Top 5 Reasons Why You Should Add Real Estate to Your Investment Portfolio

It may come as no surprise to you that real estate has created more millionaires than just about anything else out there. In fact, there is a government statistic that backs this up. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, only 1% of the population retires wealthy. That’s anyone with a net worth of $5 Million or more. What’s interesting to know is that the majority of this wealthy 1% club; about three quarters, did it through investing in real estate and business ownership.

You can choose to follow public option and listen to the media, or you can be smart and do what the wealthy are doing. They’re investing in real estate, and here’s why:

1. Income

How would you like to go on vacation for a month and still get paid? That’s what real estate can do for you. When you own a portfolio of properties, you can receive passive income, or “mailbox money.” This is the positive cash flow you get when your tenants pay rent. Build a big enough portfolio and your passive monthly income could swell into the thousands. I know one investor who purchases apartment buildings and his monthly passive income is over $100,000! The other type of income is active income. This is money you can make from various short term strategies, such as wholesaling, rehabbing, short sales, etc. Quick, lump sums of cash. Yes please!

2. Tax Deductions

Did you know that you can virtually eliminate your tax liability by investing in real estate? You see, as a real estate investor and business owner, you have over 400 tax deductions available to you. For example, the IRS generally will allow you to depreciate the value of the structure on a rental property over a period of 27 & 1/2 years. If you are a W2 employee, it would be like getting a pay raise. When I was working for a boss, I set my taxes up about even. So I didn’t owe anything and didn’t get any money back. Then one year I purchased a rental property, and when I filed my taxes the following year, I got a refund of over $10,000! Nothing had changed other than the fact that I bought the property.

3. Appreciation

Ask your parents what they paid for their first house. Of if you’re a little more “seasoned” in age, think back to what you paid for your first or second home. Now ask yourself what that house is worth today. I bet it’s hundreds of thousands more. Don’t you wish you had bought 10 or 20 of them back then? What would your net worth be today? Even when the market softens and goes through an adjustment, it typically swings right back. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Median Home Prices went down only twice in the 43 years between 1963 to 2006. Now if you were to look at 2007-2008, that may be the third time prices went down. But over time, real estate trends up. The population continues to grow and there will always be a need for housing.

4. Equity

It’s possible to lose equity, no question, but when purchasing real estate, you should always purchase the property below market value. This creates instant equity in the property. What better way to increase your net worth? I have a student who purchased six properties over a twelve month period. Their net worth increased to over $250,000 as a result of this. How long would it take you to achieve this without investing in real estate? Probably never.

5. Leverage

This one is huge. Let’s say you got a hot stock tip, and you went to your bank and asked them to lend you $100,000 so you could buy the stock. What would they say? Obviously they would laugh at you and think you’re crazy. But let’s say you wanted to purchase an investment property, do you think you could get a loan on that property if you have good credit? Absolutely. This is called leverage, or using O.P.M (other people’s money.) When you do the math, even if you receive a modest 6% appreciation on a property over time, you would still end up with a triple digit return because you are receiving that appreciation on the entire value of the property, not just your small down payment. The wealthy understand this, and it’s one of the reasons why they continue to get more wealthy every year. Because the poor and middle class invest in CD’s, Mutual Funds, etc. while the wealthy invest in real estate.

These are my top 5 reasons why you should add real estate to your investment portfolio. Are there risks? Of course. Any investment involves risk, but there are things you can do to reduce your risk. The longer you wait, the longer you delay your success. If you want to maximize your chances of getting into that wealthy 1% club, retire early and live the life you have always dreamed of, then it’s time to get in the game! If others can do it, why not you?

Web Source : Investing in Real Estate

Make sure you have several streams of reaching customers interested in buying real estate

Selling real estate can be fun and it can also be challenging. Sometimes there are more homes and businesses for sale than people ready to buy them. Other times you have many people reaching out for the limited number of properties on the market. The real estate marketing solutions to these issues really depend on what is going on. Paying attention to the patterns and trends out there in the market are what will help you to stay on top.

