You want to build a thriving real estate business.
You want to gain time freedom and financial freedom for you and your family. You want to work less and make more.
That’s awesome! At Call Porter, we help people just like you. 🙂
But there’s a problem…
You’re not the only savvy investor on the block that’s trying to generate local leads, buy distressed properties, and multiply their money.
No… far from it.
If your market is like most, then there’s a lot of competition — wholesalers, buy-and-hold investors, house flippers, and even unfriendly agents — all trying to make your business fail so that theirs will succeed.
Screw that.
Here are 10 tips for building a successful real estate investing business. Implement even a few of these and you’ll be far ahead of your most aggressive competitors.
CLICK to learn how Call Porter has helped hundreds of investors build more profitable businesses in less time.
Tip #1: Start Small to Learn the Game
If you’re new to the game of real estate investing, start small. There’s no reason to dive headfirst into wholesaling, house fix-and-flipping, and buy-and-hold investing. Choose one mode of investing and learn the ropes as best you can. Once you fully understand one type of investing, you’ll more easily understand the others.
But how can you learn about real estate investing?
Well, one of the best ways is to find a real estate investor in your area and ask them to teach you how it’s done. They might even do it for free if you’re willing to help them with some of the grunt work. In the meantime, take advantage of these online resources:
- Real Estate Investing Guide for New Investors
- Real Estate Investing 101 – 9 Steps to Get Started (or Restarted)
- 8 tips on real estate investing for beginners
Tip #2: Know Where Your Money is Going
In real estate investing as with all businesses, you need to know what’s happening to your money.
Where is it coming from? Where is it going? And how much is left?
Many real estate investors make the mistake of spending money on direct mail, VAs, and house repairs without much thought for their overall ROI.
That’s a big mistake.
Often times, the investor who understands where their money is going — whether by hiring an accountant or by managing it themselves — is the same investor that dominates their market. Knowledge is power, and knowledge of how money works is half the battle to building a successful investing business (or any business, for that matter).
So do what you need to do — buy a book about accounting or hire someone to take care of it for you.
A few of our personal favorite books on the topic are…
- Rich Dad Poor Dad: What The Rich Teach Their Kids About Money – That The Poor And Middle Class Do Not!
- I Will Teach You To Be Rich
Tip #3: Delegate Your Calls
The amount of time you spend answering the phone every day — it’s absurd.
And the worst part is that the majority of those phone calls are a complete waste of time — they’re from tire-kickers that want nothing more than to interrupt your dinner with your family (or so it seems) and tell you about all their problems.
But answering those phone calls doesn’t just cut into your time with your family, it cuts into the time you could be working to actually grow your business — hire people, train people, create new marketing strategies, etc.
At Call Porter, our expert trained U.S. based reps will answer the phone for you, screen the caller, and schedule a follow-up call between you and the most motivated sellers.
That way, the time you do spend on the phone isn’t a waste.
Tip #4: Mitigate Your Risks
It’s no secret: real estate investing is risky business. Or, at least, it feels that way. The thought of unexpected market fluctuations, not being able to sell a home once you own it, and even needing to fully trust the people that you hire can make any real estate entrepreneur shake in their boots.
Fortunately, you can mitigate many of those risks (real or perceived) with some simple forethought and business process improvement.
Here are some examples of different ways you can reduce risk…
- Stay up to date on the market — no one can completely predict what will happen to the market, but having a best guess and understanding where the market currently is will help you make good business decisions.
- Choose your area of operation carefully. With loads of online tools in today’s world, you could operate practically anywhere you want — so choose a market that will make the path forward easier rather than harder.
- Spend as much time as you need on your home evaluations (and make safe estimates) — When you’re new, it’s better to spend more time on your home evaluations than it is to purchase whatever comes your way. Ask an experienced investor to help if you need it and, in the end, make safe estimates that give you some financial wiggle room.
Tip #5: Streamline Your House Renovation Process
If you buy distressed properties, fix them up, and flip them for a profit, then this real estate investing tip is for you. Fixing up houses can take a lot of time — choosing color schemes, selecting furniture and appliances, buying the right windows. Anyone who has fixed up their own home is familiar with this tedious list of to-dos.
When you’re doing it at scale — when you’re trying to build a thriving business that’s based on fixing up distressed homes — you don’t have time to choose a new color scheme for each house, or a new tile for each bathroom. Instead, you need to streamline the process.
The most efficient house flippers have just one set of appliances, colors, carpet, tiles, etc., that they use on every house. By so doing, they keep momentum with their business and don’t get tied up in silly menial decisions.
