BiggerPockets

Subject2.com Review, Worth Your Money? Prt 3

Tuesday, September 15

Ok, here is part 3. A little overdue but that's ok.

 Chapter 8 is about tabletop closing versus title co closings.This chapter is great because Nick walks you through the process of tabletop closing to where you feel totally comfortable with closing a sale on the back of your pickup truck or even in a coffee house. I was nervous when I started to read this chapter but as I started going through how tabletop closings were done I became more and more relaxed with the concept of them. 

It's fantastic! Nick tells you when to use tabletop and when to use title co. for closing. There are benefits to using both! Each at the appropriate time. He always gives you a very advantageous way of leading the seller through the paper work at a tabletop closing. Very smooth Nick very smooth. 

Chapter 9 talks about completing your exit strategy! What else is needed to be said about this chapter? This the chapter that we cash checks in! Isn't that awesome?

 Chapter 10 is one of my favorites because Nick discusses with you about Water, Weeding, and Repeating. (sigh) I love yard work. No but seriously, Nick teaches you how to "grow"your "garden" of "flowers". In other words, "increase" your "network" of "people". Oh you didn't know you needed people? LOL! Nick shows you how to keep your lists strong, which I love as a beginner! I get insights of a seasoned veteran on how to keep my relationships strong! 

Wow 10 Chapters jammed full of his expertise for how much? Practically nothing. 

WAIT that's not all!!! A Bonus chapter and RESOURCES!! Ok the bonus chapter is sweet because he shares his genius on how to get creative with subject 2 investing. His resources are based on what his AZ forms are but they give you an awesome start that you can take to your local attorney and have them changed to fit your states laws.

Well that's all! It is a great resource to have in your library! Subject2.com is scheduled to launch Sept 25th officially and you will be able to get your long awaited copy. Check back with me then and I will have link that you can get your very own copy!

For Newbie's Minds

Tuesday, September 15

Do you have your mind right?

The strangest things have happened to me since I started transforming my mind. Where to begin I really don't know but I will try to convey some of the things that are happening.

Have you ever wondered why some people just look, act and feel happier than you?

Have you ever wondered why some people can take the leap of faith that others cannot and succeed! It's because they have their mind right! 

A wiseman once told me that "you are where you are in your life because you chose it".

Now I don't know about you, but when I was told that, my life was NOT where I wanted it to be.  Why was it not where I wanted it to be, because my mind wasn't right. My mind was in exactly where I was, depressed, unmotivated, pessimistic to everything and heading even farther down that dark road. Fortunately I had a couple good people in my "circle". They recommended a couple different books to me, "Maximum Achievement" by Brian Tracy and "Think and Grow Rich" by Napoleon Hill. These two books have helped tremendously with how I now allow myself to think in my mind! That's right I saidALLOW myself. You and only you can control your mind. You are the one that CHOOSES to think those thoughts. You are the one that allows those thoughts into your head. You have the choice as to whether or not you are going to let them invade your mind or whether or not you are going to say, "nope sorry your not allowed here". 

Ok I want to tell you what is happening.

Here is a tip for all you Newbie investors out there! (I am one too) Don't ever let anything get you down and keep you down. If a deal falls through understand that what you have done is not failed, but rather you have found a way that does not work and you must now try another way until you find what does. Do not focus on the negatives for when you focus your mind on the negative things that is what you will produce, negatives. Only allow yourself to focus on the positives! The two things that I always say to myself outloud are these, "I think positively!" and "I like myself". First I think positively tells your mind that you are a positive thinker and not only reminds yourself of that fact but reinforces it. Second, I like myself is awesome I don't care who you are or where your from there are times when you look at yourself and say that I don't like what I see or I don't like the way that I acted, when you are feeling down about yourself the best way to pick yourself back up is to look into a mirror and say to yourself "I like myself!"Don't laugh it really works, you must say it with FEELING though. Don't believe me? Give it a try for a week and see if your attitude not only about yourself but your attitude towards others doesn't improve.

You want to know what my neighbor's wife and daughter said about me to my wife a week after I had started doing this? "Your husband is looks different lately" My wife asked them why that was and they replied, "He has a twinkle in his eye". OMG!!! When my wife told me this I was blown away at the fact that it showed through that much!

The other piece of advice that I want to leave with you is this... DON'T FOCUS ON THE MONEY!!!!!!! That's what I did for the first 2 weeks and guess where that got me... exactly, no where.  You know why? Because PEOPLE CAN TELL!!!! As soon as I stopped focusing on me and started focusing on what I could do for others this amazing thing started to happen. A door here, and then a door there, started OPENING. All I have done is taken my mind off of the money and focused on people because this business is about PEOPLE. So do what you say your going to do-even if your not bound by a contract-and your net worth and more importantly your network will grow faster than you could have ever imagined.