Many people have the issue of not getting enough response to their real estate marketing. The best way to make sure you get this real estate marketing solution to work is to generate the volume of interest you want. Make sure you have several streams of reaching customers interested in buying real estate. For example fliers, newspaper articles, pay-per click and a website with current listings.

This way you are getting access to people out there regardless of which method they use to find property with. Many people will use more than one method as well so that means they may get exposure to your offers more than once. That is good though as it will help to keep your name fresh with them.

What You Should Do Right Now!

As for feedback from those who see your materials, pay close attention to it. Offer an online survey or a card that they can mail into you. If you don’t require them to place their name on it you will get information that is honest. You can find out a great deal about the strengths and weaknesses of your business this way.

For example if you get plenty of responses that your customer service team doesn’t answer questions timely you can fix that. Make a commitment to have them answered in 24 hours or less. You can also add a frequently asked questions section where people can find the answers. If the customer service team is answering the same things over and over again this can be very effective.

You may get plenty of responds that say the information on your website make it much easier for them to buy their first home. This means the materials you have in place are good and need to remain there. It can reduce the chances of your inadvertently removing things that you thought weren’t doing well but actually were.

Based on this information, you can start to implement real estate marketing solutions that are right for you. Turn the information you get from your contacts into something you can use. This can only help you to better serve them and everyone else in the future. If you aren’t actively looking for a real estate marketing solution though then you will likely end up disappointed.

You can’t keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect the results to be different. Any successful business has to be ready to make changes and to move forward. Otherwise you will find yourself left behind due to the competition that is out there. Stay on top of what is going on in the industry though and you will have a very good chance of being the business that consumers turn to for their real estate needs.

Realtors to take you business to the next level and attract more listings and buyers in today’s real estate meltdown. Use highly advance real estate marketing solutions to do a 180 on your business. Read the following below to turn this market to your advantage.

Web Source : Real Estate Marketing Solutions

Real Estate Marketing Techniques & Prosper that you can implement for your business

There are tons of real estate marketing techniques that you can implement for your business. You have to do your part to get people directed to you. It doesn’t matter how great the properties are that you have available. It also doesn’t matter how good the price is if you don’t get people to recognize what you are offering.

You see there will always be people looking for a home to move into or sellers looking to buy regardless of market conditions. Therefore you need to do your part to reach out to those people. You have to be able to discover who your target market is.

These days you need to be able to implement both online and offline methods of real estate marketing techniques. This way you will reach the largest volume of possible buyers for the properties listed. Some people in the real estate business make the mistake of only advertising locally. Yet you will be missing out on all of the people out there looking to possibly move their family or their business to a given location.

It is in your best interest to have several real estate marketing techniques in place at once. This way you can get streams of consumers coming to you from the various directions. You do need to test out different methods though to find what works well. You may discover a particular real estate marketing technique isn’t getting you any results. Therefore you can make changes to that one or you can remove it from your overall strategy.

Real Estate Marketing Techniques You Can Use Right Now!

Here are a few things you can do:

-Web 2.0 the use of social media networks and video sharing sites to build a list of eager buyers and sellers to market to.
-Pay per click (PPC) to get your listings sold and your website noticed.
-The use of well targeted direct mail to capture more leads
-Real estate search engine optimization to build a better visibility for your business
-Direct response copy to get buyers and sellers salivating to use you to buy or sell their home.

It can be very competitive in the world of real estate though. Therefore you have to decide if you are going to take action or not. This isn’t the type of business where you want to just sit back and let it come to you. If you are doing your very best from the start to reach consumers you will do well. It won’t be long before those individuals that are happy with what you have done are sending other people your way as well.

