|
|
|
Buy Properties in Bulgaria: Investing in Bulgarian Real Estate
Two seminal events make the decision to buy properties in Bulgaria a financially beneficial endeavor in the 21st century.
One of these events already occurred -- the opening up of the Bulgarian real estate market following the collapse of the...
Ethanol And Its Significance In The Stock Market Investing World
In the bid for the world's search for alternative sources of
energy as time is currently running out given the current
scarcity of crude oil, there have been numerous initiatives by
companies to develop the potential of different alternatives...
Flip that house style real estate investing
I love those TV rehabbing shows like Flip That House. On the
show people buy a house needing to be seriously updated and
repaired. Usually the kitchen is heavily upgraded with new
cabinets, cutting edge appliances, new countertops and more....
How to Protect Your Nest Egg While Investing Online
Would you like to know how to protect your nest egg while
investing online? Well, read on and I will explain how I do it.
I'm not trying to hide anything. HYIPs, Rolling Maturity Date
HYIPs, Slow-rolling HYIPs all have their drawbacks. The...
Where Real Estate Investing and Speculation Collide
Investing vs. Speculation is a collision of epic proportions! What's the difference? Lots. Read on. The difference can be the difference between big money and big trouble!
Some uninformed folks would describe someone who...
|
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
How To Start Investing For Financial Independence, Part 1.
Today, I am going to start a multi-part series about how to go from being a beginning investor to being “financially independent” in a steady and predictable way. At our website, we get tons of e-mails about how do I start, how do I start with little $’s, etc., etc., etc. If you are asking this question, congratulations because you are ahead of most. All of us have been there at some point.
I must warn you…. What I am about to share here for free is what “gurus” across the nation charge thousands of dollars for in weekend seminars. The “secrets” revealed are going to seem pretty simple because quite frankly, there are no secrets. The methods used here have been done for centuries and there is no real reason to complicate them. Let’s apply these principles to see how fast someone might become financially independent without betting the farm.
Realize that everybody has wildly different starting points and different financial goals. For this series of articles, we assume that an individual has access to at least $15,000 liquid capital (or home equity) to start, is at least breaking even with their current income versus expenses, and has decent credit to obtain financing. Note there yet?.... See the footnote below.
To start, what you need is to make your money grow while keeping your current income stream, and current expense level in place. I can’t say this more plainly…..To change your current financial path, you have to us your money and your time to grow additional income streams that increase wealth. There is many ways to do this but we are going to use investing in real estate as an example.
Now for beginners, here is the really bad news…… As an investor, you reap rewards by putting your money in HARMS WAY. You do everything in your power to minimize your risk but bottom line is that real investors make money by taking CONTROLLED risks. As investors get better, they learn how to make fantastic investment returns doing things that all their friends and relatives thing is crazy….. However, they know exactly what risks they are taking are why those risks are small in comparison to the potential rewards.
One reason people really like real estate investing is leverage; i.e, you can purchase an expensive property using 0-20% of your own money while financing the rest. So if you put 10% down for example, and then the property goes up by 20%, you have made a 200% return (ignoring expenses, taxes, etc. for simplicity). Of course this works in reverse… If the property drops by 20%, you have lost not only your original investment but have to come up with another 10% as well….. Ouch!
For someone beginning, here is what I would suggest:
1) Look for an opportunity that will return at least 150% in 2 yrs or less;
2) Be mentally and financially prepared if the investment does not work out;
3) Have VERY good reasons why you don’t think you will lose money…… You may not make as much as expected but you would rather not lose money at this stage.
4) Be patient. This single result should not either make or break you but it is crucial to a longer term plan.
In our Mastermind Group, we are bringing out a land project (see related article Land Investing that appears to meet these criterion (each investor has to decide for themselves). So let’s say the purchase price is $150,000, with 10% down and another $3,500 in closing costs. With good credit, then the financing obtained would make the land payments for 2 years while waiting for growth.
Now let’s say after you did your analysis, looked at what had happened in the past, looked at why you thought more and more people would want this property, etc., you decide that you think this property will average 20%/Yr escalation over the next 2 years. MORE IMPORTANTLY, you decide that barring a major meltdown in the market, you think there is little chance that you can’t at least break even after 2 years.
So if you end up being right about the growth, then you might net a tidy $43,000 (before taxes) or so after everything is considered. After long term capital gains at 15% let’s say, then you just picked up about $36,000 of the “market’s money”. That is money that if you take a loss on the next investment will not be nearly as painful as if you lost your original money. When you combine this with your original investment amount, you now have around $55,000 of operating capital for step 2.
Realistically, you cannot predict how much you will make from the investment. When I invest, I try to establish in my mind what is reasonable. Frequently, I have been surprised to the positive and made much more than expected. Sometimes I have made less. The key being to put yourself in a low risk situation where you have a strong reason to believe the market will go in your favor.
To accomplish this first step, let’s look at what you really had to do:
1) Had to be willing to put $$ in harm’s way;
2) Had to educate yourself enough to evaluate the risk and the opportunity;
3) Had to find the opportunity or be in a position to have the opportunity presented to them;
4) Had to act.
