had to write some checks he didn’t want to.  Who cares?  But, here is where I discovered an interesting behavior I had never known existed before –a possible scientific discovery noteworthy of the journal Nature, I will admit – but I discovered something  I call the ‘Where’s My Check?’ syndrome.

And I want to explain how you can observe this in your own life.

The ‘where’s my check?’ syndrome usually comes when people who have been fortunate enough to receive some type of monetary compensation from you, usually as a result from on ongoing relationship you have with them(say, for example, a contractor), begin to develop a sense of entitlement.  You give them some work, they do a good job.  So you give them more.  At some point, you have a relationship where you are essentially making an investment in them.  Perhaps employee, perhaps contractor, perhaps consultant.  Perhaps you are paying a fee to your media group for a radio show.  But for the purpose of this treatise you have paid someone consistently for about a year, and paid them an income which they would not have had otherwise should you not have seen value in their work and wanted it to continue in an ongoing capacity that you viewed as mutually beneficial.

Now, the year may end.  Suppose it does.  You review expenses and realize that, maybe you have been investing money in a resource that hasn’t provided the same output for your input.   Things have gotten out of balance with your investments in people.  You view them as a resource, but now you see them as a different kind of resource.

A resource that has….perhaps…taken you for granted?  Especially after so many checks that have been written unquestioned.  You just paid and paid and paid.  And finally, you decide – ‘enough …now I will consolidate my finances and stop spending money where it is not getting a solid return on investment.   I will cut expenses.  Thank you for all your hard work, and hopefully we can work together in the future.’

What happens next?

Everybody comes a runnin’.

‘Where’s my check?’, they scream. ‘I need this to pay my rent!!!!!’

Of course you do.  My investment in you paid your rent while you spent less and less time attenuating to the reason why I invested in you in the first place, and whether you were taking payments and doing less of a quality job or just outright plotting behind my back and stealing, or WORSE, committing a conspiracy to defraud, we all know that YOU really were not doing the right things.  And now you got busted – and you are sad that your finances are beginning to collapse as your friends disappear.  Perhaps you are getting your…just desserts?

Yet my thoughts at this time juncture are as follows…

Why wouldn’t you be looking for your check?  Sorry it’s gone.  But, the fact that you can’t pay your rent or mortgage isn’t my concern, honestly.  It’s yours and you should have considered that, before I saw you as an expense that needed to be excised, or got fed up with your constant and never ending sea of excuses, spins, and lies.

Too harsh?  In 2009 I used to think so, but now I am not so sure about that.  The necessity of performance and results has overshadowed any compassionate obligation I once felt for those who were simply nice to me.

This was solidified when a recent media relationship I had, an account manager specifically, who tried to renew my contract(already at the top of the rate card) and sent me a contract renewal with a 23% increase without notice, telling me to sign because other people had ‘lined up’ for my spot, and that I could easily be replaced.

Now, I get that.  On a major Memphis station, AM talk radio – I get it.  Many advertisers want to be there.  I am surely replaceable.

But, ratings DO count.  And, what I didn’t tell you is that I took my show on this station, where I do all the programming myself out of the pool of national speaking talent for REIA groups(not easy to do), from a 30 minute show which was preempted most of the time with a 1400 person average listener base to a show which had an average 5000+ person average listener base in the same time slot, same year – in less than 12 months.

I tripled the listener base for my program in one year.

UNHEARD OF in AM radio.

Yet, as I tried to syndicate between multiple local stations, programming couldn’t be bothered to assist.  It was an inconvenience.

Ok, again – I get it.  There are bigger fish to fry for the programming division of radio stations, and my show is not a priority.  No problem!  I’ll take my show to the two hour slot where the president/general manager of the station has spoken assisting me with national syndication.  Just move to another station, quietly.   The fact that, from a production standpoint, the new station is half the cost is only a bonus.

Can you guess what happened?

They came a runnin’.

