For years, I ran my construction business as an owner-operator, wearing every hat from sales and project management to bookkeeping. The business produced income, but it depended entirely on me. If I stepped away, everything stopped. That realization led me to create the Biz Freedom Framework™, a five-part system for building a business that can thrive without the owner being involved in every decision.

The framework begins with Ownership: defining a clear vision, documenting guiding principles, and intentionally building a company that can succeed with or without you.

Next is Leadership. That means developing people, setting clear expectations, and empowering others to make decisions instead of relying on the owner for everything.

In construction, the next steps are Get Work and Do Work. Consistent marketing and sales systems generate opportunities, while documented procedures and trained teams deliver quality work efficiently.

Keep Track ties everything together through job costing, cash flow management, and financial reporting that supports informed decisions instead of guesswork.

Applying this approach transformed my construction company into an employer-led business that performed just as well, if not better, when I wasn't there.

When I moved into real estate investing, the same principles applied. Get Work became Get Deals, and Do Work became Do Deals, but the foundation remained the same: Ownership, Leadership, consistent deal flow, efficient execution, an ... Read More…

If you don’t think that real estate investing is a relationship business, you haven’t been paying attention.

Your connections with other investors bring you local market knowledge, referrals to trustworthy professionals, funding, partnerships, and deals. Those relationships are what help you succeed, not just this year, but for years to come.

But these relationships don’t just happen for most people. You have to be intentional about building and maintaining them, just like you’re intentional (I hope) about building a rental portfolio, a buyer’s list, or a marketing plan.

REIA groups exist, in large part, to provide a platform for you to find and interact with like-minded folks who can encourage and help you be successful, but you have to do your part, too. Here are some tips for the 95% of us who aren’t natural connectors:

1. Be intentional about your professional development.

There’s no job you can have or business you can be in where your value isn’t enhanced by knowing more.

And in real estate, that value comes in two forms: knowing more simply means you can do more deals and make more money, but it also means you have more to offer your colleagues.

Knowledge is one currency that you can share to get what you need from others, and it’s a way of offering value to other people. Plus, it’s not fair to expect other people in the community to teach you every single thing you need to know about real estate. I ... Read More…

The rehab business didn't get harder. It just stopped forgiving mistakes.

Listen in as Jerry Fink (30+ years rehabbing) and Rebecca Sequiera (our Rehab & Retail Focus Group leader) join Vena Jones-Cox to talk about what's changed and how to still win in a slower, pickier market.

If you rehab, make time for this one.

Listen to the episode HERE

O.K., so you’ve gotten it into your blood, mind, and soul that you want to be a rehabber. Take that ugly, smelly eyesore and turn it into the gem of the neighborhood. No problem, right? After all, you’ve watched all the home renovation shows. You know all about which countertops to choose, what color schemes will wow your buyers, and that bathroom layout you have etched into your mind is a winner.

Well, there may be just a bit more to it than you think.

In this article, I want to address some of the areas you will want to start with before ever lifting a hammer or paint brush. Some of the things which, if done correctly ahead of time, will make your project run infinitely smoother, save you time and money, and allow you to keep any hair you currently have.

What Needs to be Done?

Believe it or not, this is one of the areas where most of us…even experienced Rehabbers…have some of our biggest challenges. Do I replace the windows? What about the furnace? Should I use Home Depot countertops…Corian…mid-range? There are a myriad of things to consider here, and the more experienced and wiser you become, the closer you will be to “guessing right”.

For instance, one of the first things you must consider is:  Who is my end buyer / user – are you rehabbing for a landlord or for a retail buyer? Vinyl flooring in a rental unit is just fine, but a retail buyer will really be impressed by ceramic tile in the kitchen and ba ... Read More…

Indulge me in a fable, and see if it jibes with your current, or perhaps past, experience as a developing real estate entrepreneur: 

You’re standing on a sidewalk with your nose an inch away from a brick. It’s a good brick. You’ve studied it for a while, and you’ve come to the conclusion that it’s reddish, rough, and surrounded on all four sides by parts of other bricks. You’ve looked at it long enough to decide that it’s a pretty great brick. 

Someone walks by and asks, what are you doing? Looking at this brick, you reply. 

Are you sure it’s a brick you’re looking at? the stranger queries. You might want to take a step back, because there’s more to see here than you think. 

So, you take a step back, and you realize that he’s right: the brick you’ve been so obsessed with is just one of many. In fact, from your new perspective, you notice out of the corner of your eye that there’s also something else — a hole, with glass and wood in it. Is that important? What does it do? Should you spend any time finding out more about it? 

While you’re wondering, another passerby happens along and asks what you’re doing.

I’m looking at all these bricks, and this weird opening, you explain. 

No, step back: you’re looking at a wall, says your new friend. That’s a window, and it opens and closes to let air and light in, and that particular one ... Read More…

         Way back in the mid-90s, I went to a workshop taught by the great Pete Fortunato.

          Several times during this event, he mentioned deals he’d negotiated or financed with the help of what he called “financial friends”.

          At the time, I had two thoughts about this: first, “Why does a guy who’s been in real estate for 30 years and is probably richer than Croesus need other people’s money to do deals?”.

