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Does Your Real Estate Business Have Enough ‘Elevators’?

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on Friday, 08 March 2024
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Have you ever stayed at a hotel that doesn’t have a good elevator experience?


If you have a 400 room hotel, resort, and conference center, and just two working elevators that fit 5 customers, it’s not going to be a good experience.


Your customers will be upset and frustrated. Even if everything else is 5 star worthy. In turn, they will upset your staff. Who will then disappoint you, or leave you scrambling for replacements.


If you’ve ever suffered through an experience like this, there are many literal and metaphorical takeaways for many parts of your real estate investment business and portfolio.


Short Term Thinking = Short Success

Do you only want short term success?


The above is the perfect example of short term thinking that not only makes for a frustrating business that isn’t fun to operate, but which fails soon too. At best it means limping along with thin profit margins until a smarter competitor takes you out of the game.


The elevator example applies to all of your real estate marketing and deal making processes.


You can blast out a million marketing pieces or pile up 1,000 units in your inventory, but if you don’t have the capacity to efficiently handle those leads and deals, most of them will be wasted, along with your company’s reputation.


Are The Stairs Where They Should Be?

If the technology (elevators and automation) aren’t working, then customers will run to the stairs right? Especially in an emergency situation. Well, imagine the stairs aren’t there right next to the elevator, at the end of the hall, with a sign, just as you expect.


In a fire, or business emergency, that would be a literal death trap.


Believe it or not, there is at least one hotel that has made this mistake. Many more real estate businesses are making it by not thinking through acquisitions, or by failing to have phone or human support as a back up when their new technology fails. Which is happening more often than ever as companies try to jump on the automation and AI bandwagon.


In the automotive business this has become so bad, that new regulations are coming to require old school, manual controls, rather than just touchscreens for everything.


Whether you are wholesaling houses, office buildings, or hotels, make sure your business has enough elevators, and it's obvious where the stairs are.

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Real Estate Business: What’s Changing This Year

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on Thursday, 18 January 2024
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A wide variety of highly impactful changes could be coming to the real estate industry this year. Here are at least seven significant changes real estate business owners, entrepreneurs, and investors should be watching…


Realtor Commissions

Recent lawsuits have found that NAR has illegally colluded to artificially keep Realtor commissions high.


This will not only cause consumers to lose faith in Realtors, but also to put more downward pressure on their commissions.


TikTok to Tinder

This may be the year when advertisers finally realize that no one is really buying things on Tiktok. Marketing is everything, but ROI on marketing and labor is more important than ever. Some may find that they get better results on in person marketing offline or Tinder than wasting time on TikTok.


Employees Vs. Contractors

Strict new criteria is being rolled out for classifying employees versus independent contractors. Many real estate businesses may have to restructure how they hire and what they have team members do.


This comes right on the brink of the world’s largest freelancer platform Upwork looking like it will implode after a string of terrible decisions that have burned their best customers.


New rules around employees and contractors mean that few will want to or can afford to risk even hiring remote workers in places like California or New York.


The Real Jump In Inflation May Be Coming

Consumer prices are still astronomically high, and growing. Though, recent and current events from new regulations to conflicts in the Middle East, and interruptions of shipping paths could create a new round of hyper inflation that is even more significant than post-COVID. If shipping and import costs are quadrupling right now, what will that mean for consumer prices in the next couple months?


The Next Phase Of Migration

We recently experienced huge shifts in companies and residents from places like NY to NJ and FL. That is now triggering a new round of migration from these states to new destinations like AL, SC, and OH. Some media outlets have also posed that the new American Dream is now to leave America for better lifestyles elsewhere abroad.


We’ve also recently seen more than one proposal to open up the use and sale of public lands to foreign entities and migrants.


Property Prices

While some see inflation continuing to lift property prices, other investment industry veterans expect $1T in debt defaults, and prices to fall by 50% or more over the next year or two.


Small price cuts are no longer cutting it. It has to be a complete no brainer with an existing exit at a steal of a deal price to attract solid offers and buyers.


The Middle Class Is Gone

Inflation and a weakening job market leave only room for the highly paid tech elite or the welfare class on food stamps to survive. Consider how you can serve these groups in order to keep business flowing this year.


The bottom line is that real estate investors, entrepreneurs, and business owners will have to do things differently, find new groups to serve with new proposals, and price deals differently this year. Yet, this all means immense opportunity for those who are flexible and get ahead of the curve.

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Don’t Kill Your Real Estate Business With Deadly This Mistake…

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on Thursday, 11 January 2024
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Want to save and grow your real estate business this year?


One critical step is to avoid the business killing mistakes that are sabotaging other companies from the inside out.


We are already on the precipice of seeing many companies small and giant implode due to poor choices in implementing automation technology and artificial ‘intelligence’.


At the root of this is often a very broken belief that more automation and AI will make everything better. Internal efficiency is important. It is becoming more important as many businesses find themselves refocusing on cost cutting.


Being prudent with your finances is vital. Yet, as Seth Godin says, “you can’t cost cut your way to greatness.”


This is especially if you end up cannibalizing your own business, and alienating your best customers. Without those customers you simply don’t have a business.


We’ve seen this at giant incumbent companies in a variety of industries, and multibillion dollar startups that turned to trying to squeeze and bleed their best customers dry, only to their own demise.


The Steak ‘n Shake Issue

A road trip across, or up and down the country this season can easily reveal all of the flaws of current tech trends. As well as how to do customer experience right.


Steak ‘n Shake is an 89 year old restaurant chain. Once having over 600 locations, and pulling off a turn around that added $100,000 a day in sales.


Go into one of these long beloved diners today, and while you might find the same vintage decor, they are likely dead and empty. Gone are the waiting staff. Instead there are big do it yourself ordering screens. No cashiers either.


You might just run across a couple of other customers. Though it is likely they will be frustrated at the experience.