Now this time, not only were they asking ‘where’s my check?’, but they were – get this – threatening me that I would never be broadcast on their station again.  That I would be burning bridges.  So I better stay on for another 2 years. OR ELSE.

The last straw came when I switched to paying by check from credit card auto debit.  Having paid faithfully for 12 months, when I wanted to walk in a check, I got – not lying here – no less than 4 calls and 3 emails a day from the account manager asking where the commission, um I mean payment, was.  Evidently, people needed to get paid.  Which brings me to the topic of this article, which talks about this interesting idea of entitlement.  If I enter into a relationship with you AND pay you faithfully, can I not faithfully give you notice AND stop without hassle?

I guess not.

Now, I don’t know most of you readers but I have written faithfully for you for the past year.  And it is on this extremely professional not that I let you know my 2010 philosophy has changed from my 2009 one of personal growth and real estate development/personal financial freedom to more genuinely reflect and emulate the attitudes, actions, and behavior of so many of my colleagues in the industry.

I have simplified my philosophy, and it is now this:

WHERE’S MY CHECK?

Perils, Pitfalls, and Promises

Buying investment real estate from a wholesaler can seem, at times, like a good idea.  I should know – I was a full time wholesaler for the past 3.5 years, and founded one of the top wholesale companies in the Mid South.  Anyway, I know wholesaling – but the question is, do you?

Wholesaling is essentially buying a property not from a licensed broker or Realtor, but from an individual who usually controls the property through a Purchase and Sale Agreement.  The difference is, essentially, that when you buy from a wholesaler you are not buying it at cost: you are buying it at their cost plus a premium markup.

The advantage of buying from wholesalers becomes plainly clear when the truth is that, even if you are paying a premium, you are getting the house(should be getting, anyway) at a substantial discount under market value.  So if you can buy houses so cheap through a wholesaler, why shouldn’t you just buy from them immediately and just buy based on numbers?  What need is there for caution?

Well, in order to look at the reason that we need caution we must first look at the reasons why you would buy from a wholesaler.

1)     Convenience

This is probably the primary reason that people consider making an investment from a wholesaler instead of sourcing a property for themselves in the field.  The fact that they can avoid ‘driving for dollars’ makes the process of real estate investing, especially for those who want to do it part time(working professionals, example) extremely accessible.  No need to spend long hours in the field, walking through trashed houses, when a wholesaler can do it for you.  That alone makes buying from a wholesaler a potentially enticing choice.

2)     Lack of Experience

For people who are new to the world of investment real estate, wholesalers can look like saviors.  Surrounded by intimidating information and a lack of experience, working with a wholesaler can seem like a godsend, especially if they are furnishing data such as After Repair Value and repair estimates.  In these cases wholesalers seem to ‘bridge the gap’ for the new investor.

3)     The Offer of Complete or ‘Turnkey’ Services

This can be an enticing lure for inexperienced investors.  Some wholesalers will offer ‘everything, including the kitchen sink.’  This would include finding the property, placing a tenant, managing the property, offering financing, insurance(vacant and dwelling), snow removal, the works.  For a new investor who does not have experience with all aspects of the purchase/renovation, these services can seem from simply puzzling on the good end to exasperating(or worse) on the lesser end.

4)     The Promise of a ‘Good Deal’

Wholesalers make money by finding discounted deals.  This means that when you buy a house from a wholesaler, you technically are supposed to be getting a really good deal.  This is the premise that lots of people buy from wholesalers based upon – the idea that if someone is wholesaling a property, it must be a good deal.

These are the factors that make up the idea of wholesaling.  Wholesaling is also a unique career in that it requires no licensing – unlike becoming a real estate agent, there is no law barring an individual from putting a property under contract and then reselling it.  That simply is a capitalistic enterprise and anyone is entitled to do it.  So, while the barrier of entry is low, the cost to purchase from a wholesaler may be steeper than you think.  Let’s consider the cons of purchasing from a wholesaler, and pitfalls that might take place if you end up working with the wrong individual.

