6 Things That Won’t Make You $1M In REI – Part 1

Jay Schultz — Thu, 03 Dec 2020 20:38:32 +0000

You read that right! You don't want to make that $1M, right? Or grow your REI holdings?

Or pass on the feeling of knowing you tried and gave it your all? Well, if this sounds like you, you are probably already a master of these six things! Lord knows that I was an expert – but things change!

But if you do want your "REI ship" to come in, you need to purge these six habits from your mind:

Avoiding Goal Setting
Being Afraid of Success or Failure
Making Excuses
Not Asking for Help
Putting Too Much Pressure on Yourself
Waiting to Have ‘Enough’ Money

1. Avoiding Goal Setting

We are human! We make mistakes! We procrastinate! And, we avoid setting goals. Sometimes it might be because we don’t know what we want! Or, maybe it is because we don’t know what a goal should be.

The latter is my problem.

I avoided setting a goal because I wanted to be realistic and as a newbie, I didn’t know what was real! That is a sure fire way of never achieving your $1M dream. So, set a goal. No matter what. Could be as simple as looking at one potential property next week. Or, buying one house this year. Or 100. Writing a first REI blog or launching an REI site (starting FastPath Home Buyers was super hard for me). Doesn’t matter. You need to believe in it and then take the first step to get there.

Then the second.

2. Being Afraid of Success or Failure

Afraid of failure? Duh!!!!

But seriously, who is afraid of success? Well, it is a thing. Stan Lee made me think about it with his famous Peter Parker Principle: “With great power comes great responsibility”.

Or great success!

When I examined my own fears, it usually came down to responsibility. As one becomes more and more successful, that person’s responsibility usually increases with that success. Responsibility ticks up – higher and then higher.

But as a new investor, it is tempting (and exciting) to envision our future real estate empire. The 100 or 1000 doors you hope to have. Well, great…But that is 100 or 1000 more than we have now! So it is no wonder we are afraid of success. Our mind drifts from our future riches to all the questions. How am I going to find all those tenants? Manage the leaky toilets? How will I make the monthly PITI payments if the vacancy rates increase? What if my tenants stop paying and I need to evict them all at once?

HOLD ON!!!!

That IS terrifying! The normal process is that you own one door. Then two. Now 5. And then 12…so the responsibility gradually increases as our portfolio does.

And fear of failure…well, that is more straight forward. This blog represents a fear of mine. Afraid to put my thoughts out there. Afraid of what people would think. Or worse yet – afraid of negative comments! This is my first blog post ever. And this is my first step at conquering that fear. I avoided it for so long. Today was the day. It was my goal for the week.

To those still with me: don’t be afraid!

3. Making Excuses

Oh my goodness!

Now I am a true expert at this one. Don Wilder said, “Excuses are the nails used to build a house of failure!” Such a great quote for a house flipper. My mother first quoted that to me when I made some excuse about something…maybe a bad grade in gym. It was well before I knew what it really meant. She reminded me of that quote every time an excuse came out of my mouth, all through high school. 30 years later that quote still constantly resonates inside my mind – and I still make excuses!

I need to constantly keep myself in check in this area. When I find that I am giving a reason to avoid doing something (usually around a goal and usually to myself) or missing a target, I need to step back and examine it. Sometimes the process involves telling my wife the “reason” and it makes me feel better just to vocalize it. Maybe I hope she might agree with me. Or stay silent, even. No matter what, I have this feeling inside of me that this so-called reason is actually just an excuse and it is putting me on the path to failure. Stepping back and being honest with myself helps. Meaning, I think, “Is this an excuse or a legitimate barrier?” Most of the time it an excuse. And, guess what? Excuses are preferred!

Why?

Because excuses are bogus. They have solutions. They can be conquered. Most of the time even easily! But for some reason it is all blown out of proportion in my own mind. A hallmark of excuses. I love realizing it is an excuse instead of a legitimate reason or barrier because then I can do something about. Find your process for identifying an excuse before your ‘house’ falls. You can have excuses. You can have results. But you cannot have both.

It is embarrassing to think how many nails, I mean excuses, I made delaying this blog.