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Real Estate Predictions For 2022 With Kathy Fettke – Real Estate Women

REW 99 Kathy Fettke | Real Estate Predictions

 

With the pandemic affecting everyone around the world for the past few years, it also impacted the economy. A lot of people are struggling to get by every day. Kathy Fettke believes that 2022 will be different due to inflation. With a passion for researching and sharing the most important real estate and economics facts, Kathy is a frequent guest expert on such media as CNN, CNBC, and Fox News. In this episode, she emphasizes that people need to be cautious in buying and selling homes. The demand for houses is rapidly increasing, so the supply is insufficient, allowing opportunities to house rents.

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Real Estate Predictions For 2022 With Kathy Fettke – Real Estate Women

Real Estate Investing For Women

Kathy, welcome back to the show. It’s nice to see you.

Thank you. It’s so nice to be back.

Thank you so much for having me on your show.

I learned so much about you that I did not know.

When you hang out with people and you get to know them, you respect them, but you don’t talk necessarily. We don’t talk about ourselves naturally. That was lovely, but thank you. What I wanted to share with my audience is what your perspective is on what to expect in 2022. Does that sound like a fun topic?

Let’s do that. It’s on everybody’s mind.

What are you expecting?

In 2020, I said I was expecting a Black Swan Event. Can you believe that? I did not know exactly what I was predicting there. 2022, we have a few factors in place that people need to be aware of. One is that we have inflation. We are seeing lots of inflation. For investors, the people who own real estate, that can be a pretty big deal. You can build some wealth. It’s not necessarily wealth because it’s inflation, but at least you own assets that are inflating. If you don’t have assets, then what you have is the higher prices. People who own assets in inflation are going to increase your net worth, and those who don’t are going to have to figure out how to get in the game.

A coin with two sides. We got to look at all the sides. What happens in an inflationary environment is the Federal Reserve will then want to slow that down. The Federal Reserve is a central bank. It’s their job to curb inflation. That’s one of the key metrics that they look at. For a long time, the Federal Reserve was saying, “This inflation was transitory.”

Many of us were saying, “We will be checking in with that. It does not look like it’s going to be transitory when you printed so much money. That’s a whole lot of money circulating. That is going to create inflation.” A lot of us were questioning that, but here we are and the Fed is now saying, “It’s probably here for a bit longer,” which means they are going to raise rates to try to slow down the economy to try to curb inflation.

This is a big mouthful. It’s a lot that I’m saying, but bottom line, when the economy is chugging along and it’s going strong, that means people are getting hired and there are jobs, there’s a strong stock market, real estate prices are going up, and people are making money. They are spending money and all that is circulating, and the velocity of money is driving prices up. When you add to it, the fact that we have so many job openings, and that’s usually common in a robust economy, lots of job openings, which means that employers have to pay more to attract good labor, and there does not seem to be the labor out there, that causes inflation.

You add all the money supply that’s out there and this issue with materials and all these issues that we are having, trying to get the materials that we need, and because we can’t get them, the costs are going up. There are so many factors that are driving inflation that it’s forcing the Federal Reserve to raise rates, which historically has slowed things down in the past.

31 is the typical home-buying age. It’s a massive, massive amount of people over the next two, three years that are just coming into home-buying age.

Unfortunately, in the past, it slowed things down to a screeching halt many times. Often, in an environment like this, it would cause a recession. What we are paying attention to is will the Fed get it right? Will they do it nice and slow that the economy can adjust to it, or will it take the air out of that balloon? Moving forward, we need to be careful and cautious in 2022, about what we own, what we buy and what we sell.

It’s not going to be 2021, 2020 or 2019. It’s going to be more like 2018, where interest rates were going up. It was back in 2018 that the Fed did start tightening and started to slow down the economy a little bit. It was chugging along pretty good back then, too. That affected new home builders. They saw a slowdown, but the real estate market, in general, did not slow down, but new homes were having a bit of a more difficult time until 2019, when that reversed.

I don’t know if you remember, President Trump had a big fight with the Federal Reserve and they said, “You better stop raising rates. Stop it. Not on my watch. You are not going to have a recession while I’m president.” It’s basically what he’s saying. The Fed listened and turned it around. I’m not sure how that all happened, but it happened.

COVID came along and then the Federal Reserve did what’s called commodating, which is lowering interest rates and flooding the economy with capital. That worked and it got things going again, and now they got to put the brakes on. The bottom line is things could slow down a little bit, which is a good thing. It’s prices can’t go up at these double-digit rates forever. We do need to pay attention to the Fed and what the Fed does.

With that said, we still have some serious fundamentals in place, which is so many young people, these Millennials, who are reaching home-buying age, and there’s not enough supply for them, many of these young people who are forming families and want to have that backyard and never want to be stuck in an apartment again. In case, there is another COVID situation where you are stuck in your apartment and can’t use the pool or the facilities. People are like, “I want my own yard,” especially when they have got young kids and they are having kids. They are the largest cohort of Millennials is 29 years old.

Thirty-one is the typical home-buying age. It’s a massive amount of people over the next several years that are coming into the home-buying age. The product is not there for them. You are going to have a tightening and a raising of interest rates while there the demand is still there. I don’t see any housing crash, but the intent is to slow down the dramatic increase of prices, which may or may not work because the demand is still there.

We have all these studies. Historically, we know what the markets do. We know how to affect and change the markets. There are specific tools that the government has used for a long time with some success or not, but it’s an unprecedented situation this time. First of all, we had COVID so we had all this money that flooded the market, but also our expectations. Up until COVID, everybody was moving more into the cities, people wanted to be closer together and condos apartments, and then COVID, now people are going back out into the country, not the country, but you know what I mean.

All over. They are going to cities, too. There’s a massive household formation.

It’s because people are getting to choose. I don’t know if this is true all over the country, Kathy, help me to understand, but in the Silicon Valley where I am, we can now work anywhere. You can move to where you can get a larger house. Even if you are paying the same amount, you are getting a larger house that might be in a different city. Are you seeing that people have so much more mobility so they can make choices that are better for them and their families?

We are seeing that, but we are also seeing a massive demand for homes in Silicon Valley. I read an article about the mass exodus out of California. I know real estate agents in the San Francisco Bay Area who cannot keep up with demand, still have multiple offer situations. None of it makes sense. I would say that there are people who are making life decisions that they maybe could not before. That life decision might be, “I might sell this house while I can get multiple offers and go live in Arizona or Boise, Idaho, Texas,” or wherever they are going, and live a very different lifestyle.

You could sell your house in the San Francisco Bay Area and have the mortgage-free if you wanted to, or have a much bigger house for a much lower payment or have maybe better schools. A lot of people are making life choices that they maybe could not make before, but what that does is open up a property for someone who now gets to buy it, even though it seems so much more expensive than it was a few years ago, but maybe not with the interest rates.

My daughter bought a house that was probably $750,000. She paid $1,100,000. That payment is the same as rent in Southern California. She’s outside of LA and half an hour from me. She was able to take on such a huge purchase because the payment is not different than the rent. What was offered out there was hideous.