This is a very effective type of real estate marketing technique that will come with time. You can encourage your clients to tell others but often you don’t have to. People will do this automatically if they feel they have been treated well and gotten the very best possible service available. My advice to you is to continue using a variety of real estate marketing techniques so you can get recognized. The beauty of using these techniques and others is that you will not only get recognized but you will be also making extra trips to your bank account

Realtors take you business to the next level and attract more listings and buyers like magic. Use highly advance real estate marketing techniques to make a fortune in commissions. Read the following below to turn this market to your advantage.

Web Source: Real Estate Marketing Techniques

The key process that you need to take when selling your property

The demand for real estate is always hot. Every day, there are new properties up for sale. If you intend to list your property for sale, you will be fighting with other sellers in your area for buyers. But once you are experienced in the selling process, it will not take you too long to market your property and sell it successfully.

In this article, let us discuss some of the key process that you need to take when selling your property. This will give you a clearer understanding of the selling process which will in turn help you to sell your house faster:

1. Prepare your property for sale. To sell your property fast, you need to attract buyers. Buyers are attracted to properties that are in tip top condition. That is why you should make sure that the property is clean and ready for sale. If you find any wear and tear in your house, you should either repair or repaint it. Pay attention to every detail. If there is a garage, make sure tidy it up. Every area of your property is part of the overall selling package. First impression is extremely important. So in order to sell your property quick, you need to impress your potential buyers right away.

2. Determine the selling price of your property. Get your property valued by a professional before you put it up for sale. Get an assessor to evaluate your property and suggest a price range for you. With the price range, you will be able to determine the right price for your property. One thing to note is that during negotiations, you should always quote a much higher price. This is to ensure that you will have enough room to play with the price when the potential buyers ask for discounts.

3. Write your listings and market your property. With the necessary information on hand, you can now move on to create your listings. Internet is one of the best ways to market your property. There are many good real estate portals on the Internet that you should leverage on. These websites have high traffic volume, with thousands of potential buyers visiting them every single month. When creating your listing, make sure that you only upload nice photos of your property. Nice photos will make your listing more attractive to potential buyers and thus increasing the inquire rate for viewing.

With this process, you are now better equipped to sell your property successfully. If you intend to use a real estate agent, make sure that you check every single detail before signing any contract to prevent getting yourself into any legal tussle.

Source : Real Estate Agent

Making Your Real Estate Website Known

Every website owner of any sort of business type aims for a search engine rank. Preferably, the top rank on all major search engines because it’s where most of the internet users turn to when searching for a product or service of their interest. With real estate website owners, the same principle applies.

Being visible to every individual of your target is the goal in creating and managing a real estate website. If you have already a natural knack for writing, this is also the best opportunity to exhibit your writing skills and real knowledge to real estate (and whatever niche you are working on). Though many would think that a real estate website only takes daily updates and posts, there is more to it actually.

Everybody wants to become known in their own areas of expertise and using search engines is one way how to do it. A real estate website wouldn’t be much of any good if nobody bothers to visit or read the contents you have worked so hard for. But don’t give up; as long as you are capable and determined of bringing your website to the top 10 list of a search engine, then you can do so without questions.

First you have to always remember to constantly update your site content. Better yet, add pages to your website which contains related real estate content. A rich website that is regularly updated has a bigger chance to be read by many and will get higher rankings compared to a website that doesn’t have anything new to share for a week or so. If it’s possible, come up with fresh content on your website weekly.

If you want to update your website everyday though, or let’s say even twice or thrice a week, then it is better you secure a blog of your own. If you have the time to do this, your blog will surely sky-rocket to the top list of major search engines in a timely manner. Your blog must of course contain real estate information. Since your website deals with real estate business, blogging in line with the newest fad in the real estate world is the best way to go when informing your readers.

One good thing about blogging is that it attracts new visitors constantly who can become a regular reader and eventually a future client. Also, in blogging, you get to increase your web pages and web content that is entirely devoted to your real estate business.

