Investment Strategy

Learn about asset classes and investment methods that dial into strategies to meet your REI goals: Alternative Investing | Commercial | Funds | IRAs | Multifamily | Single Family | Syndication

Back To: All Topics 

Investment Strategy

Learn about asset classes and investment methods that dial into strategies to meet your REI goals: Alternative Investing | Commercial | Funds | IRAs | Multifamily | Single Family | Syndication

Back To: All Topics 

retail center

Changing Dynamics for Retail Centers

Retail properties are recently experiencing a few different trends – some, seemingly contradictory. The sector is doing well, but there are changing dynamics with retail centers that should be examined as part of any investment decision. Department Stores Have Lost Importance Big American department stores like Macy’s are being outmaneuvered ...
learning about real estate investing

Danger: Gurus Lurking

I’m a big—no, huge!—anti-guru person. They are a real danger, especially to real estate investors who are just starting out and desperately trying to learn this business. Let me tell you a story to illustrate why I am so emphatic about this. I had a speaking engagement in Chicago recently, ...
10 Spots Where Tear-downs Could Be Profitable

10 Spots Where Tear-downs Could Be Profitable

If you’ve ever thought about purchasing a property just so you could tear it down and build something better, then you would feel right at home in a number of America’s hottest housing markets these days. According to recent data released by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, there are ...
3 Reasons to Run Away from IRA-Held Real Estate

3 Reasons to Run Away from IRA-Held Real Estate

Individual retirement accounts (IRAs) were created to protect investors and enable them to engage in different types of investing that might not be considered entirely “the norm.” Not surprisingly, this includes real estate, historically one of the safest, simplest, and strongest types of investments not usually included in your options ...
Voice-Controlled Properties Trending in 2017

Voice-Controlled Properties Trending in 2017

Voice control is set to be the next smart-home amenity home buyers cannot live without. If the idea of just speaking to your house and asking it to lock doors, turn off lights, or activate the security system makes you think a little bit of “The Jetsons” and then get ...
Think Realty Magazine January/February 2017

Think Realty Magazine January/February 2017

+ WHAT'S INSIDE The Big Picture |  TV Star-Struck • Market Update: San Diego • How Secure Are You? • An Intriguing Alternative • A Matter of Timing • Giving Back Cover Feature |  Knowledge + Power = Freedom Up Close & Personal |  Tech Titan • May the Fores ...
Multi-Plan Approach

Multi-Plan Approach

Real estate investors are exposed daily to an ever-changing market. Sometimes these changes are favorable, and sometimes they are detrimental. The only certainties related to the real estate market are that it will change and that investors should expect the unexpected. Given this fact, doesn’t it make sense that investors ...
On the Record

On the Record

So you have your first property under contract, and you’re ready to get started and hire a contractor. What now? This was the question that confronted us on our very first project. We had already done the business basics: formed an LLC for our company and got our EIN number, ...
Real Estate Resolutions

Real Estate Resolutions

This time of year, talk about making resolutions is everywhere—in conversations, on blogs and splashed across every form of news outlet. Now, what do New Year’s resolutions have to do with the reason you read this magazine? I’m going to point out the obvious: If you weren’t interested in how ...
Securing Quality Renters

Securing Quality Renters

Ask any experienced landlords, and they’ll tell you that one of the secrets to success with rental properties is finding the right tenants. The right occupants are a landlord’s dream-come-true. They’ll pay the rent on time—every time—and look after your property and treat it right. They’ll abide by the terms ...
Commercial Caretaking

Commercial Caretaking

The backbone of any commercial property is strong property management. If you have recently purchased a commercial building or have a building that you have owned for a while, there comes a time when you must truly consider hiring a professional property manager to skillfully guide the property through its ...
A Matter of Timing

A Matter of Timing

Most real estate agents tell their clients that the three most important things to consider when buying property are location, location, location. I disagree. Here’s why: If you sold a house in Stockton, California, in 2006, you might have received $400,000. If you sold that same house in 2009, you ...
Success by Design