1)     The Wholesaler Tells You the House is in a Good Area, and You Trust Them

Then you find out that it actually ISN’T in a good area.  The problem is, you already bought the house.  In fact, the house is in such a bad area that you will be hard pressed to ever resell it!  That, coupled with the fact that the area is so bad that it is extremely difficult to rent(assuming your strategy is to rent – if you were planning on retailing this scenario becomes WORSE) makes your house vulnerable to being stripped by thieves(ask me how I know this). So, the wholesaler is laughing all the way to the bank while you are literally stuck with an investment that you never would have made, had you known what you (paid to) know now!

2)     The Wholesaler Tells You What the House Will Appraise For, and You Trust Them

This is even WORSE than number one,  You have calculated your refinance costs, your repair costs, factored in your hard money costs, and even included your prorated taxes so you can refinance and have zero out of pocket costs.  Then what happens?  The appraisal comes in way below what you were told what it will appraise for.  Now, you have two very undesirable choices.  First, you can bring a lot of cash you weren’t planning on bringing to the close to the close, and satisfy the balance of what is owed to the close.  Or, you can order another appraisal(which costs more money you weren’t planning on spending) and then get the results, which will probably be about the same.  So, in the end you will end up bringing the cash to the close anyway.  Sad game

3)     The Wholesaler Tells You About The House Repair Costs, and You Believe Them

This is almost as bad as number two, above.  The wholesaler tells you the repairs will come in at price x, but later you find out that the house is price x plus 10k!  Unfortunately, the wholesaler has disappeared and is nowhere to be found.  So, surprise!  You get to come out of pocket another 10k – money that you will never get back, because if you calculated the numbers correctly, you will not be able to refinance your money out of the property because your repair costs have exceeded the amount that you had planned on, and it is a good bet that the wholesaler sold the property at a price where all of your costs had been factored in with his original repair estimate – making your additional 10k expense just that, an expense – which you will have to wait 30 years to get paid back!

4)     The Wholesaler Tells You They Will Manage The Property for You

Then they don’t.  It stays vacant and gets stripped, and you get to renovate it again, the whole time using your personal resources and unable to shake that nagging feeling of ‘why did I invest in real estate?’  Maybe the wholesaler who says they will rent it can try harder the second time.  Second time is a charm, maybe?

You see, this really illustrates the potential pitfalls with using a wholesaler who is a ‘one stop shop.’   The wholesaler says they can furnish you with all of the critical services that you need to have a successful investment home, but the truth of the matter is even if someone becomes a licensed insurance agent(the wholesaler, for example) they are doing so because they want a revenue stream, not because they are passionate about the insurance business.  So, when a tree falls on your neighbor’s car, and you call your insurance agent who was also your wholesaler, can he really help you?  Odds are, he’ll give you an 800 number to call, and you’ll be on hold for a while only to find out that you aren’t covered.  Think I’m kidding?  This happens WAY more often than you think.

I don’t want you to get the idea that all wholesalers are evil, because they are not.  It is just that MOST wholesalers really have no idea what they are doing OR are so unscrupulous that they are not focused on your needs.  In my last wholesale company, when we made a mistake, most of the time we would get out the checkbook and write checks to cover cost overruns, incorrect appraised values, and so on.  It got expensive, and these lessons really taught us that we needed to tighten up our approach – so we wouldn’t make mistakes with the people who trusted us.  You need to be critical with your wholesalers as well, and due your due diligence – not just trust and rely on theirs, especially at first.  After you have established a good relationship with them, then maybe you can loosen up.  But not at first.

A final idea here for your consideration.  Wholesalers are essentially real estate consultants, and are doing so and acting in that specific role which is the reasoning by which they earn their living.  Your real estate consultant(wholesaler) is expected to guide you to an excellent investment, a ‘piece of the puzzle’ if you will for your personal portfolio which you want to become a living, breathing, and vibrant entity.  Since that is the role they are paid to play, put them to the test with one simple question.

‘How many rental houses do YOU own?’

