Realty411 Magazine Featuring OCG Properties - Part Two | Page 16

T
he world of real estate investing is a small one.
Investors rub elbows at similar events, read in-
dustry publications and generally run in the same
circles. Carter Froelich, an author, investor and
CEO of The Property Ledger, recalls the time he met best-
selling author and renowned educator Dolf de Roos, Ph.D.
The two savvy Phoenix-based investors became friends
after an introduction by Andrew Waite, publisher of the Ari-
zona-based, Personal Real Estate Investor magazine.
At the time, Froelich was busy developing The Property
Ledger, his online software designed to analyze property
holdings, store documents and forecast future returns. Once
ready to launch, he asked de Roos to test out his creation.
That was three years ago, and de Roos still uses the software
to track his portfolio.
Recently, Froelich welcomed de Roos home from his ex-
tended visit to Australia. The famed author of eight books,
including the New York Times Best Seller “Real Estate
Riches,” was visiting Down Under to raise private money
for property investments in Arizona. It proved to be a won-
derful opportunity for one master investor to interview
another. Froelich enthusiastically took on our assignment
and provided an outstanding interview.
This indeed is a rare treat; prepare to learn from two of
Arizona’s top real estate investing giants.
—The Editor
Carter: Hello, Dolf. Tell us about what
you’ve been doing lately and give inves-
tors your perspective on the market.
Dolf: Well, Carter, although the media re-
peatedly states this is the worst real estate
market we have seen in decades, it is only
Dolf
&
Carter
give readers the latest
Tips from AZ
Interview by Carter Froelich, CEO of The Property Ledger
Dolf de Roos
Carter Froelich
Dolf: I like being on the cutting edge of
what is available. I have always done well
with new technology. When fax machines
came out, it saved us thousands of dollars a
year in courier fees.
Now, we don’t fax; scanned attachments
“... with the information stored in the cloud,
you can access your portfolio’s details from
any computer connected to the Web.”
the worst market if you are in the unfortu-
nate position of being forced to sell. If you
are in the fortunate position of being able
to buy, then by definition, this is the best
market we have seen in decades.
With that said, there are still many who
have trepidation about entering our current
real estate market. This has forced me to go
overseas. There are many countries right
now experiencing the peak we saw a few
years ago so they see the relative merits of
bringing their money to the United States
and investing here.
Carter: Why did you become interested
in The Property Ledger?
Realty411Guide.com

are better quality, in full color and don’t
require an outdated phone system to get
through to a recipient.
When I come across people in the real es-
tate industry who do not use email, and in-
sist on using faxes exclusively, I think they
must miss out on deals because of their
aversion to new technology. I do not want
to fall into that trap. The Property Ledger
is cutting edge, extraordinarily useful and
easy to use. Why would you not use it?
Carter: What benefits are provided by
The Property Ledger, which other prod-
ucts do not provide?
Dolf: With the information stored in the
PAGE 16 • 2010

cloud, you can access your portfolio’s de-
tails from any computer connected to the
Web. Before long, most services will have
that feature, but by then The Property Led-
ger will have innovated yet another area.
Surfing is so much easier one foot ahead of
the wave than one foot behind.
Furthermore, having all the details of
a property, including title documents,
HUD1s, leases, management agreements,
and the like, stored in one central reposi-
tory is simply a great way to run your prop-
erty investment business. Once you have
experienced it, it is difficult to revert back.
It would be like going back to using slide-
rules, or for those readers not old enough to
remember what they are, the curly-paged
and faded fax machine — if they even re-
member that!
Carter: Since you travel often, are the
features of Electronic Library useful?
Dolf: Absolutely. In fact, more and more
companies are trending towards cloud
computing. Clearly, it is convenient to
be able to access all the relevant data on
a property from anywhere and not have
to be concerned with taking up space on
your own computer, keeping data in sync,
having the data concerned fall into strange
hands in the event of a computer loss, in-

reWEALTHmag.com