Hope for your financial life and beyond

5 Common Rental Real Estate Mistakes Landlords Will Make

November 13, 2013 by 34 Comments

rental real estate mistakesSo, you are ready to take the rental real estate plunge and become a landlord. Awesome! I hope that you have come to that decision by desire (you really want to do this) and not by necessity (you were forced into it because your house wouldn’t sell). One of those scenarios (hint: the first one) generally works out better than the other.

My wife and I have been renting properties for some time now and our landlord experience has been positive. I believe our success comes from a desire to run a quality business, as we never considered this to be a whimsical adventure. We spent over a year studying the idea to make sure rental real estate was right for us because we knew it has its darker side. I believe we set ourselves up for success as landlords by doing that because we went into it with our eyes wide open.

Rental Real Estate Mistakes Landlords Should Avoid

Even with all our preparation we made some mistakes with our rental real estate. Here are five big ones I want to help you avoid.

1. Paying too much for a property

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High Risk Investing: When I Turned One Thousand Dollars Into…

September 23, 2013 by 12 Comments

I marvel at how Wall Street creates wealth, even sometimes through high risk investing. Purchase a few 100 shares in a small company that hits it’s stride or a start-up that goes supernova and you could be a millionaire inside a decade.

That’s not the norm, for investors as it usually takes multiple decades of steady, solid investing to create significant wealth. But it does happen from time to time, as we all have seen.

That’s why we get caught up in new companies and try to buy in on the opening day of trading. IPOs (initial public offerings) tend to be extremely volatile, which is why investors are better off waiting for several months before they decide to purchase shares. (Unless you were investing in the 1990s bull market Internet frenzy when pretty much all IPOs skyrocketed on day one. Heck, mygrandmother.com would have opened 50 points higher!)

What if you could purchase shares in a company before it went public though? That would be stratospheric high risk investing - putting money into a company that might not even make it to market. Technically, I wouldn’t even call that investing. More like speculation.

Would you do that given the opportunity? Put money on the line with a chance to hit it big or lose it all? Here’s the story of when I did.

My High Risk Investing Venture

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Shock Treatment to Break Your Financial Procrastination

September 11, 2013 by 19 Comments

College breeds procrastinators.

At no time of my life did I put more things off until the last minute than my first few months in college. Every hour something new would entice me to put the books aside and enjoy the other, more exciting things college had to offer.

The pickup hoops game at the gym.

The late night pizza runs.

The cute girl one dorm over.

Time and time again this would happen, especially early on in my college life. As a result of my attention to anything unrelated to studies, I would often find myself starting papers at 11:00 pm that were due the next afternoon. Talk about putting your back up against a wall. It was an all night scramble of writing, filled with Mountain Dew and Ho-Hos.

“Fairly quickly” is the answer to the question “How long did it take you to develop a more disciplined attitude?” Had to…my freshman GPA (and ultimately my graduation) was depending on it. I realized there was no way I could maintain those negative patterns of time management and succeed at that level of education.

Procrastination creeps into all areas of our life. We put off dealing with relationship issues, work assignments, our spiritual health and even kid problems. Perhaps in no area does it rear its ugly head more so than in the world of personal finance. What is it about money that keeps us from confronting our difficulty with managing it?

Are you a personal finance procrastinator? Ever said any of these things:

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Investing Made Easy (Part V): Common Investing Mistakes

July 15, 2013 by 19 Comments

In this final edition of the Investing Made Easy series, I’d like to detail some common investing mistakes. Investing doesn’t have to be complicated but we make it so by doing some very silly things. In the end, our meddling brings nothing but frustration and lower returns.

I’ve already touched on a few of the most common mistakes in previous articles such as not having a plan, failing to evaluate one’s risk tolerance and ignoring investing fees. And of course we want to understand every investment into which we place our money. If we don’t understand it, we shouldn’t be investing in it.

I’ve noticed through the years however, that other, less obvious issues inhibit me from having the success I desire. Each of them have hampered my investing at one point or another and it was only through losing money and honestly evaluating myself in the mirror that I was able to overcome them. (“Overcome” is a strong word, because they still creep back up from time to time and I have to fight them off again and again.)

Common Investment Mistakes

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Investing Made Easy (Part IV) - How to Choose a Mutual Fund

July 9, 2013 by 23 Comments

Wall Street - the great creator of wealth

By nature, I hate risk. Sure, I know on occasion circumstances demand or persuade me to accept more than I desire. In those instances, I’m way out of my comfort zone. Yes, it can be exciting, but I would much prefer life grant me slow, boring, predictable moments that are within the scope of my abilities and emotions to handle. That’s my personality.

It’s also why many people hate investing, especially when it comes to learning how to choose a mutual fund.

“Mutual funds are boring investments,” they say. “I want the sexy action of the newest individual stock.”

“Mutual funds are slow,” they say. “I want investing performance measured in days or weeks, not years.”

“Mutual funds are predictable,” they say. “They mostly track the performance of the general market.”

To “they” I say, “OK.” If that is your risk tolerance, more power to you. But I won’t be recommending a seat on that roller-coaster ride for investors, especially beginners. Too much risk, too little diversity for someone just starting out.

In part three of this series, I introduced the investing term “diversification.” Diversification means to spread our money around. When we diversify, we don’t put all of our hard earned dollars into one specific stock. By placing money in different investments, we protect the whole, should one of our investments falter. It’s the #1 reason mutual funds are the best place for the investors - because even by only owning one fund, you get instant diversification. Here’s how.