REW 99 Kathy Fettke | Real Estate Predictions

Retire Rich with Rentals: How to Enjoy Ongoing Cash Flow From Real Estate…So You Don’t Have to Work Forever

She could not find anything she wanted to rent, so she bought it. I’m so proud of her. She had listened when she graduated from college and got a job in Chico. I knew that the home prices were still in the $250,000 to $300,000 range. I was like, “Please, listen to your mama. Don’t buy a car and please go buy a house.” She’s like, “Mom, I’m 24. I’m not buying a house.” I said, “Please talk to a mortgage broker.”

She did. She found out she could own a house in Chico for the same price as renting, again, amazing in California. She did it. Three percent down. She had to put $11,000 down. She had it, she had saved it. She made $100,000 on that. When she sold that house, she was able to buy this $1 million house. It’s amazing to me that it’s the same as rent. All in, she’s at $5,500 a month, and that’s sadly what the rent is, but that’s how it is in the Bay Area too.

I had the weirdest situation. We had a bidding war for a rental that I was renting out where I listed it a little bit low, which is what I always do. I like to be in the middle of the market, not the high range, and provide a good product for a little less. It was the people motivated to stay. We had a bidding war that went over market. It did not go over market. It went right about the market.

Things are crazy to even as a landlord. You are right. There are all sorts of interesting things going on. I feel like it’s hard to understand and predict. That’s causing an awful lot of uncertainty with investors. There is this the right time to do it. What would you say to an investor around us? You told your daughter to buy, so that speaks very highly about getting to the real estate market.

I was worried for her, not that she was paying $1 million for a house that was $750,000. I was worried she was not going to find a place to live, and they have a big dog that’s part pit bull. He acts like he’s a poodle. He’s the sweetest little guy. It’s hard but no one’s going to rent to someone who has a big dog, a little dog, a baby, and another baby soon. The fact of the matter is, I look at my daughter, who’s 29 and she represents what’s happening. It’s anecdotal, I often look at her and she’s always shown me what’s going on when she was trying to get into a soccer team when it was very difficult because she’s the largest group of Millennials, the 29-year-olds, most competition.

She had a hard time getting into college. She did get into college, but she was competing against brilliance everywhere, that largest group of educated people competing for houses. Watch the 29-year-olds because they are facing what we faced or I faced as a Baby Boomer, competition. It’s a massive group of people who are the most educated ever of any group ever. They have more education at their fingertips, more access to information and data. They have the highest college degree rate. Our generation did, but they have more information than our government had when we were young. It’s incredible.

I look at her and honestly, my 29-year-old has no problem paying $5,000 a month for rent. Not even a problem at all. These are dual-income families. She works at home. She’s got a tech job. She’s focused on email marketing. It’s nothing that unique but it’s needed. As more businesses go online and more jobs are needed for that and these kids know how to do it, they grew up with it. She’s doing great. I look at her and say, “How many of her are out there?” There’s a lot. If you look at the fact that there are 5 to 6 million homes that change hands every year, we think that we were looking at real estate that sells.

This group of Millennials is 80 million. It’s a lot of people. You don’t need every single Millennial to be a huge success, but there are a whole lot of them that are, and they are able to afford nowadays’ prices and especially if they are the ones who say, “I’m going to get out of these big, expensive cities and go live wherever I want.”

My daughter could, but I made sure she lived near me because I needed to see those grandbabies. It’s a hard thing for me too. At RealWealth, I’m responsible for the things that I say influence thousands of people. We have 60,000 members and they do rely on me and my research to help them make decisions of what to do next.

We syndicate. We have funds that we buy houses and apartments. I got to get it right. I can’t get it wrong. It’s a lot of pressure. For those of us who have been through something like 2008 or 2001, these times when the economy contracted, it’s scary. It’s like, “Is that going to happen again? Are we going to be buying at the peak and stuck with properties? We can’t rent.” I come back in 2009 when there were foreclosures everywhere, and people were losing their shirts.

I wrote this in my book, Retire Rich with Rentals. My mother was renting. They sold their Bay Area house and my dad died. She did not want to be a homeowner and she was renting. She was renting in Chico, California, where my daughter was going to school. Her landlord was a pastor. He was on a pastor’s salary. I’m imagining in Chico, is not a lot of money. Let’s say it’s $50,000 to $60,000.

I don’t know what a pastor makes in Chico, but I don’t think it’s a lot, but she was renting from a local pastor. This pastor was retired. When he was 30, he decided to start buying a house a year. He bought ten houses in the Chico area with his little pastor’s salary. When 2009 hit, it hit Chico too, and those houses lost value, but you know what did not lose value? Rent, because all the people that lost their houses suddenly became renters. My mom was one of them.

We need to be really careful and cautious in 2022 about what we own, what we buy, what we sell.

She did not lose a house, but she was choosing a simpler life that was renting. Here’s this pastor as an example. I wrote a bit about him in the book to show that example that during the worst housing recession since The Great Depression, that was the worst and we lived through it. This guy was getting a raise. His rents were going up.

He did not even care that the value of his asset had gone down maybe by 50%. He did not care because the cashflow going in his pocket, his retirement money, was going up. That’s all that mattered. I’m looking at this guy going, “He owns ten houses, probably free and clear. He’s retired. He bought him when he was in his 30s and he’s making $2,500 on each. He’s okay.”

I want to highlight this because this is a thing that people worry about when they are looking at buying and investing in investment properties. I had a very similar experience in 2008. I bought a property at the top of the market. That was brilliant. A lot of our properties dropped in value, but you are right. The rents went up. When you buy real estate in the Silicon Valley, in Northern California, you don’t expect cashflow for at least five years.

Sometimes you are going to carry negative because we are in appreciating markets. People don’t have this anymore. It’s expensive, but that’s how I have always invested, so that’s what I do. I buy these properties and I have got negative cashflow when I buy them. Suddenly we have a disaster and all my property values go down, but suddenly all my rents are now cashflowing those properties.

It’s the same thing as what are you looking at and making decisions based on what your long-term goal is. For him and for me, it was a retirement plan. I had confidence that the markets would go back up and my properties would go back up to value, hopefully, surpass. At the very least, my rents were going up.

It’s interesting. That was another disaster time like this pandemic we went through was another disaster time. It’s hard to predict what’s going to happen there. From my perspective, I love what you do, Kathy, because you are getting people into the get rich slow, tried and true path to building wealth in America. It’s like, “This is the thing that you do if you have a long-term vision.” A lot of people are twenty years out like, “I can’t think next week what I’m doing.” How do you think 20 to 30 years out? If you have enough foresight to put a little bit aside and do that, real estate performs.

I don’t invest in high-priced markets for long-term rental like you do, because it took us down. I’m telling you my story that we were about $10,000 negative cashflow during the downturn. That’s not sustainable, especially when the values have gone down too, and you can’t sell it. It’s not for me. What I decided worked better for me is going into markets where the values are lower anyway, so the risk feels lower to me. If I’m going to buy a house in Florida, that’s beautiful and maybe brand new, it is $200,000 to $225,000. That’s a lot different than $500,000 or $1 million.

If it goes down a little bit, it’s not a lot. The rents are $1,500. It’s not impossible for someone to pay versus $5,000 a month. That’s harder. I felt that for me, I never wanted to go through a negative cashflow scenario again. We look for neutral or enough cashflow in markets where it’s still so ridiculously affordable to me.