Source: Real Estate Business

A Real Estate Agent Should Educate Himself

Getting less traffic and leads for your real estate website lately? Are you already feeling as if you want to quit because you are not receiving the quantity that you should be receiving? Could this be a lesson to you for failing to keep up with the necessary qualities that a deserving real estate should really be doing? There could be something wrong with your marketing tactics and the way you communicate with your general market audience. It could also be a case of how you build relationship with complete strangers who are interested to learn all about real estate.

Let us stop right there for now. Checking your marketing tactics is a very good idea. But you really wouldn’t have a complete clue how to do it, would you? How are you able to assess your very own marketing progress? At this point you may get confused, but don’t let it take over your entire system just yet There are still far better solutions than just thinking you are not an effective real estate agent.

Instead of brooding over your mistakes and the factors that caused you to get this kind of shortcoming, try other real estate marketing tactics. Don’t stick to what you already have because you’ll never know if it really is the most effective marketing style for you. The person who has recommended it to you may have used it to his advantage while it didn’t work the same for you. This means that there are many variations of marketing styles available and real estate agents are supposed to go out there and find which ones are best for them. Do the same.

At this point, it also calls for an effective learning opportunity. Just as you search for the most compatible marketing tactic for you and your real estate business, it’s also good to learn new and helpful strategies in using the convenience provided by the Internet. Perhaps, discover an updated approach to an already known marketing technique. By keeping yourself updated with the latest useful tactics in real estate marketing, you help yourself become a better real estate agent.

Source: Real Estate Business

5 Magic Points: Should I BUY or RENT my HOME?

Buying a Home is the American Dream. It is more than a place you put your hat at the end of the day. It defines you, protects you, and prospers with you. Yes, Home Ownership is a noble pursuit, but it always starts with this first, important question: Should I buy or Rent my Home? The answer, surprisingly, is not so obvious.

Now the question of “affordability” is an important one, but that’s not the subject of this article. We have a free calculator at our website. You’re welcome to use it. The subject of this article, however, deals with the questions that must be answered, before a renter can migrate into the magical realms of HOME OWNERSHIP.

Here are 5 MAGIC POINTS that you need to examine, on whether or not to BUY or RENT your next Home:

1. EXPENSES
2. COMMITMENT
3. MONTHLY PAYMENTS
4. TAX RETURNS
5. WEALTH

1. EXPENSES:

Renting a home requires that you give a check to the landlord each month. That’s it. You’re done. Everything else is simply taken care of for you. When you OWN a home, you are in business for yourself, and this means that you must handle all of the expenses yourself.

1. You are responsible, of course, for the monthly mortgage payment to the bank…
2. You must pay all your utilities, including phone, gas, electric, cable, trash, water, etc.
3. Don’t forget your responsibility to take care of maintenance. Not having enough money in the bank account is not a good enough excuse. If it’s broken, ya gotta fix it!
4. Don’t forget your Homeowners Association Dues, your Membership Fees, Property Taxes, Special Assessment taxes, insurance…yada, yada, yada.

When you rent a home, you give the landlord a check. When you buy a home, you must ensure that all expenses are met and managed every single month, forever…

2. COMMITMENT:

Renting and Buying have different financial commitments.

1. To rent a home usually requires a lease. Sometimes it’s month to month; sometimes it’s a 12 month lease. But, no matter what, there’s always a way out. Your commitment is limited to the time you choose to stay and reside there.
2. When you buy a home, you usually sign a 30 year mortgage, which most people would argue, is like forever. You are committed to ensuring that the payment is delivered to the bank or lender every single month, on time. They don’t care if you want to move at some point. You can sell your home of course, but you can’t just break your mortgage, like you can break your lease.

Buying a home requires a long-term, financial commitment. Renting a Home simply requires that you cut a check each month you reside at the home of choice.

