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Real Estate Investing For Lifestyle Design With Ali Boone – Real Estate Women

 

If 2020 has taught us nothing else, it’s that we’re not guaranteed anything. If you’re not enjoying the journey, then what’s the point? Sometimes, that’s very hard to say in real estate investing. With countless how-to guides out there, so many people either never get into it or have enough of a failure to deter them from coming back. Lifestyle entrepreneur, real estate investor, and author Ali Boone has been involved in real estate investing since 2011. She joins Moneeka Sawyer on today’s show to talk about her new book, NOT Your How-To Guide to Real Estate Investing. Ali talks about the importance of figuring out who you are first and starting with a real estate investing strategy that’s best suited to you for a better chance of achieving financial and time freedom. She also shares her idea of what makes a great investor and the one strategy to succeed in real estate. 

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Real Estate Investing For Lifestyle Design With Ali Boone – Real Estate Women

Real Estate Investing For Women 

I am so excited to welcome back to the show my friend, Ali Boone. It’s so fun to call her my friend because we met through the show. We’ve done so much together since then. I love when she comes back to us. 

I think you’ve had me back on her show more than anyone else. I’m like, “Why don’t we do it again?”  

The conversations are so much fun.  

It gets dangerous because I’m like, “How long can these things be?” I think we get to talking and completely forget the record button is even going. 

If your mindset is not correct, there's not a how-to guide in the world that's going to help you. Share on X

You did that right now. Ladies, let me remind you who Ali is. Formerly an aerospace engineer, Ali Boone is a lifestyle entrepreneur, author and real estate investor, new author, which is what we’re talking about. After leaving her 9:00 to 5:00 to pursue ultimate freedom through entrepreneurship, her company Hipster Investments managed to facilitate over $18 million in real estate transactions in its first five years of business. She has a Master’s degree in both Aerospace Engineering and Spiritual Psychology. Ali also teaches flying and can often be found snowboarding or volunteering in prisons. Her ultimate goal is to one day challenge Tim Ferriss to a lifestyle design duel. I love that last slide. 

I’ve gone a little lazy in that pursuit because I’m like, “I like sitting on my couch now.” I don’t know if that’s ever going to happen, but we’ll see. I figure, keep it in there just in case Tim’s listening. 

It adds a little spice to the bio. It’s not like yours needed more spice. Ali, you released another book. I got highlighted in that, which is totally cool. 

I would call it more than highlighted. You played a big part in this book. I‘m so excited. I was like, “Who can I have?” You were literally the first person I thought of because we’ll talk about the book. I wanted to interview investors because I want to give people a day in the life of. You can read about flipping and wholesaling and all that, but what does it look like? I wanted to find successful investors in their particular strategies and cover a wide variety of strategies. I was like, “What are you doing?” Honestly, your interview came back.  

It was so great because you captured the essence of what I was trying to get at, which is the real-life perspective, not using big fancy words, how–to guides, or like, “Here’s how you flip a property. Here’s how you wholesale.” It’s a very stoic type of thing that everyone reads. Yours was obviously your experience, the actual things you go through, in English. In some of the other interviews, God bless them. I was, “Okay, follow up questions,” one word answers. I was like, “Yeah.” Pretty sure yours is even the first one of everyone’s. It was a good one. Everyone should take a look at it. 

It was fun. When I got the book, it’s so good, Ali. Let’s start by telling why you even wanted to write a book. Ladies, you know that this show is released on YouTube under Real Estate Investing For Women. It’s also on Roku on Real Estate Investing For Women. I think you can look it up under Moneeka Sawyer on Roku too. I know you can on YouTube. If you want to check these shows out on video, that’s a great idea. You can check it out of those two places.  

What made me write the book? I’ve been involved in real estate investing since 2011. There are all the how–to guides. There’s everything we all go through, trying to learn real estate investing. How to be a real estate investor? You hit it in Google. All these things pop up. We all go to the guru seminar. We all do the same thing. Over time, I was investing for myself, but I was also working with a lot of other people. I work with turnkey rental properties. I was working with a lot of new investors. Over the years, I have seen so many people trying to get in this industry. I have seen so many people either never get into it or get into it and have, I won’t say epic failures, that sounds terrifying, enough of a failure to deter them from coming back.  

