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The“ WIN” Principle stands for“ What’ s Important Now”. Once you’ ve educated yourself in creatively investing in real estate, you’ ll know what you should be doing at any given time. Whether it’ s using what you’ ve already learned, or, if you’ re a little short on knowledge, maybe taking in a seminar, workshop, bootcamp, or listening to books and tapes. It may be that you need to take a break, or the rest of the day off, or even a vacation. Whatever it may be you know deep inside exactly what you should be doing at any particular time.
If you will discipline yourself to do What’ s Important Now, you WILL accomplish your financial goals. What do you want? Do you want to be rich? You can be rich! If you will diligently exercise the two principles that I’ ve outlined above, you will accomplish your financial goals! Does it sound easy? It does to me. I think it’ s a simple thing to do, but it’ s certainly not an easy thing to do.
6. Failing To Screen Your Sellers. As investors, we make our money when we buy property from motivated sellers. I had to find that out the hard way. Very early in my career, I found an little old lady that lived in a huge old house in Hollywood, California. Her name was Alice Jordan and she was part of a big mailing campaign that I was working at the time. When she responded to one of my letters, it felt like my heart was going to jump out of my
chest an on to the floor!! My palms were sweaty, and my voice trembled. She said that she wanted to sell her house! We immediately made an appointment to meet at her house the very next day.
It was sheer agony having to wait until the next day to meet with the lady in the big house. The thoughts running through my head were nonstop! Will she contact someone else? Will someone else contact her? Maybe a family member. What if she changes her mind? Am I really ready for this? This is a huge step! What if it doesn’ t work? What if I fail? I don’ t want to lose any money. Does any of this sound familiar to you? I think we all suffer with Uncontrollable Thought Syndrome. There’ s nothing like doing a good deal and making yourself $ 20,000 to $ 40,000 to make all those negative thoughts disappear. You might still have those uncontrollable thoughts running through your head, but they’ ll be a little different. Let’ s see, I wonder if we should go to the Bahamas, or if we should go to Hawaii? Should I go for the Mercedes, or should I go for the BMW? Back to the little old lady. For three weeks, we went back and forth. Every time I thought we were close, she’ d throw some garbage into our deal that would bring negotiations to a halt. Then I’ d call her after a few days, we’ d reach what I thought was an agreement, and we would resume. This would happen over and over. You’ d think I’ d have gotten a clue about this one, but I didn’ t.
I happened to be talking with a friend who was a fellow investor, and I mentioned Ms. Jordan, the lady that I was dealing with, and how frustrated I’ d become. He looked at me with a little sly smile on his face. He said,“ You mean Alice Jordan”? I said yes.
Needless to say, I was stunned. The uncontrollable thoughts started again. I quickly took control by feebly asking,“ Uh, how do you know Ms. Jordan”? His answer cut like a knife.“ Everybody knows old Alice. She gets lonely and calls on someone’ s newspaper ad or direct mail piece. That’ s how she entertains herself. She never leaves the house.’
I was crushed. I was merely an old lady’ s entertainment. Everyone else knew about Ms. Jordan. I didn’ t. My friend even called her by her first name! That’ s when I learned how important it is not to waste time on sellers that are not motivated. By the time you make an offer based on your profit criteria and you get a counter offer back from the seller, you’ ll know whether you have a motivated seller or not.
7. Lack Of Focus. There are so many different ways to make money in real estate. You can buy, fix up and sell. You can buy and hold for cash flow. You can wholesale to other investors. Come to think of it, you can even make money without ever owning the real estate. You can buy mortgages, and you can lend money and charge hefty interest rates. And this is just to name a few. It’ s easy to see how a new investor can jump from one strategy to another. A new investor is usually excited about the prospect of getting money worries out of the way, and as a result, they’ re usually more than just a little impatient. The expectations are high, but the patience is low.
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