Now, if their answer is ‘well, um, none right now because…’ or ‘the owner of the company owns x properties’, then chances are that you shouldn’t be working with that wholesaler, simply because if they do not own any investment property then who are they to give YOU advice on what and what not to buy?  I’ll give you a little secret – there are some wholesalers who HATE real estate.  Don’t believe me?  It’s true.  They like the money, but hate the process.

So, the next time you are thinking of using a wholesaler, ask them if they own real estate.  Their answers just might surprise you.

Robert Feol is an author, speaker, teacher, investor, and radio personality who’s primary focus is helping others get safely into real estate investments.  Want to learn more? Listen to his radio show every Saturday at 11 AM CST on News Radio 600 WREC, Memphis.  Or, catch the archived show here: http://www.wrecradio.com/pages/expert.html.

Robert Feol is an author, speaker, and passionate real estate investor. To learn more about real estate investing, visit Robert Feol online at DiscountPropertyWarehouse.net

Analyzing Real Estate Prospects

In the statistical world, or more specifically the world of probability, the term ‘risk of ruin’ is usually defined in terms as the threshold chance that someone’s risk of loss exists(relative to their current financial/investing pursuit), in as much that if they were to suffer large and prolonged losses over a period of time, their capital base would be eroded to the point where it would be highly unlikely that they could continue their financial endeavors with any chance of success.  This article is not a primer in statistical probability, but for the sake of this article it is helpful to understand what this term means a bit more to see its application for today’s modern real estate investor.

Investopedia.com defines risk of ruin in the following way:

What Does Risk Of Ruin Mean?

The probability of an individual losing sufficient trading or gambling money (known as capital base) to the point at which continuing on is no longer considered an option to recover losses.

Risk of ruin is calculated by taking into account the probability of winning (or making money on a trade), the probability of incurring losses, and the portion of an individual’s capital base that is in play or at risk. Also known as the “probability of ruin”.

Investopedia Explains Risk Of Ruin as follows:

Risk of ruin need not result in bankruptcy (although it often does), but rather the point at which continuing on would be unwise. It signifies a risk more relevant in trading and gambling, where there is a high probability of losing an entire bet or trade.

Now that we understand what the term actually means, let’s get to the interesting part.  Risk of ruin is most often used when discussing events which relate most closely to probability and earning money based on some element of chance, something we also know affectionately as gambling.  Gambling carries with it the connotation of seedy, smoke filled casinos and other assorted personalities, so why would we be interested in this term if we are talking about real estate investing?  Real Estate investing isn’t gambling…is it?

Enter Poker as a Metaphor for Real Estate

When chips, cards, and money get involved in some type of game, people immediately assume that gambling is what is going on.   However, gambling usually refers to games of ‘chance’; that is, the idea that the outcome of such games are independent event horizons that have no effect on each other.  For most people, since Poker involves cards and there is some element of randomness(known as chance or variance), there can be no skill involved and Poker becomes another form of gambling.  However, since Poker offers a unique element known as ‘folding’, where a player can choose to not become involved in a hand or wager money based on the cards they received, in reality Poker becomes more of a strategy game than its casino cousins like Craps and Roulette, which are true forms of gambling.  In Roulette, you lay down your money and when the wheel spins you win or lose – you can’t say ‘well, my number didn’t come up so I am going to take my bet back so I can use it and potentially win on the next spin.’  In Poker, you choose the hands selectively that you think will be profitable for you(known as having a positive expected value) and in doing so you essentially evaluate the likelihood of winning  – premium hands(such as tow Aces or two Kings) are strong hands and really do set you up for success, while as other weak hands may not have a positive expectation, and may lead to a potentially unprofitable result.  Good Poker players pick their spots carefully, and recognize that Poker becomes gambling only if you choose to put your money into the middle of the table when the outcome/profitability is governed by the cards alone.   The best players in Poker try to mitigate any chance of a random outcome through a combination of skill and critical information gathering.  And good Real Estate investors do the same.