That’s what we are seeing is in these markets like Florida, Texas, Arizona, Alabama and Ohio, that other people are saying, “That’s cheap.” I could make that my primary, and then I can go on these fancy vacations or go do whatever things. I’m in good schools and so forth, but my mortgage or rent is $1,200.

To me, it felt safer to have more diversification and different markets with cheaper properties, but nice and good quality. I don’t like junk. A lot of people go into these other markets and we did for a while and to certain markets, and I won’t say which ones. We buy old junky properties and they were difficult. They are expensive to maintain. I don’t do that anymore.

I like to buy high quality not older than the 1980s. I tried to get even newer than that, and brand new if I could. I don’t mind buying retail in an area that to me is undervalued, because the locals are like, “Why are you paying retail?” A local real estate investor in Tampa might not want to pay $200,000 for a brand new property. They are going to look for the older one.

For me, that is so cheap. Can you even imagine a $200,000 property? I feel like it does not exist. It does not even exist in Chico anymore. Years ago, maybe Redding. I don’t know, but it’s, to me, there are enough people in the world who would look at this $200,000 property and think that’s a good deal. There’s enough money flooding in from all these different places. That’s what we look for, areas where even if there was a recession to me, I would not be worried about owning a bunch of brand new or very new-ish renovated properties in the $200,000 to $300,000 range. I don’t see how that could go wrong.

REW 99 Kathy Fettke | Real Estate Predictions

Real Estate Predictions: For people who own assets, inflation is basically going to increase your net worth. And those who don’t are going to have to figure out how to get in the game.

 

Let’s say 2008 and 2009 when the markets fall, when you got these lower kinds of pricing, do you see big swings in those prices also as far as the home values, or is it more stable?

I can say this strategy that I did back in 2005, I had Robert Kiyosaki on the RealWealth Show back in 2005. That was one of the best things that ever happened to me. I was a mortgage broker at the time. I should have been able to see it, but I could not and millions of people could not see it. He saw it clear as could be that the loans that were being given out were going to go bad. People lied on those loans, and I knew that. I was in the industry. I saw it every day. He knew when those were going to reset and they were going to reset in 2007 or 2008. He knew exactly when things were going to be a problem.

He was saying, “Sell everything in the high price markets, where there was an abundance of these loans because the only way anyone could afford California at the time was lying on their loan.” He’s like, “Sell everything in California,” because he knew how many bad loans were out and going to reset. He said, “Buy in Texas because they were very strict on their lending laws.” They did not allow that because they had gone through the financial crisis of the ‘80s, the S&L crisis. They had already had their banking system go down. They were like, “We are not doing it 100%.” Back then you could have a no money down loan and get money back.

That was not happening in Texas. He saw the lending environment being stronger there and there are so many jobs going to Texas. It all made sense to me. There were jobs going to Texas, population growth, pretty strict lending laws for the most part, and affordability. I was like, “This makes sense.” We went. I found a real estate agent back then and she seemed to understand what to buy.

Rich and I bought fourteen brand new homes that were retail. We got them slightly under, but we were paying between $120,000 and $150,000 for brand new homes that rented for about 10%, so basically like $1,200 to $1,500 a month and it cashflowed. It was like, “Let’s do that.” I could do as many as I wanted. It was so easy to get loans back then. That made sense to me.

When the market crashed, those homes did not go down in value. They did not go up, but they did not go down, but the rents went up. Here we were in the middle of the greatest recession and I was experiencing the same thing my mom’s pastor had experienced was rising rents. Unfortunately, I had kept a couple of California properties that took us down. You got to be careful of the weak links.

A couple of bad decisions took the whole thing down, but the good decisions were what I did. I bought quality properties. Since then, those properties in Texas have tripled in value. Unfortunately, I sold them before that happened. Someone else benefited tremendously. I was like, “Maybe people are right. Nothing ever happens in Texas,” so we sold them. We were cashflowing. It was not a reason to sell them. It’s so dumb.

Even the very best of us make wrong decisions.

Live and learn. That’s why I’m here to share all the stories that will help you not make those mistakes.

It’s true. I wanted a little bit more of that deeper information because I have seen this. I talked to somebody else, who is investing in Alabama and he was saying that, “You don’t see the appreciation.” Like in Texas, you are seeing the appreciation too. That’s an interesting market, but in Alabama, they don’t see the appreciation. They do see the rents going up. They see a little bit of appreciation. It’s not stable. It’s happening. When the market goes down, it does not have these huge dips that you get, for instance, in Northern California, LA or something like that.

It’s because it’s still so affordable. Part of our game plan is to only buy things that the average person in that area could afford. That left a very large group of people that, if things did turn, they would still be able to afford it. I did not want to go too cheap and go too high-end. It was right there where the average person could afford. That’s pretty easy to figure out.

You can go online. CityData.com is a great place to get data. You can find out what the average income is of the area, and that will tell you what the average home price should be. It should not be more than 2 to 3 times the average salary. That’s certainly not the case in California. In California, if you buy right, you are going to do well. That’s the bottom line. You have to have the stomach for that because you are going to make the most money in California. There’s no question. The first property I bought in California, our first home went up $100,000 every year for ten years. You don’t get that in other places.

It feels safer to diversify in different markets with cheaper properties but in nice, good quality.

It depends on your strategy. I’m thinking about what is cashflow going to look like for me. We don’t do that in California. Cashflow thing does not happen here. You going to figure that whole thing out. The other thing I wanted to ask you, I have never asked anybody this online. I always recommend the easiest real estate to get into is your primary residence, because there’s a lower down payment.

You have to pay rent anyway, why not pay it to yourself? I always say, “Get your primary residence first then you can use the equity from that either to buy something else, or you can start to save for something else, but at least you are not making another landlord rich. You get the benefits of it and for very little down often.” Do you agree with that?

Yes. Kiyosaki says your home is not an asset. That’s one area where I differ from him. For our home, we have a guest house on it. When we Airbnb it, it pays for the entire thing. The money we get from that rental pays our entire mortgage and landscaping. Your primary these days can be an asset. I have got friends who are going to come to stay with us because they rented their house out and Airbnb and I’m like, “You use our guest room.” What is our term? We will use yours. People are using their primary now to make money. I’m close enough to LA that I will rent my kitchen out for cooking shows and stuff, and I’m like, “I love making money. I will do it anyway I can.”

A hundred percent, there is no excuse. I’m going to say this right into the camera. There’s no excuse for not owning real estate because you can buy something with 3% down and maybe even less. If You are a veteran or in the military, you better own real estate. That’s all I can say because the opportunity for you to get low-interest rates on veteran’s loans, you can do it. The FHA loans or conventional loans, you can get a fourplex for 3% down. You can live in one unit and rent out the other three units and probably live there for free and or even cashflow get paid to live there.