As I was watching people, I realized so much of this is a mindset game. When I think back to googling how to be a real estate investor, what is the thing that you see? All you see are how–to guides. I have a theory that if your mindset’s not correct, there’s not a how–to guide in the world that’s going to help you. There’s a huge, high percentage rate of failure. It’s entrepreneurship. They say 95% of small businesses fail in their first five years or whatever. I think it’s a similar challenge. It’s not so much the business itself. It’s just that people don’t know what they’re doing. If you think back to when we were all in school, I don’t know what they teach now, but none of us learned real estate investing or business. We didn’t learn how to do our taxes. We’ve had to figure all this stuff out on our own. That’s great but think about when you type that in. All you hear is you need to flip houses, to wholesale, to do this.  

Here are the steps. I was like, “Okay.” That may work for some people, but there’s such a mindset component. Should you be wholesaling or flipping? I don’t know. For me, personally, I assumed I would have to be a flipper to be in real estate. I’d be a terrible flipper. I’d hate it, also. Could you have paid me to think I’d end up in turnkey rental properties? No, but it works. I titled the book NOT Your How–To Guide to Real Estate Investing. It’s like a prerequisite, in my opinion, to the how–to guides. Before you can get into the how–to guides, let’s take a step back and look at which how–to guides might be best for you to try out. What’s the mindset you need getting into this industry?  

The book starts out talking about the real estate investing industry as a whole, what the different characteristics of it are because it is a unique industry. There’s a lot of unique characteristics, which in a lot of ways, are phenomenal. You don’t have to have a college degree. You don’t have to be a high school graduate to be in this industry. You don’t even have to have a good resume. You don’t have to have a good personality. How cool is that? For people who like certain levels of structure, they don’t want to be so independent, or they don’t want to have to do so much creative problem solving, maybe it’s not the industry. That’s where we’re starting.  

Let’s introduce you to the industry. It lets you understand how it works. Let’s go further. What are your strengths? Let’s help you navigate the process of figuring out what strategy might work for you. I feel like if you start in a strategy that’s better suited to you then everyone’s like, “Go, flip properties.” Great for some people, but super misleading for the people that’s not good for. Let’s look at different strategies, so you can get a feel for picking one that is better suited to you. Therefore, you have a better chance of success. What are the steps to get through that? The investor interviews, to further exact reason, to give you a better perspective, would you like the life of a wholesaler or would you like land-lording rental properties? I don’t know. Here’s some information to help you decide. My whole motivation with this was to take that step back and try to give people a better start to help increase their chances of succeeding once they get into all those how–to guides. 

With my coursework too, it’s an exact same process. I think that’s why you and I are so well aligned. Everybody’s watching HGTV and it’s sexy. “This is what can happen to you. You can wholesale, no money down. Look at what can happen. You can make how many dollars.” Sexy, yeah, for some people that work. In the HGTV world, none of what happens there happens in real life. There are people that are successful at flipping. There are people that are successful at wholesaling. There’s a lot of successful opportunities. It’s important to figure out who you are first. As you say, and like I’ve been saying for years, if you start with a strategy that’s best suited to you, your goals, resources, personality, what you love, what you don’t, how much time you’ve got, all of those things, you’re much more likely to stick with it. You’re much more likely to make it through the challenges because every business has its challenges. You’re much more likely to experience great success. 

I’d say it’s not even more likely. That’s the only way it’s going to work. I could choose a strategy that’s not well suited to me, but I’m not going to enjoy my life while I’m doing it. In my opinion, I don’t think there’s any way to be as successful doing that as I could be doing a strategy that is suited to my strengths, interest, whatever. I think strengths and interests go hand in hand. How many of us are good at doing things we hate or terrible doing? We don’t usually love the things we’re terrible at. I love what you say about sticking with it through the challenges. For me, that rings true about entrepreneurship.  

Entrepreneurship is hell on wheels. This whole time that I’ve been doing it, if I weren’t desperate for what it gets me, I would have quit a long time ago because it’s not easy. Real estate investing, in a way, is entrepreneurship. There are going to be challenges. If you’re hating what you’re doing, and you’re not succeeding terribly great with it, what’s going to happen when you get challenged? When are you going to quit? You’re going to be mad at real estate investing and jaded. I care so much about people’s experiences. That crushes me if that happens to somebody because I get where they’re coming from. I‘d probably be traumatized from it too, and never come back. I don’t want someone to give up unnecessarily when there might be a perfectly good strategy there.  