Now, knowing this, we need to discuss the idea of risk of ruin as it applies to today’s modern investor, specifically, the new investor.  New investors frequently look at real estate investing as a fertile ground where bountiful riches await, and they are eager to ‘get their money in’ as quickly as possible, often without knowing the probability or profitability of the potential outcome.  Ironically, it is in this way that real estate investing can become all too much like gambling.

How Risk of Ruin Relates To Real Estate Investing

Professional Gamblers who want to avoid going broke exercise something called bankroll management.  Bankroll management is simple – determine the amount of money you have to gamble with, identify that number, set those funds aside and work within those limits to increase your bankroll over time.  Natural downswings do in fact occur, but gambling within the specified bankroll and setting specific loss limits for sessions(and being disciplined to stop and take a break from a losing session), theoretically, prevents a gambler from going broke.  Now, bankroll management from a practical example works like this – suppose a Poker player has $1000 as their bankroll.  If he goes to the Poker table and plays in a game where the minimum buy in is $1000, he is way over their bankroll and his risk of ruin is extremely high.  One losing session and he cannot hope to become profitable because he has no capital with which to invest in future sessions.  By not exercising good bankroll management, our player has doomed himself to bankruptcy, because he simply choose to not exercise a practical approach to the volatility that exists in endeavors that have some element of a random outcome.  Had our player played in a game that was within his limits(say, a $60 buy in for example) he would still have $940 left after a losing session and the possibility for future gains still exists as a realistic possibility.  Our gambler’s Risk of ruin in that case was low.

Now, today’s modern investor doesn’t think of real estate investing as gambling, they think of it as making an investment, and the caveat here is that often the inexperienced investor will think NOTHING of committing to a debt service payment on an investment property which is so high relative to their current income and financial resources it is akin to our gambler in the above example playing at a table with a $1000 buy in.  Inexperienced investors tend to generalize and assume everything will go smoothly, or WORSE, be told that such a thing will happen by an unscrupulous wholesaler who is just trying to make a quick sale, and take their word for granted.  The risk of ruin in these cases is so high that it is only after the new investor is on the verge of bankruptcy that they realize that something happened which probably could have been avoided – but by then it is too late.

A Simple Example To Illustrate

Suppose we have a new investor who wants to buy his first investment home to supplement income by renting the property to a paying tenant.  Before he considers the money that potentially will be generated through the investment he must first identify the potential risks involved with purchasing an investment home knowing that, assuming he doesn’t have the capital to pay cash outright, financing carries with it debt service and that debt service needs to be paid on a monthly basis, lest the investment become jeopardized or the investor’s financial situation collapse in attempting to service it.   Suppose our ‘would be’ investor brings home 2k every month from his full time job.  What is an appropriate mortgage payment for an investment property the investor can realistically tolerate, assuming that an extended vacancy arises which keeps the investment property from producing income?

Experienced investors understand that this question cannot simply be answered by looking at one’s take home salary and figuring out a number, but simple rules which help mitigate the risk of ruin certainly apply.  Ideally, the investor should not be ‘investing’ more than 10 – 15 percent of their net monthly take home into long term unending debt service which is front loaded with interest.  Why such a low number?

Risk of ruin.

Assuming 15% of 2k as a benchmark for debt service, our mythical new investor would be carrying a mortgage payment of about $300/month, money which was typically used for discretionary income but now must be permanently committed to covering the debt service of a mortgage placed against an investment property.   However, while a $300/month mortgage payment would indicate an investment home in roughly the 30k range(which represents a very entry level type of rental home, at least in Memphis where I live) the investor here is exercising a manageable amount of risk – and in doing so the expected value of our investor’s profitability is positive.  A profitable outcome is expected.  Our investor can tolerate a few months of vacancy because he has purposely kept his risk of ruin low.