3. MONTHLY PAYMENTS:

It always appears that a renter will pay less each month on monthly payments. Let me shed some light on this subject. Examined closely, this is as far from the truth as the moon to the Earth. Let’s use an example:

1. As a renter, you pay $800 a month, let’s say, that increases 5% each year. The math may differ with you and your landlord, but you get the idea. Barring rent-control, this is inevitable. Simple enough.
2. As a Homeowner on a fixed rate loan at $1000 Principal and Interest per month, the payment never changes…Never…Not ever…
3. In other words, the renter’s monthly rent will eventually SURPASS the homeowner’s mortgage payment…Much faster then you might expect.

In this example, our Renter’s Monthly Payments will exceed our Homeowners Mortgage Payment, in about 6 years.

4. TAX RETURNS:

A renter usually does receive a tax benefit from the State and Federal tax boards each year, sometimes referred to as a “renter’s credit”. But the Homeowner receives a deduction on the Interest paid on their loan. This is a huge benefit to the homeowner.

1. Let’s use the same example with our $800 renter. At the end of the year, our renter might receive a $600 renter’s credit on their 1040EZ form when doing their taxes. Simple enough.
2. Our Homeowner, on the other hand, paid a total of $12,000 in mortgage payments, of which about $11,500 went towards INTEREST. This INTEREST is a write-off.
3. Let’s see…$600 versus $11,500. Hmmm. I like that math. That equates to a nice healthy tax return for most of us, come April of next year.

Take those thousands of dollars in tax return, and go on a nice Cruise around Jamaica!

5. WEALTH:

It’s arguably much, much harder for a renter to build wealth. There is no built-in mechanism for appreciation, whereas the homeowner has postured themselves wisely for the future.

1. Let’s say we have a renter that wants to get wealthy. Great! They must go find a business to run, or a stock to invest in, or come up with a great invention, or be the next rock star, or follow a family friends “tip”, and go do Cattle Futures from August to September (just an example, folks…I don’t know anything about cattle…). In any event, most people would be concerned that our renter is following the proverbial “pipe dream” towards wealth.
2. But let’s say we have a homeowner who wants to build wealth. Great! What do they need to do? Simple….Nothing…Pay the mortgage…Live in the house…Go work your job. That’s it. Real Estate appreciates in value, on average, over the long haul, like no other financial vehicle. It is a virtual certainty, and it is automatic. The homeowner controls the total value of the home. That’s the magic of leverage.
3. Let me drive the point home: Someone might buy a house at $150,000, let’s say, and over the course of 7 to 10 years, it is completely reasonable to suggest that this very same house could be worth around $600,000.

Renters do not have a built in advantage for building wealth, whereas Real Estate appreciates in value as a virtual certainty. They don’t call home-ownership the “American Dream” for nothing!

SUMMARY:

The subject of deciding on whether to Buy or Rent, is not simple. In the end, it boils down to a question of complexity. Being a Renter is simple. Being a Homeowner is more complex, and yet, that does not mean that it is not within your grasp. It IS!!! There are so many people that are just waiting in the wings, yearning to help you get there. Real Estate Agents, Mortgage Brokers, Friends, Family, etc.

With all of these resources around you, just about anyone can own a home, and in this great country, the American Dream of Home Ownership is completely within all of our grasps!

But do me a favor. Give yourself the time to examine these important questions first. Look within. As we all get older in life, we yearn for more. Buying versus Renting is a common theme in this journey. As we wave goodbye to the younger years, we say so long to the simplicity of life, and we say hello to the promise of prosperity, wealth, and a better tomorrow. We also say hello to higher, more complex things. Often times, it’s simply the willingness to accept complexity that will get you to the understanding you need.

Source: Real Estate Agent

Common Mistakes On Real Estate Websites

When you have a new business online, what you instantly plan to do for it to gain recognition and direct cash is to use Pay-Per-Click (PPC) for exposure. Many online real estate agents however, overlook the tiny detail that there is still a chance that this method may make or break their online business.