You might have to sacrifice a little bit. You might have to live somewhere where you don’t want to live forever. That’s okay because you don’t have to live there forever. That’s the important thing that a lot of people don’t understand, and my daughter, even with this house is a $1 million fixer that she bought. I’m like, “This is not your forever house. This is your inn. That sounds crazy. That was the cheapest house in the neighborhood, but in a nice neighborhood with the best schools. It does not have to be your forever house, even if you are buying it as a primary residence with a primary loan. It’s a loan as your primary home. There’s nothing in that documentation that says you have to live there forever. You can get that 3% down primary residence loan and rent it out in two years.”

We think about the way Americans are. We move every 4 to 5 years anyways. No matter how much you love that first home, you will find something you like better, even if you think it is your dream home. That first home that you get into does not need to be perfect. The mistake that we make is that it has to be the perfect home, or you don’t want to move into it.

Would you do that with a rental? “It has to be the perfect rental or I’m not going to move in.” You would not do that, and you are paying somebody else to own that home. Instead, do that for yourself because it does not need to be perfect. It needs to be good enough that you will enjoy it for the period of time that you choose to live there. You are not marrying this house.

In my opinion, the deciding factor would be, “If I found something better, could I rent this out, and would it cover my payment?” In the case of my daughter, her payment is $5,500 a month. There’s nothing in the area for less than that. That’s what I said, “It may be not perfect for you, but it’s good enough. If you something better, you can rent this out.”

What I found is when you are busy and you are raising children, ten years can go by real fast. When they first came down to be near me. When they found out they were pregnant and needed mom around to help, I said, “You are going to be shocked. You get a two-year rental because you are not going to believe how fast two years go.” Sure enough, the lease is up and there was nothing for them to rent, if you want the security of knowing that no one can kick you out and that your mortgage is going to stay the same.

That’s your key. If the mortgage is going to stay the same. No landlord is going to raise your rent. Nobody’s going to sell the house from underneath you. It’s yours.

You can fix it up and everything you do to it is improving it, increasing value, and I guarantee, I can almost say, even though legally I should not, but I guarantee if you stay there for ten years, it’s going to be worth more. Even if it’s not, you have spent ten years paying down that mortgage and you have paid towards it.

If you live in San Jose, California, you might not be able to do it. I understand that. Maybe you are going to have to move to Milpitas. You are not going to maybe, “Milpitas might be too expensive. Maybe you are going to have to move to Stockton.” “I don’t know.” Whatever it is, if you can’t do it in the Bay Area, I understand that it’s pretty hard to get anything there, but it might be for a period of time, you live somewhere else.

Real Estate Predictions: When the economy is going strong, people are getting hired. There are jobs, a strong stock market, increasing real estate prices, and people making money.

 

There is this whole thing about your primary residence that is not your asset. You made some good points that you did Airbnb, and you rent out your kitchen and all of that stuff. My husband always says, “Does that mean that my stock portfolio is not an asset? Does that mean that whatever this and that my savings account, making 0.02%?” That’s not an asset.

The thing is that all of those things are part of your net worth. It’s also depending on how are you accounting as an asset, just because it’s not making you money that you are writing off against or whatever does not mean that it’s not an asset. The big thing to remember is that instead of making somebody else rich, you are putting money towards your own future. There are a lot of cool things that you can do with that.

It’s your own. It will never be sold from underneath you, all of these things that we talked about. You can rent out a room if you need to. When I first bought my very first place, we could not afford it. We rented out a room so that we could. When we lived in Mountain View, I rented out one room. Airbnb and it paid for the mortgage and so much of our lifestyle because we were right next to Google. We were making a huge amount of money on one room. There are interesting things that you can do.

I have rented out my driveway. I’m near LA and we have a big driveway. That’s rare. They wanted to do a car commercial. I have had people want to rent our backyard for weddings, just for the ceremony, because I did not want drunk people in my yard.

Each market that you are in is going to have different things. Keep your ears and eyes open. She lives in LA and she has access to all these different things. I had lived in Silicon Valley. I have different things that people are asking for, but every place has its own little things. Each community has its things and you can take advantage of those things.

What I would want to leave with your audience is that we are in an inflationary environment. The Fed is going to try to slow that down and it will probably slow it down a little, but they are in a difficult situation where they can’t raise rates high because of the enormous amount of debt that would be impossible for the government to pay. It’s a difficult situation for the Fed to try to slow down this inflation.

What we know for sure in the housing world, in the US housing market, is that there’s not enough new supply for the amount of demand that these Millennials are creating. That’s a huge group of people that are now home-buying age. Add to it that you have got more people buying investment properties, having second homes, Airbnbs, people living longer, staying in their homes, the supply continues to diminish.

At the same time that we have got massive demand and low-interest rates, we don’t have the supply. This is going to be a problem moving forward for a while, and this is why across the US, you are seeing the same problem. Huge demand and not enough supply. If you are looking to protect yourself against this massive inflation, it’s important that you acquire real estate.

I can’t say that enough. You are going to get left behind. It’s only going to get more expensive. If you are waiting for that foreclosure crisis, you might be waiting for a while because there’s simply not enough supply. If somebody can’t make their mortgage, they are going to put it on the market. They are not going to sit around and wait for the bank to take it from them.

They are going to put it on the market and get their equity and sell it, and it will sell quickly. These foreclosures are not looking like that’s going to be an issue any time soon. If you can save your money and find parts of the US where there’s high demand, Austin, Dallas, Tampa and Jacksonville. The Southeast is the fastest-growing part of the US and homes are still cheap there, yet it’s attractive and there’s job growth.

You can still buy properties for $200,000 or less. If you want a fancy property in a class neighborhood, you pay $300,000. What are the chances that you are going to lose money on that? It’s slim. You are going to be all in around $1,200. There’s an incredible opportunity and a $200,000 house, that’s a $40,000 down payment. You do need to save your money, but if you don’t want to wait, then buy your primary because that’s only 3% down.

You have been on the show a few times and you have talked about the RealWealth Network. I want to make sure that I highlight that to my ladies. Kathy knows what she’s talking about because she helps you to buy properties all over the country or her team does. We have met Leah before on the show. She’s our own exclusive coach with RealWealth Network.

Live and learn. Listen to other people’s stories so you can learn from their mistakes.

If you want to find out more about what Kathy is talking about in these different markets, you can go to their website. The URL to remember is BlissfulInvestor.com/RealWealth. That goes directly to a page where you can sign up for a consultation. It’s free with Leah and then will also guide you to the link to go see Kathy’s amazing website, where they have so much education and all of that amazing stuff. Ladies, I want to let you know that Kathy and her team are amazing. You need to connect with them. Go to BlissfulInvestor.com/RealWealth.

Thank you so much for saying that. We have solid relationships with builders and property managers nationwide. We have known them for years and they take care of our people. They become close friends and they don’t want to let us down. I mean that sincerely. There were times in the early days of RealWealth that sometimes, they were not the highest quality, but we have learned through the years.

These relationships are solid and they set aside properties for us. You don’t have to do the bidding wars. You don’t have to fight for this stuff. They don’t raise the prices just because ten people want it, you go on the waitlist. It’s a nice relationship. A lot of them are in business. They don’t have to be. They could be retired, but they want to keep helping our members. We have a tremendous amount of trust and faith in these people.

I have been in those markets for a long time and you have these relationships, you have relationship leverage too. When things go wrong, because it’s a part of a community, they want to make things right. Not that they would not anyways.

