New to Real Estate · NY · Member since 2018 · 19 posts · 9 votes
Hello BiggerPockets family, I had just got done reading a chapter of the rich dad poor dad series. This chapter was very significant because he touched upon the topic of gaining knowledge through working for free. I’ve been wanting to gain experience within the real estate field for a few months now, and it dawned on me that one of the best ways for me to gain experience is to work for free on my off time. I wanted to know if anybody has an opportunity to work for free under them or just advice they can help me along the way. Thank You
Investor · Meridian, ID · Member since 2016 · 47 posts · 35 votes
5y
Just an opinion here, so don't take it bad. Sometime I get younger kids wanting to "shadow" us at work, a lot of high schools have that program implemented so they get school credits for it. But in my case, and I'm only talking from my point of view, it's kind of a pain to try to work and teach or explain everything when I'm working all day. I've told a few of them I'd rather put them on payroll and have them work part time, they would learn quite a bit more and get paid to do it.
My recommendation? I'd try to get a part time construction job in any of the walk on trades, like framing, drywall, roofing, painting, ect. These don't require any schooling, and at least in my local area (Idaho) construction has been so busy the last 10 years that pretty much every contractor I talk to can't find enough guys to help. Maybe work for a few months, but in that few months you'll learn a bunch on how a house is built, even if your a framer, you'll be exposed to the other trades, how the building/rehab process works, and basically learn how to build and repair stuff. Pretty invaluable if you ever need to rehab or fix something and don't want to pay for a contractor to do it. If you ever watch those TV shows where people buy their first home and rehab it, you'll see all the normal mistakes that people make. Almost the same thing except your hands on, getting paid, and not sitting on the couch. Just my two cents on this......