You need to make sure that you know more than the introductory fee of major search engines such as Yahoo! and Google. It does sound enticing, not to mention affordable. What with only paying $30 to Yahoo! as deposit fee, and $0.10 per minimum bid or $5 account activation fee for Google AdWords program and $0.01 per click minimum bid; can already start your PPC money venture.

But then again, it’s not going to hurt to read and learn more about the PPC services. What you didn’t know can be good for you too. With real estate as your frontline online marketing business, first, you must choose the correct keyword. If you don’t have the correct keyword used, you will generate too much traffic which is not relevant to your Real Estate niche and too few interested visitors.

Choose the correct keyword, correct means being your target niche for your real estate business. Popularity. That’s what keywords is all about. When you have chosen what keyword you want to use, check if it’s a highly popular one that can get you traffic that’s really meant for your real estate website and won’t ruin your budget right away.

From keywords, we then go to ads. Do not let any online ads for PPC be read by non-related online customers. This means that you should put extra careful with the words for your ads. A word like “free” or a message that goes “we’re the answer to your needs” is such a vague message. Don’t waste your money by paying for clicks that didn’t have anything to do with your real estate website and services.

Lastly, keep in mind to always double check what you need to do on the net. If you encounter any problem with your PPC service, you may have overlooked some important details at the very beginning. If you’re new in advertising with PPC, take the time to check your campaign first before submitting it, whereas for existing ones, use your resources and optimize.

Source: Real Estate Mistakes

Real Estate Investing Tips – Learn How To Make Money With Properties

You have probably seen many commercials on television claiming that you can become wealthy with real estate investing. The fact is that real estate is a powerful vehicle to generate great wealth however it does still require knowledge and expertise on your part in order to find profitable investments. Real estate is a very predictable and solid investment platform versus stock market investing which can be highly volatile and risky.

The best way to get into real estate investing is to first create a successful business of some sort that is generating solid positive cashflow and then use that money to invest in real estate to grow your wealth. This is the formula that the many of the richest people in the world use. If you are currently broke then it is highly recommended that you stay away from it for now since investing in properties is both capital and time intensive. Once you have created a successful business asset you should have the time and money to expand into real estate investing successfully.

How do you create a successful business if you are currently broke? Well you may want to consider looking into internet marketing and specifically affiliate marketing as it does not require you to have a product or service to begin with so you can make money quite fast and without having to spend money and time to create a product. Ebay marketing can be another option you may want to look into also. Also remember that if you have vision and creative ideas you can attract funding for your business from wealthy investors as long as you can convince these investors that you will be able to succeed with your business ideas.

Remember that just because you do not have money it does not mean you cannot create a profitable business since there are plenty of wealthy investors looking for bright entrepreneurs that they are willing to provide money to as long as they feel that their return on investment will be worthwhile.

One of the important keys to keep in mind in successful real estate investing is that your money is made when you buy and not when you sell. Make sure that the investment you are looking at meets the criteria of a profitable investment. A profitable investment is one where the investment generates a positive cash flow for you right from the start. Property appreciation should be looked upon as a bonus and not something that you count on in order to make your money.

Perhaps the best strategy is to buy properties at a price that allows you to rent out the property for a value that is greater than the expenses associated with the property so that you have positive cashflow or a profit. Of course you do want to look at the appreciation rate of the property for the last several years and look for a steady solid increase but if the property will not create positive cash flow right from day one then it is not the best investment.

The properties you purchase should be assets. Banks define assets slightly differently than many wealthy investors. Most wealthy investors look at assets as something that puts money in your pocket at the end of the month after all expenses are accounted for. While many people consider their homes as an asset, many rich investors consider their homes as a liability since it usually takes more money from your pocket at the end of each month.

Always consider your cash flow when evaluating a property and never get attached to property emotionally just because it looks cute. The property must look profitable after crunching all the numbers in order to consider purchasing and renting it out. This is indeed an extremely powerful and proven wealth vehicle so first create a successful business that generates solid positive cashflow and then increase your wealth exponentially through real estate investing.

Source: Real Estate Investing Tips