These people would, but there are a lot who won’t. If you are one investor who’s got a property manager is taking care of you, but that got 5,000 other properties, you don’t have a strong voice, but with us, they don’t want to let us down. It’s because we have had this long-standing relationship and we have thousands of people that they take care of. They would not want to lose that business.

I loved our conversation, Kathy. Thank you.

Thank you. It’s always fun to talk to you.

Do you want to do our three Rapid-fire questions?

Let’s do it.

Tell us one super tip on getting started investing in real estate.

I know this sounds basic, but talk to a mortgage broker. We have got 3 or 4 on our website that works specifically with investors. That’s important. You don’t want to just go to your local BMA. You need to go to a mortgage broker who specializes in working with investors and find out what you can buy because you might be shocked to see that you can qualify for more than you thought.

That’s important for your audience because they are used to having to qualify for a million-dollar property, and then all of a sudden, they find out, “This is like qualifying for a car.” It’s shocking. I would say talk to a mortgage broker and see what you can do. If you are not in a position to buy it, they will tell you why, and they will give you reasons on what to work towards. That to me is one of the first things, and, of course, educating.

REW 99 Kathy Fettke | Real Estate Predictions

Real Estate Predictions: We know for sure in the housing market that there’s not enough new supply for the amount of demand that these millennials are creating.

 

What is one strategy on being successful in real estate investing?

The more you learn, the better. I interviewed the cutest NFL guy on my show, Devon Kennard. He’s with the Arizona Cardinals. He was darling. When he’s training for football, he’s listening to podcasts. He’s constantly learning. There’s so much free information out there.

What would you say is one daily practice that you do that contributes to your personal success?

Exercise. I have to. I carry a lot of duress from what I do. If I don’t exercise, then it gets in my body. It gets out when I go work out. Especially in nature if I can go paddleboarding, hiking or something like that.

Thank you. This has been amazing. Thanks for all that you offered in this show. That was amazing information.

Thank you so much. It’s always a pleasure.

It’s always nice to hang out.

 

Important Links

 

About Kathy Fettke

With a passion for researching and sharing the most important facts on real estate and economics, Kathy is a frequent guest expert on such media as CNN, CNBC, Fox News, NPR, CBS MarketWatch and the Wall Street Journal. She is the author of the #1 best seller, Retire Rich with Rentals, and is host of The Real Wealth Show – which is a featured podcast on iTunes with listeners in 133 different countries.

Kathy received her BA in Broadcast Communications from San Francisco State University and worked in the newsrooms of CNN, FOX, CTV and ABC-7. She’s past-president of American Women in Radio & Television.

Kathy became a certified personal coach through the Coaches Training Institute in San Rafael, California. In 2001, she took the coaching process to television and produced a cable show called “DREAM” which followed the process of 6 people going after their dreams over 90 days. Kathy noticed a theme on her Dream coaching show: most people didn’t have time for their dreams when they are spending all their time at work to make money to pay the bills.

Her show sponsor was a real estate expert and the segments they produced changed her life. After interviewing dozens of real estate millionaires, Kathy discovered their best strategies for creating passive income streams. She and her husband bought numerous investment properties and since then learned the highs and lows of investing that can only come from hands-on experience.

She is passionate about learning more and sharing that information with the members of RealWealth and the listeners of The Real Wealth Show. Kathy loves the freedom that real estate investing can bring. She is an avid traveler and enjoys hiking, rock climbing, skiing, figure skating and surfing. She lives in Malibu, California with her husband, Rich, and their two daughters.

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To listen to the EXTRA portion of this show go to RealEstateInvestingForWomenExtra.com

To see this program in video:

Search on Roku for Real Estate Investing 4 Women or go to this link: https://blissfulinvestor.com/biroku

On YouTube go to Real Estate Investing for Women

Getting The Benefits Of Real Estate Without Being A Landlord With Matt Argersinger – Real Estate for Women

REW 53 | Real Estate Investment Trust

 

You can invest in real estate without being a landlord through real estate investment trusts (REITs). Today’s guest is Matt Argersinger, who joined the Motley Fool in 2008 as part of its analyst development program. In this episode, Matt discusses with Moneeka Sawyer why investing in real estate is much safer than investing in the stock market and why you don’t need to be a billionaire to start investing in real estate through REITs. It offers you the option of investing with as little as a hundred dollars! If you’re an income-seeking investor, you may want to know that REITs have a high dividend yield because it pays out 90% of the profits to investors in dividends. Excited to learn more? Join in the conversation and find out how you can start investing in REITs today!

Listen to the podcast here

 

Getting The Benefits Of Real Estate Without Being A Landlord With Matt Argersinger – Real Estate for Women

Real Estate Investing For Women

I am excited to welcome to the show, Matt Argersinger. He is the Lead Advisor of Mogul. He joined The Motley Fool in 2008 as part of the company’s Analyst Development Program. He’s worked on numerous full-investing services including Stock Advisor, Rule Breakers, Million-Dollar Portfolio and Supernova. He helped establish The Motley Fool Germany and also appears regularly on The Motley Fool Podcasts including Market Foolery and Motley Fool Money. In addition to stocks, Matt and his wife, Jean, own and manage a few income properties in Washington DC and have an interest in several commercial real estate developments.

He’s excited to use that experience and his full-investing knowledge to help Mogul and Millionacres members find the best real estate opportunities. Matt earned a degree in Economics from Brandeis University. He lives in Washington DC with Jean and his beloved King Charles Spaniel, Daisy, who we’ve heard about before. Other than hunting for investing ideas, Matt enjoys traveling, skiing, mountain climbing and board games that take at least four hours to complete. Welcome to the show, Matt.

Thank you so much for having me, Moneeka. I’m happy to be here.

Ladies, you met Deidre Woollard with The Motley Fool. She was with Mogul. Is that true, Matt?

Yes, she’s with Mogul. She’s the editor at large for Millionacres.

You heard about the amazing thing that happened. It wasn’t amazing for them. It was amazing for me. I got rated in their top ten podcasts to listen to for real estate. I did a happy dance because I’ve had this long relationship with The Motley Fool since 1994 when their very first book came out. You guys started me on my journey in investing. That’s what started the whole path to the building wealth paradigm that my husband and I have followed. You’ve been a big part of my life. For you guys to reach out to me was like God reaching out down his hands saying, “You have won. You are awesome.” That sounds weird. I don’t know how to express it. Anyway, I’m excited to be talking to you, Matt. This is fun. I want to talk about you in a second, but I want to talk about the difference between what Deidre talked about and what you’re going to be talking about.

With Deidre, she spoke about our mobile service, which is a real estate service design for accredited investors. It’s looking for deals in the private market, oftentimes, deals where you need a substantial amount of capital to get started. What I’m excited to announce is that we launched a new service called Real Estate Winners, which is designed for more beginning investors or investors looking to gain a bigger exposure to real estate within their stock portfolio. It’s a service where you can get started quickly for hundreds of dollars or thousands of dollars, no matter how much you want to invest. All you need is a brokerage account and you can get started. It’s our way of reaching out and trying to broaden the number of people who can invest successfully in real estate. Overall, what we’re trying to do with Millionacres is to help people get happier, richer and smarter through real estate investing. Deidre probably said that many times. I’m going to say it a lot too. It’s our guiding light.