There is no customer service. The experience they went for no longer exists. They could have been better served using Doordash or going through a rival drive thru.


The food may still be good, but no one may ever know, because they just aren’t customer friendly anymore, at all.


In stark contrast, your next stop on your trip could be a Buc-ee's gas station.


Of course they have technology. They have cameras, modern registers, and more.


Though, first you’ll notice they are super packed with customers. Often to the tune of over 100 gas pumps in action. Inside is packed too.


So, what’s the difference maker?


At Buc-ees, you’ll see lots of human staff. You’ll see lots of additional products. They’ve been focused on adding more value and services, and humans to help. It appears to be paying off big time.


The staff also seem happy, and go out of their way to help customers. Even with seemingly small issues and requests.


The company also advertises they are paying over $250,000 a year for some job roles. So, a household with two workers, who save half their income could be millionaires in just four years, just working at a gas station.


Something To Think About…


If you’ve been thinking about how you can keep your real estate business alive, and keep growing it during this period, a road trip might be just what you need.


Go look at some new markets you can do real estate deals in. On the way you’ll quite likely find some nuggets you can use.


That may even include seeing opportunities to acquire business at deep discounts that have gotten this wrong. As well as discover new groups of buyers and investors that are thriving and are enjoying their best financial lives thanks to choosing to give more value and human service in spite of recent fads.


Remember that technology efficiency that enhances your internal operations and real net profitability can be important. Yet, it only works to save and grow your business if you are also adding value and better service to your customers, in the form of an experience they like.

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5 Must-Do Items Before The New Year

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on Wednesday, 06 December 2023
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These are the five most important to-do items that should be on every real estate professional and investor’s list before the new year arrives…


No matter how busy you think you are, or the ‘urgent’ things that try to distract you and steal your time, the below will make or break how you end this year, and how the entire next year will go for you.


Review The Past Year

Take a day to review the past year. What worked well and didn’t? Why?


Evaluate any gap in your goals versus achievements. Did you surpass your goals, or fall short? What caused that?


Ask what has changed in the real estate market and economy, and your business, and life over the past year, as well as your personal development?


Then take the next day to celebrate all the progress. Even if you didn’t hit all your goals.


Set New Goals For The New Year

Make them specific, BIG, and achievable.


Anchor these to your underlying why. Make them visible on a daily basis. Not just for yourself, but for your entire team.


Begin setting up the framework to be able to achieve these goals over the next 12 months. If you don’t have a template for this yet, even just start a spreadsheet with the categories of items that you need to accomplish them. Including the team and roles you need to till, the connections you need to make, the infrastructure that needs to be put in place, and the budget and funds required.


Evaluate The Outlook For The New Year

Consider what is likely to change or stay the same over the next year?


Such as new regulations, demand and supply, the cost of doing business, and more.


Ask what are the unknowns or wild cards that could be played? How can you be prepared to weather it and capitalize on these changes, so that your business is unshakeable when things happen?


Take Time Out To Reset

Recognize that this is some of the most important and profitable time you will invest in yourself and your business all year.


Whether it is a weekend or a week, the ROI on this time outside of your business will return many times that of the hours you are busy in your business the rest of the year. It will boost every other minute you spend doing things over the next 12 months.


Getaway somewhere new. Ideally you can unplug from everything for at least 48 hours.


Decompress, get inspired, gain new insights, recharge, reenergize, and regain your focus, and perspective on the big picture.


This is the most important thing we all MUST do before the new year.


Set The Table

Then take the remainder of the year to have conversations about everything you’ve contemplated, learned, and set to do for the next year.


This season is ideal for sharing many meals with important people in your life, and new people. This sets the table for the entire next year.


Spend quality time with those you love and care about, time bonding with your team, and connecting with new prospects, and potential partners. Eat together, get feedback, solicit ideas to streamline your achievements, and set up plans to take next steps with them in the new year.

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Real Estate Investing: How To Prepare Yourself To Win In The New Economy

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on Saturday, 07 October 2023
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Want to ensure your real estate business takes off and continues to flourish in the next few months and years?


It’s amazing to already see the great disparity dividing investors, entrepreneurs, and businesses. Some are going bigger than ever with ease. They are growing into new niches, with $100M pipelines and plenty of deals and capital lined up. Others are already struggling and the fear and doubt that is creeping in could prove self-fulfilling.


Whether you are just starting out in real estate, have been riding the recent bull run but haven’t experienced adversity before, or have been at it for decades, there are both regular cyclical and major macro economic shifts happening.


In order to get ahead, and keep winning and growing, you’ve got to be intentional about it.


It may take some tweaks to your model, or a whole new approach. This is an important time to refresh your perspective and anchor it in what really matters and will make you successful.


Consider these 10 ways to prepare for success in real estate, and avoid being swept away by external changes.


Take Stock Of What Really Works

What has really been working, and has directly created your success so far. Be sure to differentiate between those fundamentals, and the frills that may have come along with it.


For example; it was probably working the extra hours and going above and beyond to take care of those customers, not the Ferrari that got you there.


Remember the progress you’ve made and what you’ve achieved so far.


Take Time Away To Think

There are so many distractions around us. Which is often what leads to making serious mistakes, and continuing to slide into failure.


Take a long weekend away. Detach from the everyday tunnel vision. Gain time to truly think and focus.


Unplug and evaluate. Then take time to see new things, and what’s really happening outside of your own little bubble. See how so many are actually struggling right now, as well as how others are doing so well that they are oblivious to this. See new ways of doing things.


Relist Your Priorities

What is really most important to you?


Above the work, is it your family, a partner, or your own health?


In real estate, which metrics and KPIs are truly most important? Hint; they are probably customer happiness, NPS score, and net profit. Everything else may be a dangerous distraction.