Success by Design

A successful website conversion is when someone visits your real estate investor website and takes some action you want them to take. For investors looking to buy houses, it’s when your website visitor wants to sell his or her house and either submits the requested form or gives you a ...
Capital Idea

Capital Idea

Getting a loan doesn’t have to be a difficult process, according to Ron Blum, founder of Atlas Capital and Asset Management. In fact, building a portfolio doesn’t have to be complicated, either. Atlas offers quality properties in blue-collar neighborhoods; internal underwriting of fixed-rate, 30-year loans; and property management service—all under ...
Investors' Choice

Investors’ Choice

When crunching the data for our Q3 2016 Single-Family Rental Market Report, ATTOM Data Solutions identified five sets of local markets representing different types of opportunity in the single-family rental space based on investor preferences and appetite for risk. Let’s look at each of those in some detail. Low Vacancy ...
Market Update - San Diego

Market Update – San Diego

In May 2016, San Diego, California, was the “eighth-hottest” home market in the United States according to Realtor.com. That had the media, analysts and even some economists starting to whisper the word “bubble.” At that time, Think Realty Magazine took a hard look at the San Diego housing market (“San ...
How Secure Are You?

How Secure Are You?

It seems like a week doesn’t go by without a company announcing it experienced a cyber attack, often with dire consequences for its bottom line and stock price. The security company Symantec reports that more than 500 million personal records were lost or stolen in 2015. And while small- to ...
A Winning Combination

A Winning Combination

When Matt Rodak, CEO and founder of Fund That Flip Inc., funded his first deal in January 2015, he was already confident he had a winning real estate combination on his hands. So confident, in fact, that he quit his high-paying corporate job running sales for a billion-dollar insurance company ...
An Intriguing Alternative

An Intriguing Alternative

Many factors have been driving the evolution of the world’s financial infrastructure since the economic debacle of 2007-2009. Traditional investment vehicles have been demonstrably unstable. Some of the financial giants that managed (and mismanaged) billions of dollars of investments were deemed “too big to fail”; they required U.S. federal government ...
Fannie Mae Eviction Moratorium

Eviction Moratorium for the Holidays

Fannie Mae announced it will suspend evictions of foreclosed single-family properties for the holiday season. Eviction suspensions will start Dec. 19, 2016, and continue through Jan. 2, 2017, for single-family residences and 2-to 4-unit properties. During this time the eviction administrative proceedings may continue, but families will be able to ...
Rental Vacancies Increase

Rental Vacancy Increase in October 2016

Morningstar Credit Ratings has recently published its Single-Family Rental Performance Report for November 2016 showing vacancies increased to 5.2 percent in October while transactions worked through the summer’s increased lease expirations. Rental properties backing single-family rental securitizations increased by 4.4 percent from prior contractual rents. They are now below the ...
Off Season Winter SF Buying

Save by Buying Property in Winter Months

If you’re willing to buy when the weather is frightful, your real estate investment deals could be quite delightful. So delightful, in fact, you might save as much as $50,000 or nearly $100,000 in certain locales. According to online real estate management and investment firm HomeUnion, the national square-footage price ...
Exit Position

Position Your Deal for Best Exit

And we’ve made it! This is the last installment of our special multi-part video mini-series sharing the steps that will help you dominate your deals. To recap, previously we covered your investment personality, exit strategy, how to find deals in your market & how to evaluate them and also how ...
Blue-State Investors

Red-States for the Win: Why Blue-State Investors Buy Elsewhere

No matter what side of the political aisle you prefer, odds are that when it comes to your real estate investment portfolio, your choices tend to be more red than blue. A recent report from ATTOM Data Solutions indicates that although deep-blue California is home base for a vast population of ...
What's Your Number?

What’s Your Number?

How much time do you spend on planning a vacation versus planning your financial future? This was a question asked to me years ago, and it hit home. Now, when I ask it of others, it hits them the same way it hit me. We spend months planning a vacation, ...