By Vena Jones-Cox

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.

By Vena Jones-Cox    

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…

By Jim Wood

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…

By Vena Jones-Cox

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…

By Vena Jones-Cox

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…

By Amanda Neely, CFP®, Founder of Counterflow™️

Most real estate investors eventually experience a deal that should have worked. The numbers penciled out, the assumptions were reasonable, and the market supported the strategy. And yet, somewhere along the way, the outcome fell short of expectations. Maybe the partnership became strained, maybe the timing was off,…