Learn What The Successful Are Doing

How are those that have been through these changes before handling it? Not just what they are saying or recommending, but what are they doing in their own finances and business? What have they done to survive and thrive through changes and challenges in the past?


Is it shifting investment strategy, increasing marketing efforts, or being more prudent in their offers?


Read books by real human authors, with real experience. Join mastermind groups or start your own. Hire the right team for this phase of your business, and be sure you hold onto them.


Make Sure Your Team Gets It

Most founders should be horrified by the gap between their initial vision and efforts, and how the business ends up getting run on the front lines.


Ensure your team knows the big vision, the why behind changes, their most important metrics, and the values that are there as guide rails to get there.


Discern What Will Stay The Same Vs. What Will Change

You’re probably far too behind the trend to slap the ‘AI’ label on your business and hope it helps. Now we even have AI created Coca-Cola. It’s become a cheesy and cringe worthy meme, more than a signal of value.


It can help to sail with tailwinds, yet it is being strong in the fundamentals that make a good and sustainable business. Then you build the marketing on top of that.


Refresh Your Morning Routine

It may be time to shake up your morning routine. Add new important tasks. Ensure it anchors you in a positive and successful mindset to overcome the day ahead.


Be sure to check out our Fall Funding Deals, with interest rates as low as 1%.

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7 Ways To Kill Your Real Estate Business Fast

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on Saturday, 25 March 2023
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90% of real estate businesses are unlikely to survive this phase of the economic cycle. The world’s biggest banks are falling like dominoes. That will have a big impact on everything else.


A few investors and real estate firms will not only survive this, but find it their defining moment. One which enables them to scale, establish their personal and business brands as those to count on for everything that comes after this, and will grow incredibly wealthy in a short period of time.


So, how do you not sabotage your venture, and stay in the game and grow it instead?


Relying On Others For Liquidity & Access To Funds

Cash flow and liquidity are what will bankrupt most companies and individuals in the months ahead.


Expect banks and mortgage lenders to struggle to have enough funds on hand, or the willingness to provide access in the year ahead.


Transactional lenders are likely the most reliable for real estate wholesalers. Though make sure you have cash on hand, and spread your deposits amongst banks so that you aren’t caught short when they fail.


Allowing Your Reserves To Be Depleted

No matter how much savings and capital reserves you have, it will be blown through quickly if you keep on tapping into it.


When you do face the decision to tap emergency funds, make sure you pause, and explore new strategies, income streams, inventory types, and funding partners so that you stop the bleed as quickly as possible.


Slowing Down Your Marketing

If you stop marketing, you stop making money. Your business will fail. It is just a matter of how soon. Instead, step up, juice up your marketing efforts, and grab more market share.


Robbing Your Most Loyal & Profitable Customers

When things get leaner many companies make the perilous mistake of robbing and squeezing their best customers. This will burn your relationships and wind up killing your brand permanently. Don’t raise your fees just because you can or to extract more from them when they are going through the same thing too. Giant companies like Facebook and Upwork or Wells Fargo have tried this and it has done irreparable damage.


Doubling Down On Bad Decisions

Be willing to acknowledge mistakes and pivot quickly. Don’t do further damage by doubling down in a direction that is failing.


Spam

Yes, scale up your marketing. Do not resort to spamming your hard earned and bought audience with spam. It will have the opposite of the desired effect.


Living It Up, While Hurting Customers

Don’t be like the big banks and gas companies that are taking out big bonuses, lending their friends hundreds of millions of dollars, and posting record profits, while you are complaining about costs or are shorting your customers. You’ll never get their trust back.


Giving Less Instead Of More

During times like these you want to be looking for how to add more value to your customers and partners, not how you can strip away what they already expect to be included.

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Don’t Let These Tech & Automation Fads Kill Your REI Business

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on Thursday, 02 February 2023
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Technology and automation tools can be essential for scaling a profitable real estate investment business today.


However, without a little common sense, jumping on the latest fads can mean you are dooming your business to failure instead of streamlining your way to greater success.

Self-Sabotaging Fads For Real Estate Investors To Be Wary Of

There are countless new apps, software, and automation tools coming out each day. A couple of them may truly be valuable. Most are a distraction.


You should be automating elements of your prospecting, follow up, and systematizing your business so that offers are going out, properties are being sold, and you just have to focus on the big picture of growing your real estate business.


However, some companies have gone to the extreme of trying to go a tech only route, relying on not so intelligent AI tools, and in the process cannibalizing their own businesses.


This is most notable in customer service. Live chat tools became very useful. Users have gravitated to the ability to conveniently chat with businesses online, from their phones, and get real, instant help from humans on the other side. This has been very efficient for brands too.


Now some have tried to replace these human interactions with just chat bots. It doesn’t work. It just becomes a source of frustration. Like old phone systems that just looped customers around, pressing different numbered options.


This problem is compounded by companies like Upwork which have also ended any human customer service or ability to contact them by phone. This is true even for their top revenue producing customers that have helped build and fuel their business for over a decade, and have brought them over $1M in transactions. They are just burning their best and most loyal customers, and brand advocates.


It’s worth noting their stock price has tanked by more than two thirds in the past couple of months because of this. It is probably just the beginning of their downfall. As well as the overall AI bubble, just as we saw with the initial dot com bubble.


The Number One Predictor Of Success

The number one predictor of future business performance is customer happiness.


If customers aren’t happy, the business will go south. This can tank the largest global corporations. It will certainly cut short the life of small businesses as well.


The reverse is also true. Repeat customers are cheaper, more profitable, and easier to work with. They will also help grow your business with referrals.


It’s just basic elementary school math and common sense.


How To Balance Great Service, Efficiency & Profitability

Do use technology for marketing, for following up with those in your CRM, and for enabling prospects to enjoy an automated process, when it works for them.