I would like to comment on the education side. As a former professor, I have seen very smart people spend 1,000’s of hours and 10,000’s of thousands of dollars educating themselves to “earn a living”; this is a great move in many cases. On the other side, I have seen very smart people who want investing to be a major source of income but will not spend any time or any money educating themselves.
To me, this is a recipe for disaster. By the time we finish this series, you will see that with a few simple steps, implemented over time, many people can easily produce more money than from their regular job. Furthermore, many people will put 100’s of thousands of dollars at risk but know almost nothing about what they are doing. If you chose the path of making your investment dollars grow steadily with time, I hope this does not end up describing you.
** Footnote: If you are not yet at that level, here is what I suggest. First, read Michael Masterson’s book called “Automatic Wealth”. This is an excellent book on how to rapidly change your financial position while staying employed. Next, I would read Van Tharp’s new book called “Safe Paths To Financial Freedom”. Van uses a very different thought process from many and so adds a great deal of rounding. Like anything else, you will not agree with everything written in these books but they provide some great thought processes. When you have some capital and are cash flow positive, them come back and revisit this article.
About the Author
Dr. Chris Anderson is a leading authority on real estate investing and has been referenced in many venues including the New York Times and USA Today. Free sign up at GetPreconstructionDeals.com for education and articles. Visit Mastermind Group for world class investing projects.
|
|
|
|
|
| Investing: Stock Quotes, Charts & Market News - MSN Money |
| Investing home page features investment tools like stock quotes, charts, a portfolio manager and much more. Plus market news and financial commentary from ... |
| moneycentral.msn.com |
|
| Investing : Stock Investing, Investing News |
| Our stock investing news is designed to help new and seasoned investors alike. See all of our investing news online at BusinessWeek.com. |
| www.businessweek.com |
|
| globeandmail.com : globeinvestor.com |
| GlobeInvestorGOLD Canada's most comprehensive investment tool. ... This Globe and Mail report will profile alternative investment products designed to help ... |
| www.globeinvestor.com |
|
| Fool.com: Investing, Stock Research, and Personal Finance |
| Investing information and an enjoyably useful site. Updated hourly. |
| www.fool.com |
|
| Investing, Stock Quotes and Research, Personal Finance and ... |
| Free comprehensive guide to investing and personal finance. |
| www.investorguide.com |
|
| Open Directory - Business: Investing |
| Business: Financial Services (17198); Business: Major Companies: Company Information (28); Recreation: Collecting (5684); Society: Issues: Fraud: Investment ... |
| dmoz.org |
|
| Better Investing - We'll show you how! |
| The National Association of Investors Corporation (NAIC) teaches individuals how to become successful strategic long-term investors. |
| www.betterinvesting.org |
|
| Dow Jones, Nasdaq, S&P 500, stock market data - CNNMoney.com |
| ... Real Estate Tips Main FSB 100 Small Cap Investing - Top 50 5 Best Bosses Which States Love Small Biz? ... Investing after Pfizer's flop - 3 strategies ... |
| money.cnn.com |
|
| Investing News, Personal Finance, Stock Market, Mutual Funds ... |
| Reuters.com is your source for investing news, personal finance, stock market, mutual funds and investments. Reuters is the leading global provider of news, ... |
| today.reuters.com |
|
| Investment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
| Investment or investing [1] is a term with several closely-related meanings in ... Types of financial investments include shares or other equity investment, ... |
| en.wikipedia.org |
|
| Investing In Bonds |
| Information about bond investing from The Bond Market Association. Bond price information, articles, introductory guides, and links to related sites. |
| www.investinginbonds.com |
|
| Investing for Kids |
| Welcome to Investing For Kids. This Web site is designed by kids for kids. It examines stocks, bonds, ... It teaches the principles of saving and investing. ... |
| library.thinkquest.org |
|
| internet.com - the Internet and IT Network from Jupitermedia Corp. |
| The definitive internet resource. |
| www.internet.com |
|
| InvestorWords.com - Investing Glossary |
| The most comprehensive investing glossary on the web, with over 5000 definitions and 15000 links between related terms. |
| www.investorwords.com |
|
| Investing - Share prices | FTSE100 | Stock quotes | Stock exchange ... |
| Also on Investing:. December Fund of the Month: River and Mercantile UK Smaller Companies · Virtual Trader: play our £100k fantasy sharetrading game ... |
| money.uk.msn.com |
|
| JS Online: Business: Investments |
| Investing, Personal Finance. More investing stories from the Journal Sentinel ... Readers share investment advice, savings tips COLUMNIST HUMBERTO CRUZ ... |
| www.jsonline.com |
|
| Welcome to the Investing Online Resource Center! |
| Independent, non-commercial information on online investing. |
| www.investingonline.org |
|
| Investing for Your Future |
| Online course for beginner investors. Course and program description, registration, resources, feedback and contacts. |
| www.investing.rutgers.edu |
|
| investing | baltimoresun.com |
| Business, technology, real estate and investing news, primarily from The Baltimore Sun. |
| www.baltimoresun.com |
|
| Investing for Beginners |
| Investing for beginners gives new investors articles on the stock market,interviews with leading financial experts, discussion boards, a free weekly ... |
| beginnersinvest.about.com |
|
|