Consider however,  another investor who wants to make his first purchase and has the same level of take home income, 2k/month, but finds a deal they ‘can’t pass up’, which costs 100k.  Assuming 30 year financing and an estimated payment of 1k/month as mortgage debt service, our investor in this case has committed 50% of their income to debt service which will have to be paid in the case of a vacancy.  And it is in situations like these that I find new investors so frequently coming to me these days, asking me to resell their investment property for them before they go bankrupt.  Usually these stories are pretty much the same – “real estate doesn’t work – I got ripped off by so and so who told me this would be a great investment”, but the finger of blame cannot be pointed by unsuccessful new investors who find themselves in these situations without first looking in the mirror and discovering that the problem first and foremost began there – inexperience and a lack of appropriate education coupled with a lack of understanding of the idea of risk of ruin allowed these people to put themselves into the predicament they found themselves in from the start.  They are the reason for their own undoing.

As you grow as a real estate investor, new and costlier(with potentially more rewarding) investment opportunities will come into your focus.  When looking at these, before you sell yourself on the financial upside of a potential acquisition, be sure to ask yourself about the catastrophic effects of risk of ruin and if such a potential investment is putting you into a threshold of an adversely high amount of risk.  In doing so, you are doing yourself, your portfolio, and your family a great service which shows you choose to invest only after careful and thoughtful analysis, using risk of ruin as a measuring tape of risk tolerance to prevent losing all of your accumulated assets and to insure continued and sustainable financial growth.

Real estate was never meant to be gambling…but only YOU can determine if it is or isn’t.

1.) To follow the path, look to the master,

Follow the master, walk with the master.

See through the master, become the master.

2.) From the withered tree, a flower blooms

-Zen Proverbs

Day I

What is interesting to me, and I mean really interesting, is that the more we become connected as a global society, and the more that information becomes freely available through the internet, the harder it is to find people that are not only true experts in their chosen discipline, but who are also able to teach their subject matter with great facility and in doing so create a student who is ultimately capable of emulating their success.  Listeners of my radio show know that, whenever people offer to be your ‘mentor’ without you asking, you need to run the other way.  Along these lines I have found, personally, that it is hard to find people who lead by example and have integrity.  Knowing this, when you do find these people full of integrity(and this is especially true in the world of real estate investment education), you need to seek out these rare individuals and work hard on become their students. In doing so, you will not only find success but you will also find confidence –and in this business, my friends, confidence is the name of this game.

Enter Investor Bonanza.

As a long time real estate investor who prefers to be more of a student than a teacher, and after having invested tens of thousands of dollars in home study courses, when I say this I say it with the genuine fiber and conviction of someone who has been changed – inexorably – and been given a new understanding of what it means to be a true real estate visionary.  Ergo, it is critical that you sense my conviction when I issue the following statement, publicly, and in writing:

I honestly believe that Don Derosa and Pete Youngs are two of the greatest real estate educators in the world today.  Period.

Now, I am hosting the Investor Bonanza here in Atlanta in October 2009, and to be honest wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I was asked(and honored) to emcee the event.  Yes, of course, I mean everybody has read about Don Derosa in The New York Times Bestselling book The Millionaire Real Estate Investor; Pete Youngs, well, everybody knows the 1996 Olympic Committee pretty much asked him to build the housing facilities for the Olympic staff and international athletes.  Yes, of course I knew these things – I mean who doesn’t, right?  But knowing these simple facts did not prepare me for what I was about to encounter.

Now, I could get into Pete Young’s Day 1 instruction, which was not only comprehensive but underscored a deep rooted understanding of real estate investing and construction, precision crafted and honed by hundreds if not thousands of transactions, rehabs, problems, construction jobs, or unexpected events – not to mention Pete’s mastery of mold identification.  I could tell you these things, but I won’t.

I could tell you about the simple and genuine way that Don Derosa teaches students how to negotiate real estate deals, and negotiate these deals not solely with the idea of using some cliché techniques, but rather with the idea of empowering students – of enabling them – so that they can emerge from an intensive 5 day event and begin to engineer real estate transactions which are not only profitable but also which substantially reduce risk.  And I could inform you that Don isn’t the guy who subliminally infers to an audience “I did 200+ transactions with none of my own money and you didn’t” type of mentality; rather, he is the gentle teacher who, like a Zen master, allows the student to learn with the goal of developing true mastery; if only because what was once a fearful and complicated subject has become reduced to something…well, something so damn simple and achievable the students in the workshop, myself included, find themselves wondering why they haven’t thought of these things before?