Just remember that at times many will also need a human. Whether that is by phone, text, email, or chat. Consider that $15 an hour for a great service rep, could help you make or keep a $1M a year customer. Do the math on those returns.

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Hidden Taxes To Impact Real Estate Businesses

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on Thursday, 08 September 2022
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Among the many types of inflation battering are many forms of taxes. Some of these new taxes and tax hikes have been highly publicized. Others have been snuck through in other bills and legislation.


You don’t want to end up with any more big surprises from the IRS or other taxing authorities at tax time in the new year. So, what do you need to know? How might you be able to find a better way to cleanly and legally avoid over taxation on your real estate business?


Disclaimer: This is purely for informational purposes, and should not be deemed as tax advice.


New Taxes For Real Estate Businesses

As a business owner you should already be aware that many taxes are going up. Potentially including income tax rates and property taxes. Depending on where you are headquartered and do business.


The budget reconciliation bill passed last year also established a new minimum tax for corporations.


However, Forbes has discovered another tax hidden in that bill which impacts small businesses and their workers, and there could be more.


The Hidden Retirement Tax

Hidden in the budget reconciliation bill is a new retirement plan tax discovered by two Forbes contributors.


Beginning in 2023 the ruling forces businesses with at least 5 employees to provide and automatically enroll employees in a retirement plan (IRA). 6% of their pay will be automatically rolled into this plan. Which will automatically increase to 10% of pay.


These funds must go into specifically mandated and managed plans.


The real catch that could trip up many real estate business owners is that this was written into law as a tax. So like Obamacare, if businesses don’t have this in place, they will be taxed $10 per day, per employee.


For those with 10 employees, that’s an extra $3,000 per month in taxes. Or $36,000 per year.


What To Do About It

The most obvious fix might be to comply with this mandate, and simply give all of your employees a 10% plus pay raise to account for the funds that they will be missing from their paycheck each week.


Other options include optimizing your team. You could combine roles, and get down to four employees to avoid this tax. Such as having your copywriter also handle your SEO, PR, and other marketing tasks.


The other option is to stick to remote and independent contractors only. Though you may need to reestablish and incorporate your business out of areas like California which are striving to classify all workers as employees.


You can simplify your business, by focusing on wholesaling houses instead of buy and hold, and in turn reducing the amount of employees you need.


Invest profits for more tax deductions, such as with cost segregation, and participating in building Airbnb units managed by partners.


If you are stuck with some properties, you could donate them for a tax break, like Jeff Bezos' ex-wife who just donated $55M in real estate.


Revisit your business structure. Is a S Corp, LLC, or trusts best for you and your taxes?


Above all, get a great CPA and accounting firm who can help you legally minimize taxes, and maximize your net gains.

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How To Cut REI Business Expenses To Survive & Thrive

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on Thursday, 25 August 2022
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What’s the smart way to trim your real estate business expenses to survive this phase or the market, so that you can thrive and scale?


The Problem Facing Many REI Business Owners

The vast majority of real estate business owners, investors, and agents have not experienced this phase of the economy and market before.


In just a few weeks they have gone from denying that it is possible, to being on the verge of panic as they see it happening.


Many are experiencing stress and fear as property prices and deal flow changes, and they see many real estate brokerages making massive layoffs, and lenders losing their credit lines and redying for bankruptcy.


What’s ironic is that we are entering the best part of the real estate market for buying the best deals, and making the most money. Many are right on the brink of success, if they would just hold on, tweak their real estate strategies, and optimize their finances and operations.


There are going to be millions of property deals coming, and with Best Transaction Funding they can finance 100% of their acquisitions.


To Quit Or Not To Quit?

You only fail if you quit.


Many may be quite happy going back to day jobs and hourly pay working for someone else in a different industry, if they can find anyone hiring. Yet, for those who are truly entrepreneurs and business owners, giving up now will be a choice that will haunt them for the rest of their lives.


If you really don’t want to put in the effort to keep going, then consider your options before you just throw in the towel and shut it down.


You could potentially sell your entire business and at least wrap it up cleanly and walk away with some cash to get you through the next phase of the economy.


Alternatively, you could merge your business with someone else, or just sell off your assets. This may include your data, other physical assets, and portfolios of properties. There are plenty of other investors who want to buy them.


Where To Cut Costs

This is a good time to trim frivolous expenses that are eating up your cash flow and profit margins.


Subscriptions and software can add up fast, yet are often underutilized. Review your accounts for all those you are still paying for, and cancel all but the essential.


The biggest area to cut for those still working old school is their office and business premises. Not only is having an office unnecessary, it is putting you at an extreme disadvantage against the competition. Both financially and in terms of productivity.


You can also cut labor on unnecessary activities. Like meetings, or low yielding busy work that doesn’t increase profits and revenues.


Where NOT To Cut Costs

Whatever you do, do NOT stop marketing.


If you stop marketing, you stop bringing in deals and dollars. Your business will die. Just more slowly and painfully than if you just shut it down now.


Also be wary of laying off your best talent. You cannot replace great talent with lower quality talent, and expect for things to go well. It is counter productive. If you lose your best talent to the competition, they will use it against you. It is hard to find, harder to keep, and easy to lose.


If you can’t afford your current wages, then consider temporarily reducing and minimizing their hours, until you get your deal flow going again.

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Is It Time To Sell Your REI Business?

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on Thursday, 26 May 2022
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Is it the right time to sell your real estate investing business? If so, is your company even sellable?


This could be the ideal time for many real estate business owners to cash in and sell their companies. It is a window of opportunity many will kick themselves for missing out on.


However, not every company is positioned and optimized to be sold or bought. Let’s look at the timing, why you should be prepared regardless of your plans, and what you can do to make your company an attractive acquisition.


Why Now Is The Right Time To Sell


This is the phase in the real estate cycle when many real estate businesses may be peaking in value and appeal. It is also the same peak time in the general economy and mergers and acquisitions cycle for business owners to sell.