Check this post out and leave your thoughts on the quote.

Private Investor

Wednesday, September 02

OK so here I am brand new to investing and I've decided to quit my job and dive head first into fulltime investing. Well needless to say I worried about money. But I also knew that staying at my current job I was going nowhere, making someone else wealthy and losing deals every minute i wasn't able to call and network. So I decided to make the plunge.

I ordered business cards and bandit signs and the whole nine yards to get started while i still had income coming in and started telling everyone at work that I was going into business for myself. Now normally I would have kept this to myself or told a very few people, but when I read Nick Johnson's new book and he said to tell everyone including the dog that you were in real estate and that you never know where your next deal was going to come from I started telling everyone. Sometimes even if they didn't want to listen! I passed out business cards and everything it was totally out of my comfort zone but i knew that to be successful this is what I needed to do. Not to mention that I getting out of my comfort zone I was not only gaining experience but I was growing as a person. WHICH IS PRETTY DARN COOL! Cause everytime I talked to another person I started to become more and more comfortable with it.

Anyways.... back to the point, I am telling people and one of my coworkers comes up to me and says I want to invest in your business. Now, this blew me away! There are a couple reasons why I was so shocked. First, because he actually had money to invest, which is an asenine thing to think, but second because he was serious and he is an investor of all types of different stuff. But now I have a private investor, and he's dirt cheap too!!! He offered me a 5% flat rate fee. Which since I had no prior experience I thought was awesome. Even if i do 4 deals and end up paying him 20% total I don't really care at this point because I now have a resource that I didn't know existed to me.

I'm so excited because my investing options have now just opened up even further. I am very excited! Did I mention I am very excited!!!! 

I will keep everyone up to date with  how this relationship goes and when I have my first deal secured!

Subject2.com Review, Worth Your Money? Prt 2

Wednesday, September 02

I'm not going to waste any time tonight getting right into talking about Chapters 6, 7 & 8 of Nick Johnson's new book on Subject2's.

We finished off the last post talking about marketing your business. 

I you didn't get a chance to read the first post do so here.

Chapter 6 talks about talking to your sellers.I will have to go back and reread this chapter as well as 7 and 8 because Nick provides you with so much information about what you can do to help the seller be comfortable with the subject2 strategy. He tells you what kind of sellers that you run into and how you can show them that selling their house to you using subject2 will benefit them as well as you. He also explains what makes a property appealing to the subject2 strategy and what factors need to be in place so that you can properly analyze whether this particular property is a good choice for the subject2 strategy. He also talks about the essential information that you need to get from a property owner on your first phone call. There is so much stuff that is in this chapter about getting the seller talking and how you control the conversation so that the seller is thinking what you want them to be thinking, (which is that this subject2 strategy is a good one) and he talks about how to lead the seller into the close. He also has some "get your mind right" books that he recommends you read. (they are very good I am reading them now). 

Chapter 7 consists of doing your due diligence. He talks about what you need to evaluate in the seller and when you should avoid a transaction all together. He then goes into how you should evaluate whether the property's #'s are going to make sense or not. This information is invaluable to a new investor like me. He talks about the DOS clause (Due On Sale). Specifically what will probably trigger the loan being called due. He also gives you ways to let the lender know that you have taken the property without triggering the DOS. 

Chapter 8 is all about the close. He discusses what he says to customers and how to lead them to the close when actually doing a tabletop closing. He explains the differences between a title closing and a tabletop closing and helps take some of the fear out of doing your own tabletop closing (good information for someone who has never done one). He actually walks you through one of his typical closings. 

I will close by saying that all of the information in these 3 chapters is very thorough and very well written. So far from what I've read these are the get down to business chapters.I thoroughly enjoyed how much guidance was in these 3 chapters was given. I still have to say that at this point I really recommend his book. It is an essential in any REI library. To not have sub2's in your bag of strategies just puts you behind the curve. 

Ok... so... I just reread my post and I hate it. Why, you ask? Because I sound like and old prof lecturing in front of a class. Whuh waaa whuh wa wa whuuuuuuh. (or however the charlie brown teacher is written LOL)

Everything that I read in these 3 chapters is ESSENTIAL to being a good sub2 investor and without these item I and you would not be worth a darn! I can honestly say that Nick has saved me countless hours of work and heartache by what he as so graciously wrote about in this section of the book. THANK YOU NICK!!! 

How many of you know which scenarios to avoid when you are evaluating a sub2 deal? huh? show of hands please!! I DO!!! I do because I have Nick's knowledge. Because he showed me the INSIDER'S point of view. He's showed me what he's been through so that I don't have too! THANK YOU NICK!!!!! 

How many of you know what to say to a lender to keep them from feeling like their loan is not jeopordized and keep them from not calling the loan due? AGAIN I DO!!!! Because I have Nick's proven knowledge! 

