Nobody Loves A Landlord
January 31, 2008
The typical landlord starts off life as a light hearted real estate investor. The investor is brimming with enthusiasm and is determined to acquire some single family homes that will be attractive to renters… and start down the road to financial independence.
Then… Wham! Reality smacks them right in the face! The investor-landlord is fair game for almost everyone.
Why? Because nobody loves a landlord.
It’s bad enough that many renters don’t quite understand that without their monthly rent payments the landlord can’t make the mortgage payments on the property.
A few renters are surprised to learn that the family room of a rental home was just not designed as the place to rebuild motorcycles.
Nobody loves a landlord.
And then… how many legal hoops must the landlord jump through? In most states tenant/landlord law favors the tenant in many ways
For example:
A tenant signs a one year lease. Six months later the tenant breaks the lease and moves. Now the law demands that the landlord find a new tenant for that unit as quickly as possible.
Maltas Market Battle
January 30, 2008
With new destinations such as Bulgaria, Slovenia and Croatia offering two and three bedroom apartments for sale for £50,000, there was concern last year among some Malta estate agents that 2005 could see a drop in the number of UK and Irish buyers choosing to buy a holiday home on the island.
With good all year round temperatures enticing many buyers for the winter months as well as the summer, driving on the left and a warm welcome from the local population who nearly all speak English, Malta has been popular for some years among overseas property buyers.
“A home from home in the Med is often the comment we hear from overseas property buyers” comments Michael Johnson of Malta property specialists Tribune Properties.
“With countries such as Bulgaria, Croatia and Slovenia opening up their property markets to overseas buyers there is a chance that the Maltese property market could see a decline in sales this year.
But it hasn’t happened in the first quarter of 2005 at least. Malta has an appeal that never really attracted the bargain hunters in the past who tended to look more at rural France and Spain where the low cost airlines fly to, and it is these buyers who are now considering the new markets rather than the buyers we see in Malta.”
To Buy or Not to Buy
January 30, 2008
Purchasing a home is a major emotional and financial decision. Often times, people want to buy a home; however, emotionally cannot afford to commit to the home-buying process. They are, in fact, afraid. "My payment will be too high" or "What if I lose my job," are some of the "excuses" which I often hear. People do not realize that they are able to meet all the commitments over their life span.
In any event, when everything is said and done, here are some of the major advantages of buying a home:
1. Quality of Life. Home-buying and living in your home affects the quality of life. It adds to your confidence, giving you a sense of pride and satisfaction. You have a sense of emotional well-being as well as peace of mind.
2. Tax Deductibility of Mortgage Interest. The entire mortgage interest payment is tax-deductible and the "net" cost of the mortgage payment actually puts money in your pocket.
3. Tax Deductibility of Property Taxes. Similarly, the property taxes are due and payable twice a year and may seem like a lot of waste of money. Typically, property taxes are $1.10/$1,000 of your purchase price. However, the property taxes are also tax deductible and you get it back in the form of tax savings.
Real Estate Values or Just Bad Habits
January 29, 2008
There are several small businesses that retain hundred year old traditions. Hand-dipped chocolates, fresh flowers and cloth napkins on every table in a restaurant, or mints and roses on a guest’s pillow at a B&B. Loyal customers come to expect these little perks or tokens of quality in the product and changing your traditions might mean the loss of your evangelical customers. These are unspoken signs of a company’s value system and devotion to the customer. Then, there are traditions that are a little harder to explain.
There are two curious habits in the real estate industry that have always baffled me. They are age-old traditions and the public has come to accept them as part and parcel of the product. But are they a reflection of company values or just a couple of really bad habits?
The first….Why do real estate agents put their picture on absolutely everything? Real Estate agents are there to sell houses, people come to the agent to buy a house not because the agent has auburn hair or because he is smiling. The image presented through this type of marketing is that of an egoistical, self centered, self serving person.
Bulgarian Property Market Insight
January 28, 2008
GOLF GRABS BULGARIA!
At the present time there are only three golf courses in the whole of Bulgaria: one at Elin Pelin, near the capital, Sofia, and two owned by Air Sofia. These are located at Ihtiman, opened in 2000, 40km from Sofia, and at Sliven, opened in 2004, 90km from the Black Sea.
Because of the increasingly rapid rise in foreign interest in Bulgaria recently, several more golf courses are proposed. One of these will be located at Razgrad, in the north-east, about 90km from the Black Sea. More are scheduled to open in the next few years: two at Kavarna and one at Primorsko, near Sozopol.
Mountain and ski areas will be represented by a golf course in the ski town of Bansko this year, and a very large golf complex between Kostenets and Borovets, the country’s foremost ski resort. This is scheduled for 2007, the year of Bulgaria’s entry into the European Union, and will be located at Dolna Banya, already near Bulgaria’s first golf course at Ihtiman.
