I break down the exact system I used to buy a profitable Airbnb. If you’ve been trying to get started investing in short term rentals, this will help you see the step by step process with a real-life investment As a beginner real estate investor, you might get ads and promotions for people’s real estate investing courses and mentorships, often with a steep price tag. Are they worth it? Before you buy into one of these courses, work through these 6 steps first to invest in yourself before deciding to buy a specific real estate investing program, and you’ll save yourself a lot of money and headaches.
Resources
Use this FREE worksheet to track your progress through these 6 steps.
For a high level overview of the LAPS funnel for buying profitable real estate investment properties, check out this video: Start Investing in Real Estate With Just 4 Steps
Transcript
If you’re a beginning real estate investor and you’re looking at how to get started.
Put away your wallet.
Close those ads you see on real estate investing mentorships and do these six things first, before you pay for any course or program.
If you’ve been wanting to get started in real estate investing because it seems like everyone is talking about passive income and you’d like to learn more about it, you’re bound to start getting ads touting memberships or courses that promise you your first deal in 90 days or less.
It’s tempting to start thinking that you’ll never be able to get any success until you swipe that credit card for that $10,000 course.
But wait, if you’ve been thinking about signing up for a mentorship or a course before you’ve done these six things, close your wallet because these steps are crucial and can save you a ton of money.
Why are they crucial?
It’s because if you’re new to real estate investing, you likely only know about a few types of strategies that can be used in the business.
Paying for a specific course or mentorship before you understand the different types of strategies and businesses that are available in this industry can have you shelling out a ton of money on something that ultimately might not fit your lifestyle or your long term goals when setting up your business.
So here’s how you get started.
The first step is to open up your favorite podcast app and start searching for real estate investing. You’re bound to find a few of my own favorites on there, including the Bigger Pocket’s Real Estate Investing podcast and the Real Estate Rookie.
Between these two shows alone, there’s over a thousand episodes to choose from. Make it a point to scroll through these episodes and pick the ones that sound interesting to you. Your goal is to listen to at least 100 episodes. You can listen to them while you’re on your commute or doing things around the house that you have to do anyway, like cooking or laundry or cleaning.
Listening to 100 episodes will expose you to the various strategies in real estate investing and help you start considering what type of investor you want to be next,
If you’re listening to podcasts on real estate investing, often the show hosts will ask the guests what their favorite book on real estate investing is.
Your next step is to start making note of these titles and start picking up a few of them from your local library. Make it a point to read at least 15 books on real estate investing, business, personal finance, goal setting and mindset. These types of books will get you ready to start thinking like a real estate investor and finding out what sort of skills and strategies are needed to be successful.
Throughout this process of learning, you’re bound to come up with questions and you probably don’t have a network of real estate investors yet. Sign up for a free account over on BiggerPockets.com, where thousands of investors interact with each other and ask and answer questions about real estate investing.
Make it a goal to engage in at least 100 conversations there and ask questions, and if you’ve recently picked up something, some advice or some information from one of the books that you’ve been reading, feel free to answer some questions that other people have.
This dialog helps you to start using the language of real estate and start to clarify any questions you have about how it all works.
On the Bigger Pockets forums, you’ll start to find other investors that live in your area, there’s even a part of the site where people can post local events such as REIAs and Meetup groups specific to real estate investing. Start talking to other investors in your area and make it a point to attend at least three in-person events to start meeting other people that are actively involved in real estate.
Now that you’ve started attending events and engaging with other investors online and offline in in-person, it’s now time to start talking to investors one on one to learn about how they’re investing, and to see if it fits with your goals and lifestyle.
Try to have at least 12 conversations with other investors in your area to get a feel for what real estate investing looks like, what work is required to become successful, and how their own journey progressed over time.
You can have these conversations in-person or over Zoom calls, but make sure to do it live. You’ll learn a lot more about how a person feels about the business they’ve created. if you aren’t doing it through emails or texting.
Once you’ve started to hone in on what kind of real estate investor you want to become, start researching how to analyze deals on that particular type of real estate.
You can find this information in books on YouTube, on the Bigger Pockets forums and in blog posts.
Try to analyze 100 deals in this specific type of real estate niche that you’re interested in and start to get a feel at what looking at and analyzing a property feels like Share your analysis on the forums and with people that you’ve met and see if you’re on the right track. Getting feedback on this step can help you spot mistakes and make sure you’re not missing important information.
Next, if you’ve found people locally that invest in the type of real estate that you’re interested in, ask if you could come with them on their next property. Walk through To get a feel for what to look for in a property and what sort of things to watch out for.
Aim to walk through or tour at least 12 properties in the type of real estate that you’re looking for, no matter if it’s single family homes, apartment buildings or commercial spaces, there will always be these kinds of properties on the market.
You can work with agents or brokers and even other investors to go through and walk these properties.
Finally, this next step is a big one.
While you’re learning about real estate investing, make sure your personal finances are in order.
Learn how to live on 70% of your take home pay and save the other 30% so that you could start building your real estate portfolio.
Although plenty of gurus out on the internet say that you can invest with no money at all, you’ll likely need some money to get started. It’ll be used to pay for inspections, perhaps for a down payment to do some marketing, to attend events, or if you’ve gotten through all of the previous steps and you feel comfortable moving forward to pay for some education.
To keep you on track with this six step plan, check out the worksheet in the description below that helps you track your progress through these various phases and to help you stay on track with your goals.
Check out this next video where I talk about the one book that changed the way I set goals and makes it more likely that I achieve them.