You know the old saying, Behind every great leader is a great team… Well, it’s true.
Ask the world’s most successful business people – including real estate investors – for their secrets and there’s a huge chance that all of them will list “the right team” as one of the biggest factors to their success.
No one who’s truly successful does it all himself.
If you want to catapult your real estate investing business to the next level and find the kind of financial and professional success you’re looking for, you need to assemble a team of experts to support you on the way.
Here are the six people you need to hire to assemble your real estate investor’s dream team and put you on the path to real success…
Realtor
The first person you’ll need to assemble your real estate investor’s dream team is a Realtor. Your Realtor (or Realtors, depending on the size of your operation) is the person at the front lines of your business. She will manage the acquisitions and sales of properties within your investment portfolio.
When working with Realtors, remember: They work on commission. If you want to work with them, you need to offer them a generous commission package on your properties.
Because they work in a commission-driven business, your Realtor will work harder for you knowing there’s a handsome commission coming her way at the end of the deal. Offering competitive commissions will ensure that you’ll be the first to hear when she has an amazing property or investment opportunity.
Contractors
The next person – or in this case, people – you need on your dream team are contractors. Contractors are the people who are going to, quite literally, build your business from the ground up, handling all the construction, design, and renovations of your properties.
Having a talented and reliable team of contractors can be a game-changer for a real estate investor – they can help you demand higher rents, flip properties quickly, and protect the value of your investment.
Even if you have the skills, trying to handle the work of a contractor yourself is time consuming.
It will end up pushing back the timelines for all your investments, so it’s definitely something you’ll want to hire out.
Ask colleagues for recommendations. You want to find someone who’s reliable, does high-quality work, and with whom you can build a long-term relationship. Typically, contractors will offer deals to owners and investors that give them a steady stream of projects.
Attorney
In a perfect world, you wouldn’t need any legal advice or protection. But we don’t live in a perfect world, so it’s essential that you have an attorney on your team to handle all the legal matters related to your properties and investments.
You’ll want to hire an attorney that specializes in real estate. He’ll be able to handle the ins-and-outs of the buying and selling process, handle joint ventures with partners, and implement the proper legal structures and processes you need for your business to run smoothly. A great real estate attorney will be able to advise you on how to best protect your assets.
Lender
It goes without saying that in order to assemble a real estate investor’s dream team, you need a lender. Unless your bank account rivals Bill Gates’, you’re going to need to a lender to put up the capital you need to purchase your properties.
Depending on your needs, there are a few types of lenders to choose from. You can go with a traditional lender, like a mortgage representative at a major bank (think Chase or Wells Fargo), which might have some corporate hoops to jump through but can offer really competitive rates on your loan.
You can use a hard money lender, someone who specializes in working with investors to flip properties. Hard money loans are usually a lot faster and easier to secure, but they have higher interest rates and are generally more expensive.
Your last option is to go after a private lender. This is basically someone who’s looking to get his foot in the door with investing and wants to loan you the money to get your project off the ground.
A private lender could be a friend, a family member, a colleague or just a person you know who has extra money they’re looking to invest.
Whatever the case, it can be easier to negotiate with private lenders since there’s no company red tape to get through.
Just make sure that if you’re borrowing from someone you have a personal relationship with, you’re both clear on the terms of the loan and the date by which you need to pay the money back. You don’t want to risk losing a relationship over an investment.
Mentor
If you want to get from where you are to where you want to be quickly and (relatively) painlessly, it’s in your best interest to find a guide to show you the way. Working with a mentor can save you huge amounts of time, energy, and money as you’re launching your real estate investing business.
Working with an investor who’s been in your shoes and has successfully navigated his way through the sometimes tumultuous waters of the real estate investment game is invaluable. He or she can save you from making costly mistakes and give you insights into things you didn’t even know you needed to know.
Identify someone in your niche who’s built the type of business you aspire to have, and ask him out to coffee to see if he’d be willing to let you pick his brain.
Property Manager
Finally, if you decide you’re going to hold onto your investments as rental property, you’ll want to hire a property management company. Having the right property manager is invaluable, and will make property ownership immeasurably easier and less stressful.
Property management is incredibly time consuming and trying to manage the process yourself will inevitably lead to things falling through the cracks and tenants becoming disgruntled or dissatisfied.
Property managers handle all the details related to your tenants and property, so you can focus on the big picture – your investment portfolio.Just like any other leader or business owner, you need a solid team behind you in order to take your real estate investment business to new heights.
With these six members, you’ll be well on your way to dominating the real estate investment industry.