Real Estate Investment Clubs?
By Steven Gillman
Your local real estate investment clubs or associations will educate you. It won't be book education, but useful knowledge about your local real estate market. The people there are investors, many who have gotten wealthy investing right in your town. This means you'll get meaningful and specific advice on what is working in your area, where to go for an inspector or property manager, and many other tips and based on real experience.
There are also the actual money-making opportunities that you'll find. People there may need a partner with money, or a partner with time to find deals. Some have properties for sale and want to save the sales commission by selling to one of the members. Also, if you have a business that's in any way related to real estate, you can make valuable contacts. Handyman or landscapers can often find business at our local real estate investment club meetings.
Real Estate Investment Clubs - An Example
The local association that my wife and I belong to is AZREIA, or "The Arizona Real Estate Investors Association." I'll tell you a little about it. If you don't have a similar organization in your own town, this may give you ideas for what to include if you start one.
The association sponsors many educational events and seminars for reasonable fees, but the regular meetings are once each month, and included in the membership fee. It cost $195 per year for the two of us to join. As I write this, I am looking forward to tomorrow's meeting, which will include a winner of the TV show "The Apprentice," Kendra Todd, telling us how she made her first million in real estate.
Speakers are great, but I also like the regular events. Every meeting starts with "Open Networking," for thirty minutes or so. It's an opportunity to meet people, learn a little, and take down names and numbers. We each have a name tag that also tells everyone what our primary interests are, ranging from rental properties to fixer-uppers to wholesaling.
The monthly meeting then officially starts with "Structured Networking." This involves filling out 3 x 5 cards with your name, occupation, real estate experience, and investments you are interested in. This information is systematically traded with randomly chosen others. It's surprising how often profitable connections are made during this process.
The best part of the meeting is the "I have / I want" event. Members (or even visitors) can stand up and announce what they have and what they want. The host writes their phone number on the overhead projector. It is sometimes something as mundane as a microwave an investor needs to get rid of, that someone doing a fixer-upper might need. Often, it is someone who has money but needs help finding good investments. I once announced that I was looking for a mobile home park to buy, and I received three calls within a week.
The meetings are not formal affairs. The millionaires in the room are as likely to have on jeans as a suit. Everyone shares a common purpose - to make money investing in real estate. In fact, even if you have no money to invest, yuo can do just fine. Just go find a great deal, and if the numbers truly work, you can probably find the money at these meetings. It is just one more great thing about real estate investment clubs.
Steve Gillman has invested in real estate for years. To learn more, get a free real estate investing course, and see a photo of a beautiful house he and his wife bought for $17,500, visit http://www.HousesUnderFiftyThousand.com
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Share Market Clubs & Advisors
Phil Wengier
People love to huddle together in share clubs, forums, associations and seek popular opinion. There’s nothing wrong with this but make sure that you’re in a position to make your own judgements about any investment.
So you think there is safety in numbers? You think by joining a share club or a forum or association you can get the answer to successful investing? Sure, you can pick up a few useful tips and tricks and information and education. But what else are you looking for?
It is perfectly natural for us as human beings to want to socialise. But consensus in a group is not a successful strategy for profitable investing. For every trade that is made on the any stock exchange (many billions every single day) there has to be a buyer and a seller. Two people that have opposing views.
Consensus won’t cut it. In the share market there is always someone who has a different view, someone has to think that the share is cheap when you want to sell it otherwise there is no trade.
So provide yourself with the education and practical experience to become 100% self sufficient with your investment decisions. Having a sound method is the first step.
Develop your own profitable track record without the crutch of share clubs and forums and the like. Become totally confident in yourself by virtue of your own results.
The next qualm I have is with people thinking advisors and experts know more than they do. Sure they’re industry ‘professionals’ but this doesn’t mean that they know how to make money. People think that share market investing is specialised and complicated, that financial advisers and experts have done a lot of study and know a lot more than you.
You think they know how to make money on the share market
Well maybe, in fact that is definitely what they want you to think so they can still keep receiving their commissions and fees from you
But it is not true. Sure, you need to learn how to make money on the share market. And you need to gain sufficient experience to do so successfully, but it is no where near as complicated and difficult a skill to pick up as plumbing or plastering or accounting or gardening or cooking. And certainly much, much easier and miles less complicated than medicine or dentistry or rocket science.
About the Author
Learn more about [http://www.saratoga.com.au/safeinvesting]Successful Investing or download more information [http://www.saratoga.com.au/SafeInvesting/downloads/Saratoga_Safe_Investing_Method_Knowledge_Base_-_Module_Overview.pdf]here. Phil Wengier has been successfully investing in financial markets for over 30 years and is the owner of several companies. In particular, Saratoga Pty Ltd has been on the Internet since 1996 helping many who wish to discover how to invest safely and successfully. Feel free to subscribe to my Savvy Investor newsletter [http://www.saratoga.com.au/html/community/downloads/newsletter/]here.
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