You would not operate on yourself now would you?

 

How many times have we heard this stupid cliché??? Why is it stupid? Because we would absolutely not operate on ourselves. But, comparing a medical procedure to educating ourselves and taking control of our own financial destinies are totally separate events or issues in our lives.

I would absolutely not represent myself in a court of law for a civil or criminal proceeding. But, I would read up on every piece of material there was if I was facing a law suit pertaining to contaminated property and owner rights and obligations. Without going into too many examples, the point I am trying to make is this, we have a duty to empower ourselves. We have to take personal responsibility for making sure we know what is going on with our personal wealth. Likewise, like many of us we have a duty to our customers to try and give them our most professional opinion regarding the real estate transaction.

Furthermore, we have to facilitate self empowerment to our customers. I think if we show that we care about our customers they will pick up on our sincerity. It’s something you can’t fake either. I, like many of you I am sure, have been burnt in this market. In the last 10 or 15 years we have been programmed to think that “the market” is going to provide this big retirement nest egg for all of us. How many prospectuses have we read that state “… if you had invested just $10,000.00 5 years ago you would have $80,000.00 today...” I know you have seen these marketing mutual fund tools time and time again.

Here is what we have to do in my humble opinion as real estate professionals. We have to show the consumer out there that real estate should be the MAIN asset in their IRA and 401K plans. Why? Because you can’t insider trade real estate. You can’t have a hostile takeover with real estate. How many times have you ever heard of a commercial strip center overstating earnings? Never. Because it is a HARD asset. You can’t monkey with it. You can’t be lied to about occupancy right? You can’t be lied to as a landlord about rent rates right?

I would not operate on myself. I would recommend 100% of the time that a customer seek legal counsel regarding their contract to purchase, rent, or lease. But, I would also recommend that they study, study, study. So they know what is going on. After all, who has the biggest interest in our investment success? Right again! You can reach me at carmine@streetwiseinvestmentsinc.com and we can talk about single tenant NNN as a part of your investment strategy.