Many failed to see this opportunity ahead of 2008. Then either struggled for years while everything fell apart, or just closed the doors and quit, leaving millions of dollars in unclaimed value on the table.


This is a time in the economy when a lot of consolidation is in the works. Capital markets still have cash to fund acquisitions, and bigger companies want to expand by acquiring more market share.


That could all change fast in a downturn. The ability to buy may evaporate. Acquirers will be looking for steals, and to offer a small percentage of what they may offer now.


Why Having A Sellable Real Estate Business Is Important


Right now you may think you will never want to sell your business. That’s what most think, until the moment they need to. Yet, we never know where the market, company values, will go, and when for sure. We never know if we will be healthy enough to work tomorrow. Or if our families will need us to be present for them, instead of running a business.


Selling a business can provide a lump sum payday, ongoing passive income, or a combination of both, without having to be involved on a daily basis.


Even if you never sell, being sure your company is set up for it will only help increase the value of your assets, and improve your operations. You can’t lose. Yet, you can build millions or billions of dollars in extra value into your company, while going about your regular daily work. It’s virtually a no-brainer.


How To Optimize Your Company


Optimize your company for value and appeal by:


  • Creating systems throughout your business
  • Maintaining clean records, accounting, and contracts
  • Use smart leverage for deals and keep your cash balance sheet healthier
  • Make sure your business can run without your daily involvement


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Vital Lessons From Netflix For Real Estate Investors

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on Wednesday, 27 April 2022
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Netflix was a hugely successful business story. Sadly, like Zillow and other giants, they may now become most famous for their failure.


There are essential lessons to be drawn from their rise and fall. Leverage the good, and avoid making the same mistakes if you want your real estate investing business to grow, and avoid collapsing. Especially with the market changes on the horizon.


Unique Solutions, Adding Great Value & Convenience

These are the things that made Netflix, and put the final nail in the coffin of the physical Redbox and Blockbuster before them.


The price was low. Better than renting DVDs. It was convenient and easy to use. They were the leaders in the space.


Scale Fast, Grow Your Brand Name

Netflix leveraged and grew fast. They established their brand name as the verb for watching TV and film online.


They got big and seemed dominant. Then appeared to forget what it was that made them successful.


They started going in the opposite direction. It seems everyone else in the world except for the executives at Netflix could see the writing on the wall, and knew their choices were going to self-sabotage the company. It was just common sense. Unfortunately, their investors are paying that price dearly.


Don’t Sacrifice Your Most Loyal Customers

Like other multi-billion dollar companies that have steeply declined, one of Netflix’ most obvious mistakes was to begin sacrificing their most loyal customers.


Not only did they seem to stop innovating, but they began raising prices on their biggest fans, instead of rewarding their loyalty.


Raising Prices, While Stripping Value

Raising prices when it is necessary is one thing. Raising prices, and giving less value is something else. It is always a losing strategy.


Power users found little to watch, and were already interested in other competitors. Netflix basically forced them to the competition. Depending on your plan, you may be paying $16 a month for Netflix, and just $1 for Hulu. A service that seems almost the same, with more fresh content for new users.


Failing To Keep Innovating

Even if it is working right now, you can’t just keep on doing the same thing. If you aren’t constantly innovating, your company is going to die.


You must constantly be improving and offering new things.


Doubling Down On What’s Killing Your Business

Of course, the inevitable happened. People stopped using Netflix.


In just one day the company lost $54B in investor value.


Then at the time of writing this was falling off a cliff. Already having lost 5 years of gains, and with its stock price down by over 70%.


So, did they correct course? Offer more content and value? Cut prices to be competitive?


No. Instead they are talking about adding back in advertisements. Which we can get on regular TV if we want them. Or on YouTube for free. They are further cutting back on shows and the content they will offer.


It is a race to the bottom.


Learn from their mistakes, and what they once did well.

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4 Ways To Set Your New Year Goals

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on Thursday, 23 December 2021
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What are your big goals for the next year?


If you are tired of cliche new year’s resolutions, that is understandable. Yet, this is still one of the best times of the year to invest in goal setting and planning for your finances, investments and real estate business.


You’ve got to have goals. If you are going to have goals you might as well set big ones. At a minimum we should all be shooting to beat our current personal best, and last year’s results.


However, there is more than one way to set your goals. Here are four of them to consider…


By Deal Volume

One way to set your goal for this year, and to build on your success so far, is to set it by deal volume, or transaction count. So, if you recently started in real estate investing, and did 10 wholesale houses last year, and want to 10x it, and go full time this year, you would set a goal of 100 over the next 12 months. That’s about 8.5 per month, or a little over 2 per week.


By Gross Revenue

When people say “I want to make $X this year.” they are often or typically talking about the topline, or gross revenue.


Depending on what stage you are at, that may be $1M, $10M, $1B or $1T over the next year.


Some count the dollar volume of real estate value they trade. So, 10 $100,000 would be $1M in volume. Though of course, you don’t get to touch all of that money. So, the gross income to your business or investment account would be a better metric. If you made an average of 10% per deal, then that would only be $100k in this scenario.


By Net Profit

It is probably far more meaningful to count the net profit you actually make in real estate. That’s the money you can actually use, spend, and reinvest in your real estate business.


This is important, because it is entirely possible to break your record for deal volume, and still actually lose money at the end of the year. Just ask Zillow. The same goes for gross revenue. Zillow was bringing in billions of dollars each year when it went bust.


Watching your net profit, including taxes, will make sure you are not caught by surprise in a similar situation. It will also help you focus your time, dollars and energy on the deals which are most profitable, versus just being busy and putting up vanity metrics to impress others.


By Desired Giving Or Impact

Giving and impact are often after-thoughts for many individuals and organizations. Even those that say they will give 10% to charity. Often there may be nothing left to give when they calculate their net.