Each company has their mission. You want to make sure that everybody is consistent with that mission. Give us a high level of your story of how you got to where you are now working with Real Estate Winners.

I started with The Motley Fool in 2008. I’ve worked mostly on our stock investing services at The Motley Fool. I loved it. I had a great time. I worked closely with David Gardner, one of the Founders of The Motley Fool. Over that same time when I was doing that, my wife and I were investing in real estate. We bought our first property in 2009 in Washington DC. It was a house we lived in but it also had an income property attached to it. I love telling the story because one day we bought the house. We were figuring out how to rent the property, the income apartment. My wife read this article. It was the New York Times at the time and said, “There’s this new company called Air Bed and Breakfast. They’re expanding.” Now we know that as Airbnb.

At that point, there were three Airbnb listings in all of Washington DC. We thought, “This is interesting. Let’s try renting this income property through Airbnb. People like to come to DC for short periods of time. Let’s try it.” That was successful. We listed it on Airbnb. Within a week, we were booked for six months. It was amazing. That was the catalyst for us to invest in more properties and follow that same short-term rental approach. We did that several times. Now we own several income properties in DC.

Eventually, we also were able to invest in some commercial properties. For example, a self-storage facility out in Colorado and a big apartment building that’s being developed in DC. We expanded. As I’m working at The Motley Fool, I’ve got this sidetrack of real estate investing going on with myself and my wife. A few years ago, I sat down with a few colleagues at The Motley Fool and said, “Real estate is this big asset class. It’s three times the size of the stock market.” If you add in single-family homes and commercial real estate, it’s three times the size of the stock market. It’s a huge asset class.

Through crowdfunding or real estate investment trusts, there are so many ways to get involved in real estate investing. Share on X

It’s not as volatile.

That’s right. It has all these great things. I met with some colleagues and said, “Let’s try to do something with real estate investing at The Motley Fool. We’ve been so focused on stocks. We got real estate out here. A lot of investors want to know how to invest in real estate.” That was the genesis of Millionacres. We launched the site a couple of years ago. We’ve been building new product since and trying to get more people to invest in real estate.

Thank you for that. I’m glad you guys did move into that asset class because it is huge. Deidre talked a little bit about when you look at the dynamics of how many women are investing in real estate as opposed to men, the percentages are low. There’s a huge asset class and huge opportunities on many different levels and women aren’t getting in. I’m proud to say that because of my show and several other leaders in the industry that are now women, we’re seeing a lot more women flooding in. I love it but still, we are the minority investors in real estate. I want to see that expand because of the potential.

The great thing is I feel like real estate now is more accessible than it’s ever been. It was that asset class that not just women but any individual investor who had never done real estate looked at it and said, “How do I get involved in real estate investing? Do I have to save for a down payment for years? If I ever wanted to buy a commercial property, I have to be a millionaire. There’s no way.” The beautiful thing about now is that through crowdfunding or Real Estate Investment Trust, there are many ways to get involved in investing in real estate and getting exposure to this asset class. It has a great track record over time. It’s less than half as volatile as the stock market. If you’re tired of the up-and-down swings in the stock market, real estate is certainly a great option.

I want to point something out. I had this conversation with my dad. He loves stocks and they’ve done phenomenally well. David, my husband, loves stocks and we’ve done phenomenally well. Thank you, Motley Fool. I’m not dissing on the stock market but I will say this. Unless you understand it, the volatility can get you. Let me tell you a little bit about what I mean by that. Let’s say you put in $50,000 in the stock market. It goes up to $100,000 in 3 or 4 years. It doubles, then there’s a huge crash. In 2008 and 2001, there have been some big crashes in the stock market because it was so volatile. It goes down. Let’s say it’s at $25,000. You’ve lost 50%. It feels bad because you lost $75,000. Let’s say it doubles again. Now you’re at $50,000 right where you begin, but it says that it’s doubled.

The volatility is what happens with it. The thing is the difference between the stock market volatility and the real estate market are two big ones. The first one is it’s liquid in the stock market. When that thing crashes and you have this emotional response, what do most people do? “Get me out of here. That was scary.” If the real estate market crashes, you can’t sell usually. You can file for foreclosure, which most people won’t do if they can avoid it. You’re forced to stay in for recovery. Here’s the thing. You don’t take a loss or a win until you sell. There’s forced longevity in real estate. The other thing is leverage. Let’s talk about what happened in 2006, 2007 and 2008. The stock market was going gangbusters. This happened in 2001 too just before the bust of the boom. Do I have those dates right?

Yes. Starting in 2001, the dot-com crash had started.

Before that, what happened was the stock market was going up. People were so excited and they were starting to margin their accounts. When you margin an account, what you do is you take the amount that you have and buy double the stock. You’re at 50% leverage. What happens is if you’re at 50% leverage and the market is going up, you’re making double the money. That’s exciting. What happened in the bust was that those accounts were leveraged and then the stocks dropped. The problem is when the stocks drop, all the brokerage firms need to come up with the money so they call your margin. People ended up owing hundreds of thousands of dollars on a stock they never owned fully. They owned 50%.

That’s what the problem was with the stock market. It’s not that you couldn’t hold on to good stocks. It was a lot of people were margined so they got called on that. The other thing was the freak out of, “Even though it was a good company, look at the way the stock market tanked.” Let’s compare that with what happens in real estate. In real estate, we put 20% down and we’re margined to 100%. We’re margined 4 or 5 times. What is that, Matt? Is that 4 or 5 times?

It’s 4 or 5 to 1. Usually, you keep 5% down.

If the value of the home drops, you don’t ever get called on that margin. You keep making payments. You get to hold on to that property. You get to watch it recover if you stay in. When we talk about the volatility of the stock market versus the real estate market, there are a lot of things involved in that. There are a lot of reasons that real estate is a much safer investment. I’m not dissing on the stock. We do a lot of it. We don’t margin on the stock. There are some things that we do to keep ourselves safe. Ladies, I just wanted to give you perspective because it was top of mind. My husband and I were talking about this. When you’re investing in real estate, that’s what happens. If you go with Millionacres and they’re talking about REITs and stuff like that, understand that you’re investing and somebody else who’s making those same decisions. How that works relative to volatility is still relevant.

REW 53 | Real Estate Investment Trust

Real Estate Investment Trust: Real estate is a big asset class; it’s actually three times the size of the stock market.

 

Your points are so spot on. We did a study once that looked at America’s billionaires. It turns out that none of us is a billionaire. Maybe some of your readers are billionaires. If you looked at the billionaire families that have sustained their wealth for decades, almost all of them are in real estate. They were never forced to sell and panic emotionally. They couldn’t offload their properties. They invested in properties. Oftentimes, they’d roll them over, put 1031 and save on taxes so you save on capital gains They kept rolling into real estate and holding on. That’s such a key point. If we talk about REITs for a moment, REITs are like stocks. They are traded in the public market. A lot of people will think, “What’s the difference between a REIT and a stock? It’s probably just as volatile.” They’re not.

