Real Estate Investing Principles to Avoid Get-Rich-Quick Schemes (VIDEO)

Principles are like the foundation of your home, if the foundation is not sound or is made of poor materials, you will be forever repairing the house. Building it on fly-by-night ideas and get-rich-quick schemes will prove to be fatal and will not bring the results that you want. On the other hand, if you pour a solid foundation on true principles, then whatever you build on top of that foundation will last and produce for years to come.

Investors and Aspiring Investors

It is paramount that you know what true principles are. Do not be duped into incorporating someone’s opinion as a principle in your life and business. To know the difference between a fly-by-night principle and a true principle is not difficult. Experienced investors have applied true principles to get where they are. Read their writings and counsel with them and they will impart the wisdom of true principles.

People selling you something usually attempt to get you to bite into fly-by-night ideas that will flare up quickly and then die out. True principles are likened to marinating and false principles are likened to microwaving. Building a business takes time, energy, and lots of hard work. Let’s look at one more principle that will help you take your business to the next level:

Be a Laser, Not A Flood Lamp

When you go fishing in a lake, you don’t put just any type of bait on the line (unless you just want some quiet time). You find out what bait works the best to catch the fish you want to catch. In a very competitive market, you have to become a specialist in what you are doing.

Just saying, “I want to flip houses” is too vague nowadays. You have got to dial in your desires and say, “I want to flip 3 houses this year in South Austin in the median price range of $150k.” You need to start there and work your way backward, putting together a plan to achieve that goal. You need to have a “laser” focus and niche. Trying to become a jack-of-all-trades in real estate investing is only for the experienced investor that has built their business on solid principles. Yet even the experienced investor at times needs to pull back and focus their efforts to be more effective.

If you are starting out like I was, your marketing budget is not very big and you need to make it work well for you or else. This is when being a laser and not a flood lamp will help you. Once you have dialed in the people you want to reach, shoot a laser at ’em. Make the marketing piece as specific and personalized as you can. It will typically take more time but a lot less money.

Letter Campaign

We ran a letter campaign for several years where we would drive through a neighborhood we wanted to flip in. My wife would write down the addresses of the houses that looked distressed, as I would bark them at her. We would then go home and use the public tax roll to get the name and address of the owner and send them a personalized letter with a handwritten and stamped envelope. This marketing would cost us only about $55 per 100 letters (plus gas for driving) and consistently gave us a 3% conversion.

Mass mail marketing campaigns will bring results, but the conversion rate is lower and you will catch “all kinds of fish”. Decide what your niche or two is going to be and then be intentional about becoming an expert in your area. As your business grows, it will naturally flow into other areas of real estate techniques and modes. There will always be a temptation to become a flood lamp, so work hard at being laser-focused.

Foundation of Your Business

There are many other true principles that you want to build into the foundation of your business. This has just been a shortlist. Find an expert in the niche that you want to work in. Read their writings, talk to them if you can, and look for the principles that they have applied to their business to become what it is.