I could also tell you about the incredible lineup of speakers who have arrived at this event, and the way that their topics work so synergistically together within the framework of Pete and Don’s curriculum.  To me as a teacher(Masters in Education, btw), it is just so evident that Don and Pete have made the conscious choice to give students not only the tools that they need to succeed; but chose to do so without the hollow upsell. Experienced investors, you know what I am talking about.

Yes, these things I could describe  to you the way a sports reporter relays a boxing match – a technical description and summary of something that only more seasoned aficionados would recognize as a true art form.  But I cannot attempt to do justice and describe accurately the crisp and articulate, dare I say, caring – way that these two gurus have chosen to dedicate a week of their lives, away from their families, to give back to their students who they are so truly committed to helping duplicate their long record of personal successes.  Instead of sharing that with you, I would rather relay to you the sentiments that a workshop student shared with me tonight, which demonstrated to that me Don and Pete, well, they are pretty smart guys who know a bit more than they let on, and that the workshop has been designed by them purposely from the ground up to empower their students and, equally as important, to provide the students with incredible value.

During dinner tonight, one of the students said to me ‘I have not made an investment yet, but today I realized that I can be successful and I can DO THIS.  The only thing that is hard for me is that my [spouse] doesn’t think this can work, and it is hard for me to feel like I can succeed without my spouses’ support.  But Pete and Don have made me realize that I can do this alone if necessary, and that alone is worth the price of admission.  I can hardly wait to see what tomorrow brings!!!”

It was in that moment – in that…brief…span of time that I realized, truly began to grasp, that beyond the techniques of acquisition and structuring financing, and beyond learning how to negotiate and develop exit strategies for real property, the thing that is the most critical element for us on this journey is when somebody gives us the gift of FAITH in ourselves, and in doing so we begin to believe that we are actually capable of such earth shattering things it actually becomes scary  to think that for all these years we slept dormant, unaware of what we have been capable of…it is in this awakening that we begin to grasp how truly precious our time here is, and how little of it there is to waste.  It is in this gift that we begin to see that the money real estate investing promises us is not the ultimate goal of the journey, but simply a tool we acquire on the journey which for all of us is so distinctly personal and yet in many ways so similar - I find myself beginning to wonder if everyone ending up in the same room here is merely a coincidence, or the suggestion of Providence???

Faith then, of all things, becomes the catalyst that empowers us, and in becoming empowered we begin to realize that we are, in fact, meant to do something greater with our lives than simply go to work each day while we wait to expire.  And interestingly, that is a sentiment I hear so often in my interactions with real estate students across the country.  People want to believe that they were meant to be successful, and to do something meaningful, although that often goes against the ideas that we encounter growing up.  Most of the time, we are taught that people who succeed are the exception, not the norm.  You know, we aren’t on TV but the successful people are, so that must mean we can only, possibly, be average – at best. Right?  Isn’t that really the lesson we are subconsciously taught from our youth?

Evidently, Pete Youngs and Don Derosa don’t like that lesson very much and thought that it was time for a change.

And today I realized that change is very, very good.

If Faith in ourselves is the element of success in understanding what we are capable of doing as real estate investors(and as people), much in the same way that Faith is a core component of a healthy and robust spiritual life, then Don Derosa and Pete Youngs have simply chosen to become the metaphorical real estate preachers who, inevitably, have begun to lead us down the path to what is both equally a real and at the same time metaphorical form of real estate salvation. It is uncanny too, because their leadership is so natural, and so almost, well, let’s just say effortless, that these two gentleman end up leading by example not only because of their breadth and depth of subject knowledge, but also by demonstrating, consistently and without fail, true integrity and deep caring for their students.  Experienced investors in this industry will agree with me that these things, sadly, are often sorely lacking at events such as these. Yet that statement makes the presence of almost one hundred students absolutely engrossed in this seminar a refreshing sight indeed.

