10 Real Estate Investor Goals (To-Do List?) For 2008

Posted @ 12:34 am - Filed under Real Estate Investing, Purposeful Planning, Check This Out, Financing, Retirement Income, Depreciation

There are coaches, mentors, and advisors armed with advice on exactly how we all should be planning for next year. It all boils down to the various parts of our lives, which are important and which are relegated to the B-List.

What has priority in our lives? It changes of course, over time.

I’m a middle aged man who decided a priority in 2007 would be my long term health. Silly me thought health as a priority would be like falling off a log. After all, since my teenaged years health professionals have given me not only great advice, but incredible training. I should’ve known it wouldn’t be as simple as, eat better, sleep better, exercise more, and generally demonstrate more discipline.

Health, like real estate investing, is conceptual, not ticking off items on a to-do list. It’s not that a list won’t get you there, it’s that understanding the concepts driving your success or failure tends to help. Go figure.

If your A-List includes finally pulling the trigger on a real estate investment Plan, listen to the Purposeful Planning podcasts. They’re located on the right column towards to top.

Follow that by the Grandpa Economics podcast.

Yeah, I know it’s almost an hour of your time. Get over it, and then think of the time spent in retirement. Most folks are gonna be alive far longer than their parents and grandparents were — especially when they retire years earlier. Since we all prefer that to be quality time, and know higher retirement incomes are better than lower — listen to the dang podcast.

Grab my White Paper. It’s on the right under Free Reports — Early Retirement. It’ll take you over to my regular website and give you a taste of what’s in the paper.

If yer over 50, there’s a podcast just for you — Close To Retirement.

About your health? While listening and reading about how to retire earlier and better, why not get serious about your health too? This isn’t a health oriented blog, nor am I anything close to an expert. Your reading this online, which means you probably can figure out how to find solid info.

What’s the use of retiring high on the hog, younger than you thought, if you’re not gonna be in spectacular health? My mom is gonna be 77 next April, and she still works out several days a week. Grandma turned 94 this year and we’re just now having to ensure there are able bodied folks around to help when needed. Until about a year ago she was still walking a mile — twice a day!

She did well with her money over the years, and has been retired since Nixon was in office. Her robust health has made that time productive to say the least.

Do the same for yourselves. Don’t let me get you to a magnificently abundant retirement only to find yourself unable to take full advantage. How lame would that be?

So here’s the goals, or maybe a simple to-do list for you to consider. It’ll help get you out of the gate for 2008.

1. Once and for all — Figure out a Purposeful Plan just for you. I’ll help if you want.

2. Take a closer look at your current financial status. Stop doing things you shouldn’t be doing, and start doing what you know you shoulda been doin’ a long time ago.

3. Ascertain the current net equity in all of your income properties. If any (or all?) are around 35% or more of the value — call me, cuz it’s more likely than not time to make a move.

4. Review the financing on your properties, including your home. Regardless of what the media says, there are some pretty enticing loans out there, some of which just might make your month end up with more cash. I can point you to the right guy if you wish.

5. Does your income property reside in a region where prices have reached levels of stoopid? It’s probably time to get outa Dodge. Sell/exchange now. Don’t fret about how much you net, cuz yer gonna more than make up for it on the other side. Really.

6. Reassess your choice of CPA’s. Yeah, I know, yours is really good — so is everybody’s. Most, like doctors with the different disciplines in medicine, know parts of the Internal Revenue Code much better than other parts. You want the one who knows the parts talking about real estate. Trust me, that’s not a big percentage of accountants. It matters — big time. So please do it, OK?

7. What strategy have you been using to allow your investment capital to grow as quickly as conditions allow, while remaining safe? How’s it been working for ya so far?

8. Stop doing the following three things: