How do you get good at tennis? Basketball? Cooking? Sewing? Or, anything for that matter?
Is it by reading?
Yes, reading helps.
But, if you read extensively about tennis yet never picked up a racket and never hit a ball, how good would you be? Do you think you could beat someone who’s been playing tennis regularly for say one year?
Probably not. You’d probably get creamed.
Here’s one to think about … can you get good at tennis by having someone practice for you?
Let’s say Roger Federer had a big tournament coming up. But, he was way too busy to practice; to train. So, he comes up with a great idea, “I’ll hire someone to train for me!”
Would this strategy work? Would Roger be ready for the tournament?
I can hear what you’re thinking, “Ridiculous! Where is this conversation going? This is common sense stuff, why even bring it up? Come on, get to the point!”
Misconception
Ok, sorry for the rambling, but I feel this dialog is necessary to convey a very strong misconception about property investment.
It’s a misconception that travels across many investment areas. And, it kills people financially. I’ve falling prey to this misconception and I’d like to spare folks from entering the same snare; the same trap; the same pitfall.
Here’s the misconception as I see it.
For some reason, many people think they can be successful property investors without participating. They think they can hire it out.
They turn over the whole process to someone or some agency and say, “Make me rich!”
But, this approach won’t work. It won’t work for the same reason Roger Federer cannot hire out his training program and expect to win. He must do it; he must train; he must put in the work.
Just like tennis, property investment is a participation sport!
The Reason!
In my opinion, participation is critical to a successful property investor. And, there’s one big reason for it. One overriding reason. One reason that – to my mind – trumps all excuses.
If you hire out the process, how much do you learn? How much do you know? How are your property investment skills improved? How strong do you become as a competent property investor?
I can almost hear the whispers as you say, “Wait a minute, if I hire the right people and they do their job, I become wealthy. I don’t need to know or understand how they did it?”
And, here’s where it all goes wrong …
What if you didn’t hire the right people?
What if you lose your “shirt?”
Now, you’re in double trouble.
First, you lose your money. Put in perspective, that’s not such a bad thing. Most successful people have probably been involved in losing deals. They respond by going out and making the money back.
They make the money back because they know what they’re doing. They’ve trained. They went out and got the experience first hand. They learn from their mistakes and usually come back stronger than before.
And, this leads to the second and most dangerous trouble issue. The main and overriding reason for gaining first hand experience.
The second trouble spot for the “untrained” investor is this, “How do you make the losses back when you didn’t gain any experience along the way? You don’t know how to play. You didn’t train. You didn’t gain any experience. You’re at square one.
This is where some people head for the lawyers. “I’ll sue the dirty rascals!” But, the only people who make money in this exercise are the lawyers.
Yes, property investment is very much like tennis. You must participate to truly succeed in both sports!
All this talk about tennis is getting me excited about improving my game. Now if I could just find my tennis racket. I left it here somewhere …