Halloween is quickly coming up this month in October. It is a time of year where most people are looking forward to attending parties dressing up in their favourite scary and hilarious costumes. As well, seeing kids all dressed up and going out for trick or treating excited to get their candy and chocolate treats. Although Halloween is a fun and positive life experience, it is important to protect yourself by drinking responsibly at parties and checking the candies and chocolates your children collect to ensure that they are not damaged or tainted before they eat them.  

In celebration of Halloween, over my 6 years of real estate investing, I have seen plenty of individuals who are ‘scared’ to invest in the real estate for the following reasons: 

1)  I Don’t Have Enough Money?

Yes, you definitely need money to invest in real estate and money is scarce. However, there are many ways you can find money to invest in real estate. You can save your money, get a line of credit from your bank or use other people’s money as a down payment to purchase an investment property. In fact, you can find no or low money down real estate investment deals through a realtor, mortgage broker, real estate lawyer or a motivated seller. This can be done and many successful people do it all the time.  

2)  It’s Not The Right Time?

This negative mindset is a myth which keeps people from never investing in real estate. There is never a right time to invest in real estate because no one can predict the way the economy and markets will go in the future, and no one can tell you what will happen. There are always good deals out there. You just need to do your homework by finding and analyzing properties to see whether they are good deals that can help achieve your personal and financial goals. If there are no good deals, you will need, for example, to go out and do some doorknocking and ask homeowners if they or other homeowners in the neighbourhood are motivated to sell their properties.

3)  I Can’t Find A Good Deal?

The bottom line is that there are good deals out there no matter what. Anything is possible in finding a good deal and there are creative ways of doing it by: i) talking to many wholesalers and have them send you deals. You can find them in classified ads in your local newspaper, Kijiji or Craiglist; ii) posting an ad in your local newspaper, Kijiji or Craiglist looking for properties to buy; iii) speaking to an experienced and trusted investor-focused realtor to send you investment properties for sale via email that fits your criteria when they hit the market, and iv) networking with many investors as you can. You can find investors on the internet in Facebook and Meetup groups or at local real estate investment clubs. At the end of the day, the more investors you meet and talk to, the better your chances are in finding good deals. 

4)  I Don’t Want To Be A Landlord?

Yes, I know. As an experienced landlord, it is challenging when dealing with difficult tenants not paying their rent on time and problems with toilets. If you don’t want to deal with the headaches of being a landlord, hire an experienced and trusted property management company. I recommend shopping around when looking for the right property management company. Here is a list of important questions you need to ask when interviewing a property management company. These questions will help you make a well-informed decision and give you peace of mind when you own an investment property. 

These common reasons, mentioned above, are factors that make people ‘scared’ to invest in real estate. Do not let this happen to you because if you let these reasons hold you back, you will never achieve your goals and have the life you want for yourself and your family. To avoid falling into this negative mental trap, I have written a book called, ”No Sweat’ Real Estate Investing’. This book helps you learn and understand the complexities about real estate investing.in order for you to become a successful strategic real estate investor.

Here is the link to get a free copy of my book: http://www.michaelbarthur.com/rei-resources

Best regards,

Michael B. Arthur

If you are like most people, the idea of riding the stock market ‘roller coaster’ makes you feel a little queasy. The highs can be a lot of fun, but the lows really give you a kickin’ (and there seem to be a lot more lows than highs for most investors). 

While real estate also follows a cycle, it tends to be a much more gradual one. Investing in revenue properties offers us limited immunity from fluctuation.   

This means that you don’t tend to see the massive ups and downs of the stock and commodity markets. It’s a much gentler ride, and tends to provide very solid returns on investment over the long run. This is another reason I prefer real estate investing over other kinds of investments.