Real estate investing and home swapping have become a hot topic on television and in the media these days, but before you get caught up in the investment fervor, you need to provide honest answers to some serious questions.
First, are you willing to start spending much of your life involved in acquiring, repairing, and then transferring the properties you purchase? The real estate sector, much more than passive investments like stocks and bonds, is a practical experience. You have to search for potential properties, sometimes a lot of them, before you find the one you are looking for. After you find a profitable home, you will need to pay for the property. Do you have financing arranged? Then you have to repair it, which will involve doing it yourself if you want to make the maximum amount of profit. Then you have to turn it around, which involves showing the property and dealing with potential buyers.
Next, do you really enjoy the real estate game? That’s important, because instead of just buying Wall Street paper investments, you’ll be embarking on what is essentially a second job when you start buying real estate. If you don’t enjoy it, it will eventually be like working a job you hate, but you won’t be able to just quit and walk away. Once the process has started, you must either complete it or face some potentially disastrous results.
If you are married, are you absolutely sure that your spouse has bought your real estate investment dreams? This is a crucial question, because if you haven’t already, changing homes can be very difficult for a relationship. Make sure your communication channels are strong, because there will be a lot to talk about during the change process, and no matter how well you think you communicate, I can promise there will be disagreements. You can avoid many of those problems by having a serious discussion about the strategy you are about to undertake BEFORE you begin!
If you answered all these difficult but essential questions with an honest yes, you can safely begin the process of becoming a home flipper. You will have ups and downs, but there is also great satisfaction in making a profit from a project that you were personally involved in carrying out. It’s certainly not for everyone, but moving homes can be profitable and really enjoyable, if you approach the process in the right spirit.
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