If helping others or a certain cause is what you are really most passionate about, consider talking this another way with your goal setting.


You could make your main goal to give $X to a certain cause, or to house 100 families this year. Make it big, and you will be well compensated for achieving your mission.


Remember that achieving these goals will largely be driven by your marketing. Take this time of the year to back out the numbers on how much marketing you need to do to hit your goals. Hire the best help you can, and get ahead of the game.

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5 Key Factors To Ensure Your Real Estate Business Survives & Thrives

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on Wednesday, 05 May 2021
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The last 18 months have been some of the best ever for real estate investors. Yet, whether we enjoy a continued bull run that attracts more big players, or we go through a correction, wise entrepreneurs will already be thinking ahead to how they can ensure their businesses continue to survive and thrive through whatever comes next.


These are five traits of successful businesses that will separate the ultimate winners from those that go bust…


They Treat Their Teams Well

A team and company is really all about the people. It is smart to recruit the best talent you possibly can. Though it is even more important that they are treated well. This is one of the leading indicators of future business success and longevity.


When companies start mistreating and abusing their team members, it will eventually show up in the sales and other company performance metrics. It becomes noticeable in customer service. Then it is all downhill from there. Take good care of your team, and they will take good care of your business.


They Treat Loyal Customers Well

This sounds super obvious, yet it is far rarer than you think. Many now very big companies started off well to lure people in and grow fast. Then instead of trying to offer more value and reward their most loyal customers, they think the shortcut is to milk everything they can out of their customers at all costs. The short in this shortcut is how long their success will last. You can look at companies like Netflix and see that in just months they’ve gone from over 90% market share to barely 40%.


They Prioritize Sustainable Thinking

If you only think short term, your success is doomed to only be short term. If you want your efforts and results to last you have to think long. That means setting big and long goals, and using those as a decision guide for what you do in your business today.


They Encourage & Embrace Innovation

Even the biggest and most established companies must constantly innovate or die. For younger companies, it is certainly the only thing that enables them to be in business and stand a chance.


This means being flexible in your strategies, and creative. It also means not only being willing to listen to your teams on the front line, but to actually test their ideas in action, even if some will fail and need tweaking.


They Invest In Themselves As Leaders

If you want your business to survive, and keep on being part of it you have to be sure you are investing in yourself as a leader to stay ahead of growth. Don't be the bottleneck and hurdle in your own business that limits it, or drags it down.

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Is It A Real Estate Business Or A Content Business?

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on Thursday, 25 March 2021
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Is your company a real estate business or a content business? How does this impact your most important moves and the investments that you should be making?


Undercover Real Estate Businesses

It used to be that many companies were really just real estate businesses in disguise. McDonalds is probably the most obvious of these. It’s not about the dollar menu burgers. It’s about the real estate.


This has also been true of schools and the most famous universities, as well as government. Ivy League colleges are really just real estate businesses which also happen to have students as tenants, and tuition as an extra form of cash flow. The US government is probably the biggest landlord in the world. Everyone has to pay them rent every year in the form of annual property taxes. They seize property and resell it when it suits them. The same may be true of many big funds which trade other financial products to pay for prime real estate.


However, all of this is changing. It may have already changed.


It’s A Content Business

Today, many, if not most of the biggest businesses are actually content businesses in disguise.


Netflix is not a technology company, it is a content company. Disney, Google, Zillow, Facebook, Twitter, and AT&T, are all content companies. They own a lot of prime real estate, but they generate billions of dollars in annual revenues from their content. They are happy to buy up other businesses with great content for billions of dollars.


Of course, real estate businesses are content companies too. Whether it is pushing out listings, home value tools, renovation tips, or investment advice, it is increasingly about the content.


The Big Question Is...

How strong is your content game?


Content will make or break you. It will determine how much real estate you can sell if that is still your thing. As well as how much other income you can generate.


Content in its many forms is increasingly differentiating the few leaders from the masses of wannabes. So, how are you capitalizing on this shift? Are you doing enough content? Are you putting out the highest quality content in your space? Are you monetizing the content itself in addition to making more real estate deals as a result of your content?

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Simple, Cost Effective Tweaks That Can Boost Your Real Estate Results

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on Thursday, 25 February 2021
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Even simple and affordable tweaks can help you significantly boost your real estate investing business and net results.


These are some of the simplest, most affordable and best value adjustments that may have surprising outcomes.


Update Your On Hold Music

If you are generating inbound voice leads, and service any of your customers via phone, updating your on hold music is a low cost, yet impactful way to keep more of them waiting, and in a good mood until you can handle their call. It may make all the difference in your net marketing ROI, conversion rates and deal volume.


It may sound unimportant, but how many times have you been annoyed by frustrating phone systems, and have just hung up? Maybe you went right on to call their next competitor or ended the relationship. Imagine if your on hold music was actually pleasant to listen to.


Get to know your demographics and what really resonates with them, and pick a better soundtrack.


Job Titles

Many real estate businesses decided not to hand out bonuses or raises over the past year. Why not show your appreciation to your team by giving them a better job title instead? It may not come with more money yet, but it could if they perform well in that position. Job titles matter. They are valued and can be meaningful. They can keep your team members focused on what you really want them to achieve. They cost you nothing to hand out.


Soliciting Feedback From Your Front Line Team

People feel valued when you ask for their opinions and ideas. You don’t have to implement all of them. Yet, more often than not your front line team members are closest to the action and know best what is and isn’t working and where improvements can be made.


This can apply to your receptionist, cleanup crew, landscapers, marketers, sales team and more. It costs you nothing to ask them, and just a few minutes to listen. Yet, it may unveil more tweaks you can make for greater performance, while keeping your employees engaged.