If you look at the historical performance of Real Estate Investment Trust and the data that goes back over 50 years. Not only have they outperformed the stock market, but they’ve also done about 50% of the volatility of the average stock. You’re investing in a REIT. Most of the time, you’re getting a nice dividend out of that so you’re getting income. The stock doesn’t move nearly as sharply as your typical stock. It’s a lot easier to hold on. You’re building wealth over time and you’re getting income. I love that part of the stock market because it gives you exposure to dozens or hundreds of real estate properties. If you’re investing in a retail REIT, you’re getting exposure to hundreds of retail properties. If you invest in a multifamily REIT, you’re getting exposure to hundreds if not tens of thousands of apartment units around the country.

There are going to be downdrafts in certain markets or there’s going to be volatility in the overall market. Over time, that should build wealth. The volatility is so much less that you can sustain your investment in that and not get panicked out of it. It’s a great option for any investor. We know on the Millionacres side, a lot of people were thinking about retirement. They look at REITs as a way to generate a nice, steady income in a lower volatility part of the market. That’s one of the benefits of real estate investing.

Let’s define what a REIT is and how it works.

REIT stands for Real Estate Investment Trust. They were formed by Congress in the 1960s as a way for the average individual investor to buy into a pool of real estate. Nowadays, there are hundreds of REITs. They’re all structured so that they don’t pay taxes at the federal level. In order to qualify for that, they have to pay out 90% of their after-tax income in dividends. That’s why your typical REIT has a pretty high dividend yield. That’s because 90% of the profits from its real estate operations pay out to investors in dividends. It’s a great option for an income-seeking investor. Over time, the REIT category has grown. Now, it includes things like data centers, for example. There are data center REITs.

If you ever drive on a highway, you’ll often see a big tower that looks like it has dishes or rays on it. Those are often cellular towers. There are several REITs that only invest in cellular towers, wireless towers. As we roll out 5G and we use more data on our phones, those towers are being used. You can invest in those in Real Estate Investment Trusts. It’s expanding. There are self-storage REITs that only invest in self-storage facilities. There are all kinds of ways to get exposed to real estate. REITs are a very efficient and profitable way to do that.

The historical track record is so great. In fact, Moneeka, we look at this all the time. If you look at the last twenty years since 2000, the average REIT has returned twice the return of the S&P 500. It was remarkable. If you think about that, we had this massive financial crash in 2007, 2008, which a lot of us think was real-estate driven. It was to a certain extent but even through that, REITs have outperformed the stock market and with lower volatility. I’m biased but if you ask me where do I invest most of my money when it comes to the stock market, I tend to do it with REITs.

Give us some real and clear comparisons between investing in a REIT versus other real estate investing opportunities.

If I’m starting out as an investor and I’m thinking about where am I going to invest and I wanted to get exposure to real estate, I could invest in a rental property. That often takes a big down payment. Generally, your mortgage options on a rental property are not going to be as good as they are if you’re buying a primary home. That can be a big burden to take on. The commercial side of real estate is very big. You have to approach it with millions of dollars and it’s very expensive to get into. REITs offer you the option of investing as little as $100 or $1,000. All you need is a brokerage account. Instantly, you buy a basket of REITs and you got exposure to hundreds of real estate properties around the country.

It is probably the cheapest and most efficient way to get exposure. You can also invest in real estate stocks. Let’s think about Zillow, for example. Everyone knows Zillow. They’re publicly traded and you can say to yourself, “I can invest in Zillow. That’s a real estate company that’s publicly traded.” With that, you’re investing in a stock. Hopefully, you understand how Zillow’s business works. You’re going to face some serious volatility by doing that. I buy a REIT instead. A REIT that I’m familiar with is Mid-America Apartment Communities, which they’re the biggest apartment owner in the country. They own most of the apartment buildings in the Southeast and Southwest parts of the United States where a lot of people are moving these days. They’re a good performer over time and consistent. They pay a nice 3% dividend. That to me seems like a great way to play the real estate market rather than the high-flying or other expensive alternatives in the market.

You brought up a good point about one that you were interested in. How do we decide what kind of REITs to get into? With stocks, we all know there are a lot of different resources to get information. How do you do that with REITs?

By investing in REITs, you don’t have to be a hands-on landlord. All you need to do is sit home and collect a dividend check. Share on X

There are a lot of ways. When I am learning about a REIT, I find what I’m interested in. Go to the company’s webpage. We’ll use the example I had, Mid-America Apartment Communities. You can Google Mid-America Apartment Communities Investor Relations. That’ll take you to their website where they have presentations. They’ve got press releases and filings. You can get to know the company a little bit, the history of the company and how many properties they own around the country. One of my favorite things and it’s easy to do is if you look at the long-term track record of the stock. The ticker for Mid-America is MAA. Look at how they performed over time. If you look at MAA, over the last twenty years, they’ve delivered a great return to investors. They’ve had the same leadership in place the entire time.

You can have confidence, “I’m getting a great return from this REIT. I know I have a management team there that’s been in place for over twenty years.” They’ve been through many economic cycles and yet the stock continues to outperform. It’s a good bet that Mid-America is probably going to continue to perform well in the future. My tip is always if you find a REIT that you’re interested in learning more about, go to the website, learn more about the REIT. See how that’s done over time for investors. If you have a REIT that’s been around for at least ten years and it’s performed well, it’s a good bet that REIT is going to continue to perform well for investors. Especially if you see it has raised its dividend over time, that’s another good indicator that it’s a well-managed REIT that’s raising the amount it’s paying to investors over time. You can use it as an opportunity to earn income and grow as the stock grows.

The other thing that happens is with the stock market, we’re hearing about stock all the time. It’s culturally something that people find interesting to talk about. You might say, “I’ve heard about this company called Google and they spun off ABC. I want to check that out or this weird company called Amazon.” You hear about this culturally out there in the world but we don’t hear about REIT. Where can we go to even start? I might be interested in a REIT to do research on, but how do I even find out what I should be looking at especially if there are thousands out there? It can be confusing.

One place to start, it’s a little boring but if you look up the National Association of REITs, Nareit, they have a website. It’s not the greatest website in the world but they have a lot of information about REITs on that website. You can go check it out. There’s a lot of great information. If you want to find out some great investment ideas in the REIT space, go to Millionacres.com. That’s our free website. We have dozens of articles we’re publishing every day, at least a few each day on REITs. We have several writers who focus full-time on finding great REIT ideas and stuff in a marketplace. They’re writing articles every day and putting reports out there.

The URL to go to would be Blissfulinvestor.com/millionacres.

Start there. Nareit is a great service out there. The links you put out for Millionacres, use that as well because I think you’ll find some great timely articles on REITs if you’re looking for ideas.

When you sent me the information, it says, “Real Estate Winners’ advisors identify a select group of real estate investments and REITs that are at the heart of some of the biggest demographic and technological trends shaping society today to generated returns of 15%, 18% and even 21% annually.” Could you talk a little bit about that?

If we think about real estate, it can seem quite boring. It’s rental properties, office buildings, retail, hospitality, hotels. Some interesting parts of the real estate market are seeing tremendous change. We’ve already talked about data centers and cell towers, for example. When we think about data usage and cloud computing, there’s real estate infrastructure behind those big trends that you can invest in. Industrial is an interesting one. When the average person thinks about industrial, they think of a factory, manufacturing plant or something like that.