The Real Estate Agent Alphabet
January 27, 2008
Alphabet Letters after a person’s name seem to bestow some kind of special prestige. PHD, MD, ESQ are common… but just look at what is available to real estate sales people…
ABR, ABRM, ALC, CCIM, CIPS, CPM, ARM, AMO, CRB, CRS, CRE, GAA, GRI, RCE, RAA, SIOR, AHWD ePRO, CAM, CBR, C-CREC, CLHMS, CREA, CRIA, QSC and SRES designations.
Can anyone, anywhere explain just exactly what those 26 acronyms mean and what the qualifications are to earn the use each of them? And if you can … WHY?
Some of those designations have extensive requirements, including several days or even a full week in a classroom setting, a written examination, a certain number of years in the business and evidence of having closed a required number of transactions in the specialty.
And then there’s the real estate equivalent of The Skull & Bones… the CRE designation. Only 1,000 people hold it, the qualifications are secret, and membership is by invitation only. Yipes… are they licensed to kill?
Oh yes, let’s not forget the QSC designation. That one requires a live or online course, a 40-question multiple choice quiz, a signed commitment to quality statement and participation in a perpetual customer survey program that costs $50 for every 20 surveys.
Real Estate Investing Produces Extraordinary Profits
January 26, 2008
Imagine making $5000 a year from real estate investing without recognizing you are real estate investing!
Real estate values are so dynamic. The marketplace is always fluid and changing. The only constant is the eventual escalation of value.
Suppose you had owned that little piece of property in your neighborhood years ago where McDonald’s is located today. If you had owned it for 20 or 30 years, what would your profit be from that sale?
Real estate values fluctuate in cycles and according to a myriad of owner situations. However, the price of real estate almost always goes up.
Let me give you a real-life example. (And if you are old enough, you have your own similar story!)
In 1970 I bought a little house in the Green Hills section of Nashville for $27,000. You know it wasn’t much because of the price. But it was home, and the location was respectable.
In 1978 I sold that house for a bigger house in Green Hills. The sales price for that little house I sold was $67,000.
Real Estate Investing with No Cash and No Credit
January 25, 2008
Lots of folks think it can’t be done.
How in the world can you buy a piece of real estate property without cash or credit? How is it possible to buy a $50,000 house or a $1 million dollar house if I don’t have an abundance of cash or an excellent credit rating?
Nothing stops a would-be investor cold in his tracks like "no cash or credit." The prevailing perception is that "I can’t start real estate investing" because (1) I sure don’t have any money and (2) my credit is horrible!
The typical way real estate investing is accomplished is with an earnest money deposit to accompany the Purchase Contract and a down payment at closing. Many real estate investing tycoons, in wanting an offer accepted, make large earnest money deposits so the property seller will recognize the buyer as a serious investor. And because many real estate investing tycoons use real estate agents as their purchasing liaison, they provide sizable down payments out of which the sales commission will be paid.
Well, when I started my real estate investing career, I had neither cash nor credit. I had a serious business failure prior to my start in real estate investing, so I had to conjure up a way to succeed outside the traditional norm.
Real Estate Investing ? The Job Escape
January 25, 2008
Real estate investing is pretty unusual in lots of ways. Real estate investing is creative. Real estate investing is risk-taking excitement. Real estate investing is diverse activity. Most of all, real estate investing is very profitable.
I’ll never forget the words of one of my professors who said, “2% think, 8% think they think, and 90% would rather die than have a thought.”
Boy, is that ever true!!!
According to surveys, 75% of the workforce hates what they do every day at their job. The survey was unneeded. Common sense and observation tells you that.
Why don’t people love what they do every day?
They hate the commute. They hate the demanding routine. They hate being demeaned by their superiors. They hate some of the people around them. On and on it goes, but most of all, they hate their limited salary ? payment per what the job pays rather than payment according to their personal contribution.
The locked-in salary cap is most despicable because it pays an employee what the job is worth and not what the person is worth. The color of your skin is not the problem. The fact you were born as a female is not the problem. Your lack of superlative educational degrees is not the problem. The problem is that a job pays what the job is worth and not what the employee is worth.
Real Estate Investing Skill Acquisition
January 24, 2008
Real estate investing is not in any list of high school electives. You can’t get an accredited degree in real estate investing. You won’t find a high school or college guidance counselor who recommends a career in real estate investing (if the guidance counselor understood real estate investing, he or she probably wouldn’t be a guidance counselor!)
The public school system and educational curriculum in the U.S. is only a feeble attempt to prepare students to just "get a job." Unfortunately there is no class in "Making Money 101." You don’t have the opportunity to take a class in "How to Become Financially Independent." No teacher ever taught a class in "How to Succeed When Everyone Else is Failing." I never learned anything about succeeding as an entrepreneur or becoming wealthy during my 10 years in the university classroom. I only became a multi-millionaire when I learned the skills of real estate investing, and I paid the price out-of-pocket and out-of-the-classroom for that education. I learned these skills in the ole University of Hard Knocks through trial-and-error.