Optimizing For Regret, Not Success

On a recent episode of the Dealmakers Podcast, one highly successful entrepreneur suggested making decisions based on optimizing to minimize regret, not for success.


That means, instead of just doing the sure or easy or most profitable thing. What if you worked on the one thing you will regret most not trying, even if there are no guarantees of huge scale success.


When you look back in 3, 5 or 10 years, or at the end of your life, what will you most regret not doing or trying?


If you do succeed it will likely have the most impact on your finances. More importantly it will make the journey a lot more fun and enjoyable.


Switch To Pre-Orders

Of course, while progress relies on trying new things, experimenting and being willing to fail, it is just common sense and good business sense to eliminate risk and ensure the profitability of your efforts and investments before you get in.


One of the best ways to do this in real estate is to switch to a pre-order model. Pre-sell or lease every property before you buy it. Have your exit inked and paid for, before you enter.

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Real Estate Business: Do Job Titles Matter?

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on Thursday, 11 February 2021
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If you want to get the best results from your real estate investments and business, can putting a little more thought into your job titles make a big difference?


Investors often overlook many of the great value adding factors that come with building a real business. That includes branding, business credit, and job titles.


Real estate business owners and investors often don’t give any thought to the job postings or job titles they are offering, and that could be a huge and expensive mistake. It can definitely impact competitiveness and operation costs. It is true that there may be some legal limitations regarding executive titles, especially in licensed businesses, though there is a great amount of freedom in this area. It is wise to use it.


Attract Better Talent For Less Money

Job titles are a powerful tool for attracting better talent for less money. It is always the best team that wins. Though if you are marketing just for low level assistants and admin staff, you are going to get a much lower quality worker than if you are hiring for ‘Customer Experience Manager’ or ‘Office Manager’, even though they perform the same work. Some people will work for a lot less money, in order to get a good job title. A title that costs you nothing to hand out.


A Free Way To Give Promotions

If you can’t give team members big pay raises, you can at least move them up in title. It costs you nothing to hand out, but can mean the world to them in feeling valued and creating loyalty and keeping them performing. Of course, if you can give them a small rise or bonus with that, it is even better.


Maximize Team Member Performance

Job titles keep people focused on their real role, mission and KPIs. If you want them to wow your customers rather than just answer the phone, make them Champion of Customer Happiness. If you want them to grow your business, rather than just maintain the status quo, consider Senior Growth Manager instead of sales rep.


The Management Burden & ROI On Hires

The job titles you advertise and hand out can make all of the difference in how you have to manage people, what that costs you in your own time, and how productive they are on their own.


Do you want them to think, be proactive, free up your time and take ownership? Or do you want them to just be assistants filling a seat on the clock until you give them their next task? Which is more profitable to you?

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New Major Lawsuits Could Create Massive Change In Real Estate & Finance Costs (For The Worse)

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on Thursday, 05 November 2020
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A big new lawsuit and investigation could significantly change the costs of buying and financing real estate in the very near future. What’s happening? How is it going to impact you and those you care about?


Redfin & Opendoor

Discount real estate brokerage Redfin is in the hot seat. They are now the target of new fair housing lawsuits claiming they are racially discriminating by limiting their service by minimum home prices. That can be as low as $250,000 in some markets, compared to the national average home price of $350,000. They are being sued in Seattle, and have been asked to stop the service by a city councilperson and mayoral candidate on the east coast in Baltimore.


Opendoor, the big iBuyer and house flipper which has partnered with Redfin and has filed plans to go public with a value of close to $5B, is also the subject of an FTC investigation into its advertising.


While no one should be discriminating, period, and we don’t know the real intentions of these companies, these legal challenges could have the opposite of the declared result and prove counterproductive and harmful for those who need the help the most.


Here’s what it means for others and the real estate industry in general…


Fewer Services & Choices Of Help

It has become clear that through a series of lawsuits like this, that if you have a public website you are a target. Many may need to take their services back to being private, rely on referrals, and other mediums to do business.


These risks and liabilities are also reducing the number of those who will want to try and innovate and change things for the better in this industry, and who will be willing to risk backing them with capital.


Higher Costs

If mortgage lenders and real estate brokers are forced to do away with minimums or must provide their products to every zip code in the nation, then they will have to either end services or dramatically increase the costs of services for everyone.


This would likely end discount real estate services and loans that would help borrowers with less than perfect credit and big incomes. This might seem to be great for the largest companies and Realtors, but will penalize the majority.


More Inequality

Higher costs and less help, means those who need the help most, especially for entering homeownership and investing are going to be sidelined even more, while others can get far better deals from personal connections. It will widen the divide between the uber wealthy and everyone else.


The Bottom Line

The increasing liability of having a public website means the need for real estate investors and business owners to start exploring other alternatives as a plan B and C. Discrimination is bad, but lawsuits like this can be more counterproductive. Be sure you are building your personal network of buyers, sellers and lenders now.

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The Art Of Customer Service For Real Estate Wholesalers

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on Thursday, 22 October 2020
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Customer service may seem like a lost art in the world today. Yet, it will make or break your real estate wholesaling business. Here’s how to master it in a few steps…


Respect Its Importance

Customer service is especially important in real estate. Great service is vital. No matter how big your company is, poor service will eventually bankrupt you. Once you have a bad reputation for it, it can be too late to shake it. In contrast, great service can make your entire business and make it grow fast.


More than just barely scratching through customer satisfaction, you should be shooting for customer happiness. Delighted customers are repeat customers, referral agents and brand ambassadors.


It is also important to get that this isn’t just about serving your buyers and sellers either. It equally applies to your team, vendors, investors and everyone else your business touches.


Make It A Priority

Most companies and business owners know that you should be striving for good customer service, but don’t really do anything about it.


To make it happen, it must be made a priority.


It should also be a decision guide. If you aren’t sure what to do in a given situation, choose the option that will deliver the best customer service experience.


