Risk or not to Risk?

Good evening people!

It's later than usual, but I had a really busy day today. I have a few deals in process and it never ceases to amaze me how unsmooth the loan process can be. They need this signed, they need that fax'd, they need this emailed....ARRRGH!!

The good news is I had a signing tonight, so all it's good. In this business, apart from the money (which is pretty good), the real satisfaction comes from helping people go from thinking about the american dream, to actually achieving the american dream.

Awesome!

Ok, so I spent the better part of the weekend just loungin around the house and watching a little football on Sunday. I eventually got off my lazy butt and made it down to the local Barnes and Noble (love this place!) to get my education on.

As always, I ended up in the real estate section. I never really know what I'm looking for til I actually find it. After 10 min of scanning the shelves, I settled on a book titled "Risk and grow rich". The title is a spin off of one of the most influential books out there - "Think and grow rich". If you're in the money game, this book is a must-have.

The author of the book is Kendra Todd. If the name sounds familiar, it's because she won "The Apprentice" a year or two ago.



The book is more or less an overview of how risk plays an important part of owning and investing in real estate.

It's a pretty straightforward book. No ground breaking news to be discovered with this one. For example, the formula she explains to become a millionaire isn't rocket science, but because of the..say it together...risk involved, most people don't bother.

The formula?

Buy one home..wait...refi...take the money and buy another place. Repeat 7 to 10 more times. Simple enough, right?

After scanning a few chapters, I realize that this is just another spin on real estate with many items rehashed. I mean seriously, after you read one real estate book (topic specific of course), you've read them all. It's still a good read, and I'd recommend it.

The book is just another reminder that to make it in real estate, you've got to be willing to risk what you have in order to obtain something you want.



My acronym for RISK:



Reward

What's the payout? What is it that you're willing to give up your security for? And does the risk outweigh the reward and vice versa. In order to go for it, you have to know that the reward is in balance with the risk. The risk reward factor.


Intuition

Sometimes you have to go with the feeling inside your gut. I play poker from time to time, and sometimes you're in a situation where you're going head to head with someone and all you have left is your intuition. Does it FEEL right? I'm a firm believer in the "6th sense" (they cover this in Think and Grow Rich) and the external forces that be.


Sacrifice

Well, it's pretty much what risk is all about in a nutshell. Are you willing to sacrifice what you have in order to get what you want? That's deep. If you're not willing to sacrifice, then you're not willing to take risks.



Knowledge

When we talk about risk, we're not just going in blindly and just taking risks to take risks. You have to know what you're getting into and know it from top to bottom.....What's the best case scenario? What's the worst case scenario? How do we increase our probability to attain the goals we've set forth? In real estate, since you're mainly dealing with numbers, the knowledge can be as simple as "It's worth 100K, but I can buy it for 50K".



Real estate investing is all about taking calculated risks!

Good night!
Al