Strengths and interests go hand in hand. We don't usually love the things we're terrible at. Share on X

One thing you and I always talk about is we have different strategies. You landlord your own properties, I use property managers. What I love about us doing different strategies is while they’re different strategies, we’re also doing exactly the same thing, which is working to our strengths and working in what comes naturally to us. Both of us have succeeded with that. I don’t care what strategy someone else does. As long as everyone’s working to their strengths and doing something meant for them, that makes me happy. We don’t know what we don’t know, which is 100% true for real estate investing. How do you know what strategy is for you? Chances are, you’re not. That’s part of the motivation too. I’ll help you figure that out before you lose a ton of money doing something that someone told you to do. 

I want to back up a little bit to the place where we talk about getting better or things went badly, never wanting to get on that horse again. What they say, if you fall off the horse, you have to get back on it and run. When you think what happens in real estate is, if you’ve tried a few things, and they haven’t worked, you’re like, “It’s never going to work.“ That’s exactly why a book like this is relevant. I always say there are a million ways to make $1 million in real estate. If there are a million ways and you’ve tried 3 or 1, what is that? There are a million opportunities. 

The good news is you don’t have to try 999,000. You’ll get it on 3 or 4. Looking at these things, how can you get there faster? If you read this whole book, the idea is to get you closer to figuring that strategy out. It may not get you right there. You and I have talked about how you did things in the past with your strategy is slightly different than how you do it now. We all evolve over time. How can we put it more in 1 to 5 attempts range versus 50 attempts range? Chances are, you’re not going to stick around to have successful number 50. How do we narrow it down to what seems might be the right thing for you? 

That’s very true. We want to make sure that we pick a strategy that’s aligned with us, probably going to be 3 or 4. You can try 3 or 4. Maybe you’ll hit it on the first one. Maybe you’ve combed the others in. For me, I’m a better person with executive properties. Yes, I have wholesale. Yes, I have flipped. Yes, I have done construction. Yes, I’ve done those things. It happened par for the course without me looking for it while I was doing my main business. It keeps it interesting and spicy, but the main business is where I make my money.  

The other thing that I want to say is we’ve had people on this show that built massively successful businesses and then lost everything in 2007, 2008 or because they went through a divorce and their spouse take everything or for whatever reason. There’s a lot of reasons that people see failure. It’s not necessarily because the strategy was bad, but because something happened and they weren’t prepared with how to deal with it. There are so many people that would be in that situation and be like, “I’m out. I’m done.” The people that are on this show are the people that are like, “I am not going to let this defeat me. I know there’s a way for me to have success. I love real estate enough to pursue.” There’s a lot of different reasons for success in this business and there’s a lot of different reasons for failure. The biggest thing to remember is who you are is the most important factor for your success in this business. 

I love what you just said. I don’t think I told you this. I’ve started offering coaching. I’ve done it on the side. I’ve never publicly offered it. I’m doing more coaching, mostly because we’re all still stuck at home. It’s 2020. We can hop on some Zoom. Let’s see if I can help some people on Zoom. I was working with a coaching client. In one of her initial information types of things, she made the statement. She said, “I don’t want to be a good investor. I want to be a great investor.” When I saw that line, I highlighted it. I was like, “What a great line.” I asked her, “What is a great investor to you mean?” I feel like a lot of people would say, “If I’ve made $2 million, put a financial whatever on it.” I told her, “When I read that line, it jumped out at me so much. I was thinking, ‘Why is this in my thoughts? What to me is a great investor?‘”  

 

It’s exactly what you just talked about. I don’t think whether you’re a good or great investor has anything to do with how much you’re making. If you want to be considered a great investor, you pick yourself back up when something happens because something is always going to happen, whether it’s your own oopsie, you don’t know what you’re doing or whatever. As you said, everything’s going along great and all of a sudden, the bottom falls out of the world. 2020 or 2008, things happen and that’s fine. There’s nothing that you personally could have done for. There are some mitigation strategies. Some things aren’t your fault. It’s not about who’s at fault. Even if you made the dumbest mistake on the planet, it’s not your fault. To be that great investor, you pick yourself up and keep going or you adjust. In 2008, what did all the successful people do? They adjusted. They didn’t quit. It sucked 100% at the moment, but they adjusted. Got kicked down, brush the dirt off, how are we going to do this? Same with entrepreneurship, things happen. You have to just course. 2020 and the pandemic happens. We’re all stuck at home.  