Hire For It

Unless you are naturally a super social person who loves delighting even difficult customers, and will be on the frontlines dealing with them all the time, then you need to hire someone to champion this part of your business. Their number one job role is just to make customers happy and ensure they have good experiences.


Empower It

Where the real problems happen is the gap between talking and doing. Every company says they care about and deliver good service. As you’ve already experienced, very few do.


This void comes between hiring people and giving them the wrong priorities, and simply not empowering them to deliver good service. They aren’t given the ability to do the job.


Hiring well is useless unless you actually empower them to do a great job. That probably includes giving your teams decision making authority and the ability to make customers happy, even if it costs you a few dollars extra.


Reward It

As a real estate business owner you’ll get more of what you reward and less of what you punish. So, if you want your teams to deliver better customer service, make sure you reward them when they do. Come up with penalties for those who sour your customer relationships.


Practice Empathy

When there are problems, great customer service comes from empathy. It’s easy to put down bad customer behavior to bad people or crazy customers. They might be. Or they may just have a different world view, or you didn’t set the expectations well. In any case, it usually pays to practice empathy, and err of on the side of making them happy anyway. Do the math on what’s better for your business long term. You can always blacklist them from doing business with your company in the future if they are the problem. Just make them happy this time.


Build Relationships, Not Transactions

Another major disconnect is when companies just focus on transactions. What if you focused on building long term relationships and providing value instead? How would that change the dynamics of your service?

 

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6 Types Of People Your Real Estate Business Needs On The Team

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on Thursday, 01 October 2020
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Your real estate business needs these six types of people to survive and thrive.


No matter whether you are a small house wholesaling operation, a construction firm, fund, rehabber, or landlord with hundreds of units, these are the separate individual roles you need to have filled if you are going to hit your goals and maintain your gains.


The Visionary Thinker

You need the big picture thinker. The one who sees the vision and casts it for everyone else inside and outside of the organization. They lay down the idea for the business, and spend their time on strategy and the highest level items. Eventually you may need these thinkers and strategists to lead all of your different departments too.


The Builder

This architect or or designer breaks down the visionary’s idea into the parts that are needed to make it happen. Like an acquisitions team, lead generation, vendors to facilitate due diligence, financing and closings, and more. They layout the organizational structure to bring the dream to life.


The Doer

Not everyone can be a thinker or dreamer, or nothing will ever actually get done. You need the workforce that is happy slugging away at the daily tasks required to move the needle and keep things working. They run customer service, admin, handle sales calls, scout for properties and more.


Social Butterfly

The above personalities aren’t always the most social. They are busy thinking, and grinding it out behind the scenes. Regardless of how technically excellent everything else is done, you still need someone who thrives on being social. This is a people business.


The Frugal Bookkeeper

It is essential to have a dedicated, unbiased bookkeeper who just focuses on the numbers. It is their job to make sure the business doesn’t run out of money. They have to be separate to other departments so that they aren’t tempted to say yes to things just to hit the metrics for other departments they are involved in. They keep everyone else in check when it comes to spending.


The Manager

Someone has to manage all of these people. This isn’t a good fitting role for the visionary. It needs to be someone who excels in managing others and the finer details of the operation. This person brings together the doers and thinkers to realize the company goals.


Summary

You simply can’t do all of these jobs yourself. If you try you are sabotaging your own potential and what your business could be achieving. Which roles do you still need to fill to fuel your real estate business?

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NDAs: The Dangers Of Using Them For Real Estate Entrepreneurs

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on Thursday, 06 August 2020
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Should you be using NDA agreements as a real estate investor or business owner?


Are Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) an essential step in business? Or are they a dangerous pitfall which will do your venture more harm than good?


NDAs 101:

A non-disclosure agreement is designed to prevent those you share things about your business with from sharing them with others or stealing your ideas and replicating them.


These are similar to non-compete agreements as well.


Some companies have business partners, new hires, and others sign these agreements before an engagement.


It is a pretty standard legal form you can find online and fill in the blanks.


The Dangers Of Using NDAs

Very rarely are NDAs and non-compete agreements useful to small businesses. Even in the case of a breach, you may have a very hard time proving it, and collecting. That costs a lot of time and money in the courts. Often with little to gain.


This can be different for large corporations. Those with billions of dollars in revenue and giant multi-million dollar legal teams. You can imagine the impact of someone stealing the prototype of the next Apple product and taking it to the competition to replicate in advance of their launch.


An example of this is new banking and card startup Stash. They didn’t even buy their own website domain name until they had raised almost $300M in capital, and five years and five million customers down the road.


The first danger is that they just slow you down. The last thing you probably need is more paperwork and forms and dealing with more attorneys and negotiations at each step in your business. Focus and speed is an asset and advantage. Don’t throw that away.


The second danger is that it can do more harm than good when it comes to trying to raise money and hire great talent for doing more deals and growing your business. The best advisors, freelancers and investors are crazy busy. They have their pick of thousands of people to help. No matter how unique you think your business is, the truth is that they’ve already seen the same thing 100 times, this week alone. There is a huge demand for their help. If you put up barriers like this, they’ll probably just fund or invest their time in helping someone else.


Thirdly, as a younger company or investor, what you need most is awareness and recognition. The more people that talk about your business and concept, the better it is for you. The more secret you try to keep it, the longer and harder it will be to get customers and grow.


You should almost hope people will validate and steal your idea and spread them around. If anything this will only make you do ever better. Besides, most people won’t take action on it. That's where you stand out. Plus, there is nothing really secret today. It’s either publicly online already or easily hackable in less than 2 seconds by anyone who really wants to know.


Cling to your advantages, speed, focus, innovation and taking action. Don’t worry about what others are doing.


We’re here to help you fund your next wholesale deal, and provide the proof of funds letters and verifications of deposit you need to go fast.

 

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