I find myself emerging from the end of Day 1 both exhausted but also renewed, cleansed in newfound knowledge and ideas of empowerment.  Recognizing this, I can only say one thing;

Preach on, boys.  Preach on!

Blogging the Bonanza is Robert Feol’s feeble attempt to capture the spirit of Don Deorsa’s and Pete Youngs’ Investor Bonanza, a national real estate investing workshop  which features some of the greatest real estate educators in The United States today.  Want more information?  Visit Robert’s blogs at DiscountPropertyWarehouse.net or join him on the live feed at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/investor-bonanza

We had a busy but great day yesterday.  Robert had Don Derosa and Pete Youngs on the radio show yesterday morning.  They spoke a lot about private lending – which is getting ever so popular these days, and had quite a few callers.  Don and Pete have a huge event coming up on September 30th in Atlanta called Investor Bonanza, a 5-day investor boot-camp.  Robert will be there to emcee.  Should be a POWERFUL event!  Listen to the latest show here:  http://www.wrecradio.com/pages/expert.html

Meanwhile, I was getting ready for the investing workshop yesterday afternoon.  Robert, Jim Reedy, and Craig Jennings shared the microphone and talked about getting started in real estate, building a power team,  and financial goal setting.  We had about 45 attendees and a catered lunch, and we got some great feedback.  Save-1-Pets, a local animal rescue group, was there with two dogs and a cat and we took donations to help their organization.  We raised over $800!  We had about 45 people in attendance, saw some familiar faces and a lot of new ones.  I am looking forward to following up on Monday with new contacts I made at the meeting!

We will have another workshop next month, date TBA.  If you have thought about getting into real estate investing, or even if you haven’t, there has never been a better time to get started.  It could be the very way that YOU could become financially independent.

Robert always ends his show with this:  ”What are you doing today to make tomorrow different than yesterday?” – if you’re wanting to make a change in your life, there’s never been a better day than today and never a better time than right now!  That’s my thought each morning and it’s what keeps me motivated throughout the day.

Hope everyone has a fantastic and productive week!

Introduction to the Fundamentals of Real Estate Investing and Financial Goal Setting

Robert Feol and Jim Reedy, Instructors

The fundamentals of real estate investing form the core of a successful investing experience.  As such, it is critical that potential investors set themselves up with a knowledge based foundation for success.  It seems like, with the advent of today’s glitzy infomercials, there are very few opportunities to get real knowledge without some type of substantial cost or hidden strings.  Robert and Jim continue their community education workshop series by focusing on the foundation of real estate investing and financial goal setting, asking and answering questions such as:

-        Why do I want to buy investment real estate?

-        What are the financial goals that I hope to achieve through real estate investing?

-        What is the time frame for me to reach my goals?  What are the milestone indicators that I am on the path to success?

-        Do I have a power team in place?  What team members do I need to succeed in this business?  Can I do this alone?

-        Do I have multiple exits strategies for each property that I am buying?

-        Am I mentally prepared to become a real estate investor?

-        What are the obstacles I can expect to encounter in investment real estate?

-        Am I financially ready and disciplined to become a real estate investor?

And much, much more!

Join Robert Feol, national author, speaker educator, and radio personality, and Jim Reedy, veteran Memphis real estate investor as they give you the tools necessary to get started in real estate investing safely and with minimal risk.  Lunch, workshop materials, and admission are all included at NO CHARGE!

Who: YOU

When: Saturday, September 19^th at 1 PM

Where: Holy Communion Church, Fellowship Hall(4645 Walnut Grove, 38117)

Why: Because you have been wanting to make a financial change.  Now is the time!

How to Register: Call (901) 335 – 9409 or email your registration at realestatepuzzle@gmail.com!