What Is a Mutual Fund?

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Investing Made Easy (Part III) - Where Should I Put My Money?

July 1, 2013 by 19 Comments

It is easy to get confused when you ask the question, “Where should I put my money?” I felt overwhelmed when I began to research my first investments. Over time however, I’ve learned this doesn’t have to be complex. In fact, the best principle is to keep it simple. Always invest in things you understand and could explain to someone else. The simplest strategies are often times the most rewarding and the most calming on the investing nerves.

In this third installment of my Investing Made Easy series, I’ll tackle the “Where should I put my money” question. Before that however, I need to ask you a question. How much risk are you willing to take? The answer to that question will determine the direction your investing dollars go.

Managing Risk When Investing

It’s risk and the thought of losing money that keeps people up at night. Tossing and turning. Sweating. Eyes wide open, mind processing what might happen the next day in the market. I’ve been there as an investor and it’s no fun.

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Investing Made Easy (Part II): When Should I Start?

June 24, 2013 by 16 Comments

Between the ages of 16-22, I was employed at three different summer jobs. First, I worked in the concession stand in our community swimming pool for several years. I then moved up in ranks and became a lifeguard for two summers. During the second season of being a lifeguard, I only worked in the evenings because during the day I had taken a second job as a construction worker. That summer’s dual-employment schedule was brutal, but I made more money than I had ever seen to that point.

Once I graduated from college, I worked full-time in construction while I waited for my bride-to-be to finish her degree. As I recall those years, I really don’t remember having any focus on where my money was going. I was saving some, spending some and giving some, but I never took the time to understand how money, placed in the right type of instrument, could grow and enhance my lifestyle.

My wife brought into our marriage a small mutual fund, compliments of her grandmother’s generosity. Over the years since it’s inception, the fund had grown and paid for some college expenses and for her car in total. “Hmmm,” I thought. “Money invested in stock market funds grows over time and pays for things we want or need. Cool idea. Wonder how this works?” That’s when I started my investing journey.

You may be asking, “How do I know if I’m ready to start investing? When should I start?” They are great questions that I would like to shed light on today in Part II of this Investing Made Easy series. And I’m sure to hear it for this comment, but deciding whether or not to invest is sort of like deciding to become a parent - we are never quite sure we are ready.

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Investing Made Easy: The What and the Why

June 20, 2013 by 8 Comments

Welcome to the Luke1428 investing series. Over the next couple of weeks I will be unraveling the world of investing and setting you on a path towards long-term success. Success in our personal financial life is something we all shoot for and investing can help us hit the target. This series will be a primer for the beginning investor and a reminder for those of us who are more seasoned as to why we invested in the first place.

There are many reasons why people choose to ignore investing. I remember first delving into this topic in my early twenties and feeling extremely overwhelmed. I would glance through a brochure for a mutual fund I was considering and didn’t understand most of what I read. I felt uneducated and uneasy. And I didn’t know anyone who was knowledgeable enough about the topic to explain it to me. There also were no really cool personal finance blogs to educate the public then either.

Mostly though, I remember being afraid of losing money. I was old enough in 1987 to comprehend that something terrible happened to the U.S. stock market on October 19th. I didn’t exactly know how people made or lost money investing, but I knew that Black Monday sounded bad. The people screaming and sweating on the nightly news looked bad. And a $500 billion paper loss in one day seemed to make people feel real bad. So if that can potentially happen, why should I risk losing my money through an investment in the stock market?

This investing series will give the answer to that question and others like it that I had to figure out for myself when I began. The topics I will cover include:

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Should We Sell in May and Go Away?

May 7, 2013 by 11 Comments

No sooner has the ink dried on the April 15 tax returns, than investors are bombarded with cries from Wall Street to “sell in May and go away.” It can be a rather confusing statement, especially for a new investor. I know the first time I heard it many years ago I thought, “Why would I sell? I did all this research to purchase the right investment and now I’m being told to give it up? What gives?”

I learned quickly that the adage “sell in May and go away” is an investment strategy designed to take advantage of the seasonality of trading that seems to exist within the markets. In essence, an investor should sell stocks in May and buy back near the first of November. They would then hold these stock positions through the next April. Rinse. Spit. Repeat…year in and year out.

Why would an investor do this?

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Waiting Until Next Year Will Cost You Big Time (Part II)

October 19, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Many of us are born procrastinators. We love to put things off until the last possible minute. When that moment arrives, we go into manic mode in a desperate, final scramble as our backs are up against the deadline. This usually involves locking ourselves in a room away from the rest of humanity and a steady supply of coffee (or other caffeinated beverage) so we can forego our normal sleep patterns as we pound out the final details of our project.

If you are like me, you don’t like it when you procrastinate and you vow each time to NEVER let this happen again. Or you may try to fake yourself into believing that it doesn’t matter - like it is positive character trait - by saying “I work really well under pressure.” If I am honest with myself, I hate the tension and frustration that comes when I put myself in that predicament. It highlights my lack of discipline. It reminds me of all the time I wasted. It makes me realize the truth of the saying, “Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today.”

There is no hard and fast deadline when it comes to our personal finances. This project is very open ended as it lasts your entire lifetime. So procrastinators rejoice - you can delay dealing with your financial problems for years. But if you do, it will cost you greatly.

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