Your goal is to make money, not to make every house look unique. So choose good-looking, affordable renovations and use them on every house.
Tip #6: Make Sure Your Marketing and Actions Line Up
It’s tempting. I get it. To make big promises that you’re not 100% sure you’ll be able to fulfill. Especially when you’re new to real estate investing, the temptation to make false promises to sellers or buyers is damn-near intoxicating.
Maybe they’ll sell to me if I start with a higher price and then knock it down a bit once they sign the contract..
Maybe I’ll get more leads with deceptive yellow-letter mailers…
You’d do almost anything just to close your first deal or to close your next deal. But here’s what you have to keep in mind: you’re trying to build a business, a long term business that lasts well into the future, ideally.
And the only way to do that is with a reputation of honesty and trustworthiness in your market. Although it’s tempting, never sacrifice the long term health of your business for a few short term wins.
Tell buyers and sellers what you’re capable of doing for them and then do what you said — that’ll take you a whole lot further than empty promises and deceptive marketing.
You can learn more about this over here.
Tip #7: Hire An Acquisitions Manager
You started a real estate investing business because you want to make money. But not just because you want to make money — ideally, you want to make enough money to easily support you and your family, and you want to do it while working less.
Put simply, you want to work less and make more.
That will require you to hire people who can manage your business while you’re away. An Acquisitions Manager, for instance, is one of the most valuable roles you can add to your business (so long as you hire the right person for the job). This person is typically responsible for overseeing each deal from A-Z — marketing, sales, contracts, and closing.
Of course, you don’t want to overwhelm this person. So make sure you give them a reasonable number of tasks to achieve and that you outsource more tedious tasks (answering the phone, for instance).
Many of our members at Call Porter have built wildly successful real estate investing businesses with just an Acquisitions Manager, a VA, and our live call answering services backing them.
Tip #8: Make Room For All Kinds of Real Estate Investments
Don’t get me wrong. When you start as a real estate investor, it’s best to learn as much as you can about one type of real estate investment — wholesaling, for instance. That way, you can focus all your time and energy into learning and growing a single-trick business.
As you get your wits about you, though, it will almost always be in your best interest to expand your scope of operation. You might go into new markets, you might hire new people, but you should also make the most of every lead you generate — whether they match your current business model or not.
For example, you will still find great rental properties as a wholesaler (as my brother is fond of saying, “Keep the best and wholesale the rest.”) and you might even come across a few low-priced vacant lots worth flipping. The more that you’re able to work with sellers and adapt to the situation, the more your business’ profits will grow.
It’s okay to be a one-trick pony in the beginning, but expand your real estate portfolio as your business grows and you will serve more people and make more money down the road.
I have a full article dedicated to this concept over here.
Tip #9: Always Keep Your Sales Pipeline Active
When the sun is shining, you don’t worry too much about the upcoming storms.
Ehhh, maybe the weather forecast is wrong.
But then Wednesday roles around and, look-y look-y, the weather stations were right: thunder storms. Fortunately, we live during a time when our homes can withstand any type of weather with very little upkeep or planning (no more straw huts).
You know what can’t withstand that metaphorical storm without planning?
Your business.
It’s easy to ignore marketing much when you’re closing deals and making money. But you must remember that the only way to keep closing deals well into the future is to run ads, create word of mouth, and network, even when things are going well — especially when things are going well.
Tip #10: Be Persistent, Have Grit
No one ever built a successful real estate investing business without a few failures under their belt.
But how did they succeed if they first had to fail?
Well, they stuck with it. They didn’t give up. They learned from their mistakes and got back on the horse. They proved to themselves that it was possible because lots of people have built successful investing businesses, and then they resolved to keep at it until it worked.
You have to do the same. There’s no way around it.
If you’re going to succeed, then you’re going to have to jump some hurdles and break through some barriers. Decide to make it happen now so you’re ready to push forward when the going gets tough.
Conclusion
Maybe it seems like growing a thriving real estate investing business — one that supports you and your family and doesn’t have you working 15-hour days — is a tall order.
And I’m not going to lie to you: it’s not going to be easy. Sometimes, it’s going to be remarkably challenging, one of the hardest things you’ve ever done, even.
It’s going to challenge your determination, discipline, and grit. But if you stick with it, if you implement the above 10 strategies, then you will succeed.
It will take time, to be sure — but it will be well worth it when you’re spending $10,000 on a family vacation without even a second thought.