I watched Shark Tank all the time, hearing how the entrepreneurs have switched modes because it’s like, “Stuck at home now, what am I going to do?“ I’ve seen so many people adjust course and come out way better off. It’s so cool. When you were talking about that, I was like, “It’s the great investor.” I had this whole conversation with my coaching client. I want to be clear. What I see as a great investor, it’s not about what you buy, what you invest in, what your returns are. Do you keep getting up when you get knocked down? If you do, you are great, in my opinion, because if you keep doing that, there’s no way you’re not going to succeed. 

The other piece about that is there is something incredibly fulfilling about not allowing yourself to be defeated. There’s so much of what we talk about with bliss. How do you feel about yourself? We each define success differently. A lot of times, especially when you’re looking for a blissful life, that success isn’t defined by money. Money helps. It creates a foundation for a lot of blissful things, but it’s not the big end result. The big end result is how do you feel in your life most of the time. When we look at success that way, you can look at real estate in your strategy in a very different way too. I want to tell a little story. I do these journals on starting something new. I’ve started some new projects, some good ones. You can listen to this so you can find out what’s going on. I released this in Thanksgiving of 2020.  

I went on vacation. Four projects came to a head, 2 to 4 days before I left. One, I had been working on for nine years, one for three years, one for six months and one for three months. They all had to-dos. Everything came. I had to do it right then just a few days before vacation. We were laughing, my husband and I. We’re like, “I need to go on vacation more often.” What’s so funny about that is there was all this urgency before I left. On the day that I was leaving, I left on Tuesday morning. My flight was at 8:30. I texted everybody on Monday night. I said, “I’m out. You guys need to manage it. I’m only gone for ten days, so handle it.” What’s awesome is I came back and it was handled. Everything moved to the next step. For me, that is success. I can go on vacation and have a vacation. How are we defining success? How does real estate fit into that? 

That’s a cool segue into one of the chapters of the book, if you remember, the one that’s called The Three True Currencies. I have this theory that there are three currencies that we’re all using at all times in exchange to get something. First one is money. We all know that. The second one and the third one that I feel like people aren’t talking about as much are time and sanity. If you think about it, anytime you want to get something, whether it’s a service, a product or an investment, you are paying for that thing in one or more of those currencies. When you can step back and look at the value of each of those currencies for you, it can change everything.  

My most important currency is sanity. You’re talking about for some people. It’s a monetary success. What’s my definition of success? I can tell you what it’s not. It’s not anything that involves me losing my sanity. If my sanity is not at peak, intact, and I’m happy, to me, nothing else is successful. If I’m not happy, I’m not successful. If I’m successful, I’m happy. Anytime I’m going to get something or do something, I look at that. In some scenarios, we’re talking about putting this book out. Usually, I’m not a fan of sacrificing my time and sanity at all. I’m much more apt to pay someone to let them do it. They’re going to do it better than I do anyway. If it means I get to keep my time and sanity, I do that.  

When I went to put the book out, I wanted to go through the experience because I had never been through it before. I lost all time and sanity. In that case, I did it purposefully. I didn’t do it because I thought I had to be doing it. I use the currencies all the time. If I want to hire a housekeeper, is it more important to keep my time and sanity in that case or do I want to save the money? How much does the housekeeper cost? It’s exactly what you’re talking about. It’s this definition of success. How are you doing things? What you described about going on vacation, you might have been able to do all things with all those projects in ten days. Ultimately, is that what matters? No. That ten–day vacation matters. There’s always going to be a balance. It’s honestly my favorite chapter in the book for exactly what you just described. When people put the stuff in context, it can literally change everything.  

Financial freedom is actually time freedom because you get to do what you want to do. Share on X

I laugh a little when someone has a full–time job and a family with five kids and they say they want to wholesale. I’m like, “When are you going to do that?“ Someone in that case, I would assume that time is your most valuable currency. How is wholesaling, which is the most active strategy on the planet, going to fit into them? Do you, though? You might want to find a more passive strategy unless you hate your family and your job. It’s so simple, but it changes every decision I’ve ever made, like flipping properties. I think that’s one of the examples I use in the book. My sanity would be so far in the toilet, I don’t care how much money I was making. Turnkey rental properties, I’m going to pay more for those than I would if I did a BRRRR. For me, I keep my time and sanity most of the time. 