          And second, “That’s great for him—he has decades of experience, so I bet he both knows a lot of people and is able to impress them with all the deals he’s done. I wonder how long it’ll be before some of these ‘financial friends’ find me?”

          As time has passed, and experience and observation has filled in the blanks, I’ve discovered the answers to both questions.

          First, no full-time investor EVER has enough cash to do all the deals they’ll ever find.

          At the height of my father’s real estate empire, he had $40,000 a month in positive cash flow but was still buying 2-3 houses a month—one f ... Read More…

Begin by teaching them about the lifestyle choice they’ll get to make each day of their lives: the choice of being rich, poor, or middle class. Once they make that decision, show them how they can use real estate as a vehicle for reaching their chosen destiny.

Let’s face it… for almost everyone starting out, investing in real estate is just another job. Part time, yes, but still a job that takes additional time away from family and friends. Rare is the first-time investor who has the available funds to jump into rehabbing or buying rental units without another job to support them. Most of us get started as real estate entrepreneurs by doing real estate “on the side” in the evenings and on weekends while keeping our day jobs to meet our families’ financial needs.

My wife and I got into the real estate business almost accidentally. Out of necessity, we would buy junker houses to live in because that was all we could afford. Then we would fix them up while we lived in them. As the family grew, we would buy another house with more bedrooms and baths and fix that one up. All this was happening while our children were young.

I got started as a real estate entrepreneur when a friend of mine who rehabbed houses talked me into buying a house at auction to renovate. My wife and I bought that first investment property and went about renovating it ourselves. Very quickly I was declared by the family to be an “absentee father.” My wife ... Read More…

Begin by teaching them about the lifestyle choice they’ll get to make each day of their lives: the choice of being rich, poor, or middle class. Once they make that decision, show them how they can use real estate as a vehicle for reaching their chosen destiny.

Let’s face it… for almost everyone starting out, investing in real estate is just another job. Part time, yes, but still a job that takes additional time away from family and friends. Rare is the first-time investor who has the available funds to jump into rehabbing or buying rental units without another job to support them. Most of us get started as real estate entrepreneurs by doing real estate “on the side” in the evenings and on weekends while keeping our day jobs to meet our families’ financial needs.

My wife and I got into the real estate business almost accidentally. Out of necessity, we would buy junker houses to live in because that was all we could afford. Then we would fix them up while we lived in them. As the family grew, we would buy another house with more bedrooms and baths and fix that one up. All this was happening while our children were young.

I got started as a real estate entrepreneur when a friend of mine who rehabbed houses talked me into buying a house at auction to renovate. My wife and I bought that first investment property and went about renovating it ourselves. Very quickly I was declared by the family to be an “absentee father.” My wife ... Read More…

You got into this business for freedom, right?

Money freedom , yes. But also time freedom, and life-on-your-terms freedom.

But here’s a truth a lot of us don’t realize early enough—and it handicaps us:

Independence isn’t…Independent

At every stage of this country’s history, it’s been groups of people, acting together, that have secured the blessings of liberty for themselves and others.

From overthrowing British rule to ending the practice of slavery to suffrage to the civil rights movement and on through today, new freedoms have only come when enough people got together for a common cause, organized to achieve what they wanted.

Guess what? Personal financial freedom is ALSO a team sport.

No one builds wealth in a vacuum. No one protects their property rights to it by themselves. And no one makes it to the top without a whole bunch of people who have  their back.

Wanna do new things without messing up? You need vetted education and advisors.

Wanna scale? You need team members and financial friends.

Wanna get past the inevitable mistakes? You need partners and allies.

Wanna keep what you’ve built? You need a team that fights for your rights when the government comes knocking.

That’s us.

COREE isn’t just some “club”.

We’re a community of real people building real freedom—and making sure nobody takes it away.

We teach each other, challenge each other, help each other.

We h ... Read More…

Think back for a minute—what was your first thought the first time you saw one of those handwritten signs at the highway entrance? You know, the one that says, “Handyman Special Must Sale [sic] $87,000 555-5555”? Or the first time you saw a bandit sign that said, “I Buy Houses Close in 7 Days”?

Unless you happened to have encountered one of these messages for the first time after you’d already started studying real estate, your reaction was probably a mixture of:

• Suspicion (“Is this for real? Who tries to buy houses by putting a sign on a telephone pole?”)
• Confusion (“Handyman’s special WHAT? What are they trying to sale [sic] me, exactly?”)
• Mistrust (“How can they possibly buy a house in 7 days when it took my bank 45 to close?”)
• Curiosity (“Who puts these things up, agents?”)

Today, of course, you completely understand the goal of such marketing, because today you live in a bubble populated by other real estate entrepreneurs who eat, breath, and sleep deals. Now that you understand what a handyman’s special is, and that a 7-day closing is in fact possible with other people’s money, your emotional reaction is more likely to be one of jealousy (“Dang, I wish I’d put my sign there”) than of confusion.

But—and this is important—You. Are. Not. Your. Customer.

Your customer, especially your SELLER customer, is NOT familiar with the worl ... Read More…