Don't think that for one moment you know everything there is to know! I guarantee that you will learn something that you hadn't thought of when you read Nick's book!! So harass him!! PM him!! Tell him he's hurting your profits by not getting this book to you!! Hell, leave a comment here for him I'm sure with as big of a SEO(search engine optimization) guy as he is he has probably found my blog by now.  So leave your comments!!!!!!

Subject2.com Review, Worth Your Money? Prt 1

Monday, August 31

Hi All.

That's right, a review on the unreleased book of subject 2's, by our very own Nick Johnson here on BP. I was able to get my hands on a "leaked" copy of the book. (Had to pay a pretty $penny$ for it though.)

Many of you might know him and/or have used his useful and helpful tips, posts and blogs, which he so graciously provides here on BP, to your advantage. Most of you know that he is very knowledgable and very creative in what he does. But what we all want to know is can he write a friggin book that's worth a darn?!

Well, hopefully I will be able to shed some light on that matter.

At this point and time I am going to attempt to write this review in 3 parts. It may change in the future but the goal is 3.

Let's Begin...

I'm only up to page 60 so I will be reviewing up to there today, hence the 3 part saga.

Let me begin by saying that the format of this book is great! You get approximately 430 words per page (in word) which means that he didn't blow his font up to reach 166 pages in his book. Which means his book isn't full of air.

First off his book begins with an interesting story about Nick and where he comes from. I took this as inspirational material that no matter who you are or where you come from this can work for you too. When you read where Nick came from and the hurdles he had to jump in his journey you will see that anyone that truly has the desire to better themselves, their family and there future can and will.

Ok, so basically chapter 1 talks about what subject 2 is and what it is not. No surprise there. If you have no idea what subject 2 is then it is great informationm if you've subject to'd before then you will not need this section. It does give a really good rebuttal to homeowners, when they ask you if this is even legal, though.

Chapter 2 talks about having a business plan. He personally recommends software, to you, that he has used to create his own business plan. Actually I think that all the affiliates he recommends to you throughout the book he personally uses in his own success day in and day out. The 3 most important parts of the business plan are, business summary, economic model and your marketing plan, don't know what those are? That's ok Nick show you.

Now... Chapter 3 and 4 are where I really started to get excited. Why? Because this is where you get to see Nick's "Marketing Genius" come out! Ch.3 is all about finding buyers!!! Yesssssssssss... those are the people that give us our checks to CASH! He addresses finding them in some fantastic ways. Ways that, unless you've talked with him personally, you've probably never even thought of! I know that I hadn't. Get this... he talks about having lists! Not just a buyer's list but lists! That's Plural! I didn't even think about what I was reading until he put the ideas in my head. I can't even keep the light bulbs lit up in my head because there are so many going off at once! It's amazing! So not only does he give you ideas but he stimulates you to discover your own ideas. At least for me I felt like I was a kid in a candy store.

Ok Ch.4 here we go again! This chapter is on marketing to your buyer's. And some of the ideas that he gave me in his book are pure genius again, in my opinion. But maybe that's cause I'm not a marketing "guru" oops I used the G word. I would share some of them with you but I said I wouldn't disclose any detail. Ok, I'll tell you one... DON'T TELL NICK!!!! Youtube.com!!! It's awesome!!! Ya, youtube.com! I can see you thinking, "youtube.com? What the hey are we going to do with youtube.com?" It's cool trust me. You will have to get the book to read what you will do with it but it will definately set you apart from everyone else.

Ch. 5 is about marketing your business. He talks about various inexpensive, yet very effective, ways to market your business.

So this is as far as I have gotten and without touching on actually doing any subject to deals or talking to sellers I would say that if you're a newb like, no doubt you've figured out by now, I am then the first 5 chapters alone are worth the price of the book. If you are a vet but just aren't having the success with marketing either your properties or finding enough solid buyer's then this book is for you and if you are a savvy investor who knows his stuff... well... we all know that you can't ever "know it all" and this book would make a great addition to your knowledge and you might even increase your sales as well.

Man... I just re-read this blog and I sound like a cheerleader. That's ok though I'm just letting my excitement out. I'm so excited that I'm going to put my two weeks in at my J O B and take the plunge into REI. (Don't worry I have one of those really cool wife's who has a good enough job to do something this crazy! She's Totally Awesome!! Just to quote Rhino from the movie BOLT for all you out there who have kids.) Subscribe to my blog so you can follow my progress over the next year to see how things go. Oh ye and to get the other two parts to this review!

If your as excited as I am about Nick's book make sure you PM him and harass him about getting his website up so that you can get your very own copy!!

Oh... I almost forgot! BOOTLEG COPIES ARE FOR SALE THE NEXT 48 HRS!! GET YOURS AT THE LOW LOW RATE OF $5000 DOLLARS A PIECE!!

Just kidding Nick