There is truth. We get to live in that space as best we can. We need to make it a priority, but things happen. Life happens. Our priorities shift for short periods of time. It was interesting. I’ve been trying to refinance my primary residence. Lenders are going crazy because of all the stuff that the feds are going through and putting them through. We don’t know that on the front end unless you’re on the back end. I have a lot of mortgage friends. I know what they’re going through. It takes six months for me to get a primary residence refinanced through.  

They want me to sign while I’m on vacation, or I’m going to lose the lock. The lender has not finished the undersigning. They haven’t finished the documentation. It hasn’t gone to title. They’re not done. They’re going to get done the day before the lock ends. I was sitting here for six months. I told my broker, “No, you’re not going to disturb my vacation.” He says, “I can send somebody to you to sign, where you are.” I was, “Fine, call me. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t, but I am not going to lose my lock.“ He’s like, “There’s nothing I can do about it.” I was like, “We’re going to do something about it. I waited here for six months.” We’re good friends. He knows I dig my heels and not to argue with me. I did call from the airport. I’m like, “Jerry, what’s the deal?” He said, “We’re going to get the lock extended, and I will cover whatever the cost is.” As it turns out, the lender didn’t charge for the extended lock. I didn’t work on vacation. 

We all hate mortgage loans. I don’t know if I could possibly hate the mortgage process more. They’re like, “We need your left arm, your firstborn child. Now that you already gave those to us, can you give those to us again?” I’m like, “I already gave them to you.” They’re like, “We need them again.” “You already have it. It’s on your desk.” It’s bad. 

It’s hard right now too because we’re trying to be conscious and caring for people that are suffering, but the Feds are not giving them a break. It’s a nightmare. The compassion doesn’t go all the way to the top. I can’t believe they can’t be compassionate. If you look at what they’re willing to do, the Feds are not willing to support them. They’re putting demands on them and then not supporting them. It’s a bad situation. 

They’re swamped because rates are so low. I know a lot of the lenders I work with have now had to push back the refis and just say, “We’re doing primary, but now refis are on the back burner.“ It’s a crazy time. 

At the time, I wasn’t able to get any of my non–owners refi. The point is simply that sometimes we have to set our boundaries. This is what I like these to look like. How much is enough? It has to do with how I feel, rather than how much money is in the bank, cashflow I’ve got, all of those things. Let’s say they are important, but they don’t have to happen yesterday. It can happen at the pace that keeps me blissful. 

It’s so important too, to sit back. How many of us or how many people out there want the money? I don’t know anyone who wants the money because when we want the money, we want the thing or something that the money gets us. I was talking to someone. I don’t know how I’d never heard this before, but it’s so amazing. He’s like, “The funny thing about financial freedom, which is what everyone wants, is if you think about it, it’s actually time freedom.“ I was like, “Oh my god.” Here I am, preaching these things for years. I’m like, “How come I never thought of that?” It is because you get to do what you want to do. It’s like you’re retired. You get to do what you want to do when you want to do it. That’s what financial freedom gets you. People think it’s about the dollars. It’s not.  

I use the example in the book. I’ve said it so many times. I remember being thirteen years old. I woke up one day, and I was like, “I want to be a gazillionaire.” It wasn’t for pretentious reasons. It was more of a personal challenge. I was like, “I’m going to figure it out. That’d be so great.“ The biggest year being the first year of entrepreneurship, I was more broke than I’d ever been in my whole life. I told people. I was like, “I’ve never been more broke in my life, but I’ve also never been happier.” It’s like, “How is that possible?” It turns out being a gazillionaire isn’t what is most important to me because I assumed being a gazillionaire would get me certain things.  

There are certain things that absolutely do get me. I would rather make less money, be happier, live the lifestyle I want to, have time freedom and all that kind of stuff. If I have that, it’s taking the focus off the numbers. I think we’ve all gotten distracted into thinking it’s about the numbers. When you think about what the number gets you, it can also change your course. It’s the three currencies, money, time, sanity. Chances are, it’s not all about the money. It might be in some cases like, “I definitely want to save the money. In this case, I’m going to sacrifice little time and sanity.” 