In real estate, there are also some interesting facets of industrial if you think about warehouse space or logistics centers. Think about how much time people are spending at home and ordering online these days. There’s real estate out there that’s benefiting from that trend. The returns you threw out. We’ve identified companies with our Real Estate Winners service that we think are benefiting from these trends. We do our projections of those returns that we think investors can get with the dividend. Those are some of the returns we’re finding.

Real estate isn’t boring if you’re earning 15%, 18% or over 20%. That’s possible out there. You have to do your due diligence, get to know the company and the management a little bit, see how they’ve done over time, and if there are some tailwinds behind it. One of the reasons I like Mid-America and keep coming back to that name is because if you think about the country at large, there’s this big Sun Belt migration going on. A lot of people are moving to places like Florida, Texas, Arizona, away from the traditional Northeast or Coastal cities. I’m looking for companies that own a lot of real estate in these places where people are moving to. I like to say, “Real estate follows people. It follows capital.”

As people move to these places and income flows to these places, real estate is going to follow. A lot of these places are underserved in terms of how many apartments they have available or other types of properties. There are some big trends out there in real estate. In 2020, we accelerated a lot of them and we’re going to see those play out in 2021 and beyond. What we’re doing in Real Estate Winners is trying to identify those trends and put money behind them.

REW 53 | Real Estate Investment Trust

Real Estate Investment Trust: If you’re investing in REIT, you’re going to get exposure to hundreds of retail properties.

 

We’re going to be talking about that, ladies, more on EXTRA. He’s going to talk a little more in detail about those trends, where they’re going to be looking, and where we should probably look in 2021 to take advantage of the trends that already have some momentum. I’m excited to talk about that in EXTRA. Talk a little bit about the premium subscription service. There are Mogul and Real Estate Winners. You have a few different things. You started by talking about that. I want more information. I want to know all about it.

Under the Millionacres umbrella, we’ve got a service called Mogul. That was the first service we’ve launched. That is what we think about as our go-anywhere real estate service. We’re looking at REITs like we talked about. We’re looking at the stock market, but we’re also looking at private opportunities. There’s this whole world of crowdfunding now. Some of your readers might have heard of Fundrise, CrowdStreet or maybe some of the other big platforms out there. These platforms are coming out with private real estate deals all the time. We wanted to develop a service that would help investors navigate these platforms and figure out what the best deals are among those platforms. With those deals, you often have to be an accredited investor. You have to come to the table with a pretty high income or net worth.

It can be pretty prohibitive. That was one of the reasons why, in addition to Mogul, we launched Real Estate Winners. Real Estate Winners is geared toward the person who’s either new to investing, maybe new to the stock market or new to REITs, or wants more real estate exposure to their portfolio and wants to do it in a very cheap and cost-effective way. That’s the beauty of what we talked about as well. You don’t have to be that weekend landlord that my wife and I spent a lot of time at. With a small amount of money, you could get exposure to some great portfolios of real estate managed by professionals. All you need to do is sit home and collect a dividend check, hopefully. It’s great. That’s what we’re trying to do. Those are our two big services behind Millionacres.

Deidre talked a lot about Mogul and that was more of the crowdfunding piece. With Real Estate Winners, which is what your focus is, that’s more of this beginner investor, which is more for REITs and that sort of thing. Ladies, I want to tell you a little bit more about how to find out more about Millionacres. You know that I’m a huge fan. You can go to BlissfulInvestor.com/millionacres. There is a free gift there waiting for you. It’s the Ten Best Real Estate Investments. Go check it out at that website. Get your free gift and start studying. For me, when I talk about blissful investing, you know that a lot of it has to do with low stress and low-time commitment. That’s what bliss feels like. Everybody can define bliss how they want to. From my perspective, it is a hands-off, high-return thing that I focus on so much. This is another one of those ways to accomplish that. Go to that website and download the report. Matt, are you ready for our three rapid-fire questions?

Always. Let’s do it.

Give us one super tip on getting started investing in real estate.

First and foremost, decide what kind of real estate investor you want to be. Do you want to be someone who’s hands-on, who likes to get their hands dirty, doesn’t mind dealing with tenants face-to-face and getting involved in real property, really challenging? If it has huge rewards, great. If you’re instead on the blissful side, you’re more of a hands-off and you want to identify some nice trends in the real estate market, decide on that. Maybe REITs or other options in the public markets are probably the places to go. That’s the first thing you do. Decide what kind of real estate investor you want to be. After that, you can find the right path to get started.

What is one strategy for being successful in real estate investing?

You touched on it earlier, which is being able to hold on. If we think about the stock market and REITs, we get excited about buying, investing and putting money into work. We get dividend checks. It feels great. What happens when volatility or the inevitable downturn comes? Being able to steel yourself against that and accept the fact that now and then the stock market is going to drop like it did last March 2020. It’s going to drop 20%, 30%. It’s going to drop fast. How you act in those kinds of moments determines how much wealth you’re going to be able to accumulate over time. If you can hold through, even take advantage of some of those downturns, you’re going to come out great. If you’re someone who can’t, panics and sells at those moments, you’re going to do some real disservice to your portfolio and returns. Emotion, I don’t know if it’s a skill or what, but it’s the hardest thing to maintain to be an investor. If you’ve got the right emotion and you can steel against those downturns, you’re going to be very successful.

I often say on this show I love Warren Buffett’s quote, “If you can’t control your emotions, you can’t control your money.” That’s what we talk about with Blissful Investing is learning how to manage your emotions so you can handle those challenging times. Even when the market has dropped and you freaked out, that you don’t live in that place. You’re able to bring yourself back to the bliss equilibrium where you can make rational decisions rather than emotional decisions. What would you say is one daily practice that contributes to your success?

Finding time to go for a walk, get fresh air and do a little exercise. My brain is always so full because I’m always thinking about things, reading about companies or working on a project. I’ve got so many things dancing in my head all the time and the idea of being able to shut it all down for a little while and go for a walk. It’s easier these days with the pandemic because here I am at home with my wife. We have a two-year-old son and being able to go spend a little time with him and clear the head, and then come back to work. A lot of us are stressed out even in non-COVID times. The ability to disconnect for a while, get some fresh air, exercise the brain and the body a little bit and come back to work. If you can do that and fit that in for at least 30 minutes a day, it has made a huge difference to me. It will make a huge difference to your readers as well.

This has been awesome. Thank you for all that you’ve offered in this portion of the show, Matt.

Thanks, Moneeka.

Ladies, we’ve got more coming in EXTRA. We’re going to be talking about the potential growth of investment classes that expanded in 2020 and have continuing potential in 2021. If you are not subscribed to EXTRA but would like to be, go to RealEstateInvestingForWomenExtra.com and you get the first seven days for free. You can take a look and see if you love it. If you don’t, no obligation at all. Thank you for joining us. I look forward to seeing you next time. Until then, remember, goals without action are just dreams. Get out there, take action and create the life your heart deeply desires. I’ll see you next time. Bye.

 

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