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Sept 24, 2014

Effective today, all future commentaries will be posted on the Latest News Page only. Please refer to it going forward.

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Real estate calculations

Sept 17, 2014

Real estate is a numbers game first, last and always!  Whether one wishes to discuss purchase price, yield on investment or any other metric, you must know your numbers. Years ago, I ran across a book which to this very day serves as an excellent reference when doing numerical due diligence on an investment property. Although it can be said that it is overly complex and only for ‘math junkies’, its value cannot be understated.

The book is called “What every real estate investor needs to know about cash flow… and 36 other key financial measures” by Frank Galinelli. This time honored classic will ensure you know your numbers inside out. You do not need to go through this much detail to purchase a property but it certainly does not hurt to at least be aware of these calculations.

The book is available on Amazon and some useful pdf and Excel spreadsheets can be downloaded here: http://www.realdata.com/book/download.html

Delegation: a key to success in real estate 

Sept 10, 2014

In any team sport, no one individual can or is expected to be responsible for everything. Goalies have their jobs, goal scorers have theirs and so on. That is why you have a team you can delegate your responsibilities to. The same is true for real estate investing.

Now let me be very clear about one point here. Most real estate seminar attendees will never have more than three or four rental properties in their portfolio so the concept of delegation will not apply. Seminar companies know that but will never disclose it to the audience. If you are to truly grow a portfolio of properties, then delegation is extremely important.

Given the choice between money and time, time is more important because it can never be replaced. With that in mind, some aspects you may wish to start delegating are as follows:

1) Delegate the day to day property management of your investments. There are only so many properties one can handle (usually 7-9) that someone can handle before they need to start delegating duties. Donald Trump does not manage his own properties and neither should you.

2) Hand over all of your accounting to your bookkeeper and accountant. They are specialists in this area and keep up to the latest changes in the tax code.

3) Give all of your legal duties over to an attorney who is part of your power team. This (like accounting) is also an area where being an amateur is simply not good enough to be successful

4) Daily errands such as housekeeping, grocery shopping and paying bills can be outsourced. In this digital age, there is no reason to go to the bank to pay your utilities like some people still do.

5) Having a team of competent professional tradespeople will only propel you to success. Make sure they are responsible for looking after your electrical, plumbing and other requirements that come up from owning rental properties. They can get the job done faster and more efficiently than someone who is not a registered professional.

With all this extra time, you can now proceed to expand your portfolio and purchase your next piece of real estate.

WordPress 4.0 Installation 

Sept 3, 2014

WordPress 4.0 has been installed and is fully operational. Thank you to the worldwide WordPress community for your continued efforts!