When you’re poor, it’s about the money. I will say this. There is a point to which money does buy you happiness. There is a baseline. I don’t want to tiptoe around that. If you’re poor, it is about the money because the money feeds you. The money allows you and your children to sleep. It allows you to get clothes so you can go to work. There is a baseline. 

Even if it’s not a baseline, think of a parent. If they need to financially contribute to their family, to put food on the table, roof over their head, parents, in general, are going to sacrifice time and sanity. You’re right. It’s not a closeted, blanketed statement of everyone should focus on what’s most important because you may not have that option. That does go into the individual analysis of given your situation, which currency needs to be the most important? If you have the luxury of choosing which one you want to be more important, great. As an entrepreneur, and I say entrepreneur applies to investing too, there have been times where I’ve needed to sacrifice my time and sanity because I either didn’t have the money or I needed to get the money. I like that clarification to say that it’s not just about which one we want, it’s one we either need or what’s most applicable to that situation. I think that’s phenomenal clarification. 

That’s so true in every part of our life, not just in our business, not in entrepreneurship, but in every area of our life. We launched and we’re already out of time. We do have an EXTRA. In the book, there are all of these amazing insights from Ali. There are several interviews with actual investors, myself included. It’s a great book. Ali has said that she is going to give all of you a copy for free. How can they get that? 

My company is Hipster Investments. If you go to HipsterInvestments.com/bliss, you can get a free digital copy of the book there. If you’re like me and you have to have a paper book, something in your hands, there’s a link on there too, the Amazon link for the book where you can get it if you just want to gift it out to friends or family. I’d love for you to check out the free digital copy. I’d love to hear feedback. The only thing I ask is, as a brand new author, every review I can possibly get counts. If you check out the book and you like it or you don’t like it, I would love an Amazon review from you. Have fun with it. Enjoy it. I hope it helps you in some way. You get to check out Moneeka. Hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. It’s so good. I love that interview. 

It’s HipsterInvestments.com/bliss. You can get that there. In EXTRA, we’re going to be talking about, at the very end of the chapter or the book, she lists six steps to get started. We’re going to do a little breakdown of that in EXTRA. Before we do that, are you ready for three rapid-fire questions? Ali, tell us one super tip on getting started investing in real estate. 

Read NOT Your How-To Guide to Real Estate Investing: Life Lessons for Hacking Your Mind Before You Hack Your Wallet. What a great opportunity to self–promote. Plenty of experienced investors have read it and I want to help them also, but I focused it on people getting started. That’s my non-self–serving part. I hope and think that it can help you. 

What is one strategy on being successful in real estate? This is more for people that are in it. They’re already doing the thing. 

If you’re already in it, you already know this. We said it earlier. You got to keep picking yourself back up. I’m one of the first ones to admit being guilty in this department. It’s probably quarterly, I have to have a mentor pick me back up. I’m like, “I’m out. I’m done.” Even when we got on the call earlier, I was like, “I hate this industry.” It’s natural. No matter how tempting it is to quit, pack your bags and do something easier, just stick with it. That’s how you’re going to be successful, for sure. That is mostly advice to myself. 

That’s interesting because Ali is very successful. We all have this, all of us. I have the same thing. Good advice. What is one daily practice that you would say, Ali, that contributes to your personal success? 

This is going to sound so lazy. It’s taking time off. Some people have known me to say this. Sometimes I wake up and I have my coffee. I’m like, “I don’t want to start working yet. I’m going to watch an episode of my soap opera.“ A lot of people in a corporate job may not have that luxury or care about soap operas like I do. It’s the idea of we’re in a society now, where it’s like go, go, go. You got to do, do, do. Never take some time. Sometimes you need a day off with a Netflix binge. To me, it’s one of the most important things because I can hit it hard for so long. I’ve always allowed myself and not felt guilty for it.  

You got to take some downtime. If that’s just an episode of one of your favorite shows or it’s like go play with the dog or spend some extra time with your kids, it sounds counterintuitive. It’s like what they say about going to the gym. You have to give your body a break. That’s one of the messages that have gotten lost in our society. Don’t feel guilty about it. That’s the big thing. People do it all the time, but they’re like, “I feel so guilty.” Don’t. You have to take care of yourself. It’s on the daily. Whatever that looks like, do something that brings you some level of bliss. I usually say joy, but we’re talking to you, so bliss. Do something blissful, even if it’s the smallest thing if they can make the biggest difference. 

