The challenges of being a new investor.

My dad was my inspiration to look into real estate investing as a part time/second career. He was originally a Denver city planner, then a real estate broker, later in his career he was a consultant for office park and mini-warehouse/self storage facilities throughout Denver. I even got my real estate license to work with him for a couple of summers, while completing my Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree at Colorado State University. The world of itching dogs, anal sac abscesses, and feline urinary tract problems kept me away from Real Estate Investing for about 20 years. I bought a Carleton Sheets course from an infomercial and a couple other courses as well, read through them but never did anything with them. I took a two day course from Bernie Zick about ten years ago, I worked with some other investors for awhile, I just found it very difficult to put in 80 hours a week as a veterinarian and then trying to find the time and strength to do the investing on the side.

It has been in the last few years that I have earnestly restarted my education in the field of real estate investing. I think we have an opportunity to change the way we educate our new real estate investors. The programs that are sold by the gurus may help some people but at such high financial costs, they just do not seem to be worth it. The quality of the education from some of the gurus I believe to be excellent. I think that the length of the education, most have you being part of their programs for six months and then you are essentially cut off, is the fact that I struggle with the most. I know that despite four years of education to become a doctor of veterinary medicine, I truly think that most of my practical education occurred in the trenches, in the day to day practice of veterinary medicine. I have been a veterinarian for almost 27 years and I still learn something new every day. I promote the idea that these programs have some sort of continuing relationship with their students as we all grow and continue to learn, through continuing education and communication. I have been able to form a few mentoring relationships with some of my coaches where I get to learn directly from them and the benefit that I bring to them has been my time and effort at finding and evaluating properties or securing deals and then joint venturing with them, a definite win/win for both of us. I would like to thank Sam Sadat, Trish Williams, and Bryan Holmes, who have become mentors, friends, coaches, colleagues, and investment partners.

I encourage any new investor to take a deep breath and count to ten before pursuing any high end package deal (the proverbial shiny object syndrome) from one of the real estate gurus, at least until you have had a chance to explore your local real estate REIA meetings, become a member of Bigger Pockets and really use all their educational resources, network with folks and see if you can find someone to learn from and be mentored by, and then if you still feel the need go ahead and explore one of the big programs with your EYES WIDE OPEN! The costs involved in these programs could fund your first real estate investment and start earning you passive income/"forever cash", that will definitely get you greater and more measurable returns then the high end training program might do.

Hope you enjoyed the first blog, more to come!