They’ve done clinical studies on this, that brains without rest don’t perform at the same level. If you’re a very high performer, you’re still going to perform better than a lot of people, but you’re not performing at your best. You perform better and you’re happier. You do need rest. Our bodies need rest. Our minds need rest. That’s why I’m when on vacation, I’m on vacation. That’s the way it goes. 

Be the promoter of take a vacation. Watch a soap opera. Don’t work. 

I do have a chapter in Choose Bliss called Plays the Way. It’s about play, relax and engage the parts of you that feel good so you can take that into the rest of your life. 

It goes back to that theory of it’s probably not about the money, even when you think it’s about the money. It’s about happiness, I would assume whatever brings you that happiness. If you’re missing out on all the happiness along the way to get the money, aren’t you missing the boat a little? 

Why not go to the end result? 

Do you know that short story about the fisherman? I don’t know if he was in Central America or something, but a guy who went out every day fishing in a third-world country. Fisher’s family got the fish and this big, high-end, ritzy dude from the States went down there and met this fisherman. He proposed all these different things about how to be more successful. The fisherman was like, “Why would I do that?” He’s like, “So then you can retire.” He’s like, “What would I do when I retire?” He’s like, “Whatever you want to do. Fish?” Here’s this guy trying to convince him to go through all of this hell to get back exactly where he was. It’s such a nicer-sounding philosophy story type of thing. I can’t even say it back.  

It’s so true. If we’re not living that now, why do we think we’re going to get there later? We’re not. Live it now. If 2020 has taught us nothing else, we’ve probably been learning this for decades at this point, but especially in 2020, we’re not guaranteed anything. If you’re not enjoying right now, how long do you think you have exactly? That sounded a little dark. We’re not guaranteed tomorrow. It sounds cliche, but we’re not. 2020 prove that to us. If you’re not enjoying the journey, what’s the point? Sometimes, that’s very hard to say in real estate investing.  

There’s a reason you’re doing it.  

 

It’s like that year I said, I’ve never been more broke, but I’ve never been happier. I’d also never been more stressed than I was that year, but it was a different stress because it was blanketed on top of something that brought me a lot of joy. I was still making my schedule. I was working as late as I wanted to and sleeping. It was on top of the joy. If you’re missing that joy component, or that bliss component, it might be worth looking at how you’re doing things and maybe readjusting a little. 

That was a good short, rapid-fire answer. 

We are super short to the point we can barely fill the time. Who do you think you’re talking to? If you don’t stop me, you know I’ll keep talking. 

We do get to keep talking in EXTRA. We’re going to be doing these six steps to get started in the least risky way. That’s going to be fun. 

That’s to get started in anything. You don’t have to be real estate investing. These six steps can get you anything you want. 

We’re looking forward to that. Ali, thank you for all that you’ve offered in this portion of the show. I know the ladies are going to want to get the book because you’re so much fun and so down to earth. That was great. Thank you. In EXTRA, we’re going to be talking about the six steps to get started in the least risky, terrifying way. If you’re not subscribed to EXTRA but would like to be, go to RealEstateInvestingForWomenExtra.com. You get seven days for free. You can download a ton of episodes. Get a lot of good content, and then decide if it’s for you or not. For those of you that are leaving Ali and I right now, thank you so much for joining us. I am looking forward to seeing you next time in either case. 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 soon. 

 

Important links

• Hipster Investments 
• YouTube – Moneeka Sawyer 
• Roku  
• NOT Your How-To Guide to Real Estate Investing 
• HipsterInvestments.com/bliss 
• Choose Bliss 
• RealEstateInvestingForWomenExtra.com 

 

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How To Pick The Strategy That Is Right For You! Journal #7 Real Estate for Women

 

How are you going to choose the real estate strategy that is best for you? Our strategies can change over time as our needs change. That’s what’s going on for Moneeka Sawyer right now, which is why she’s trying something new. In this journal entry, she shares how and why she picked the strategy she is focusing on. How about you? Have you chosen your strategy, and did it work for you? Per your request, Moneeka is doing a “starting something new” video journal. This is entry #7 where you can learn real-time what goes through her mind when she’s starting a new project – how she makes decisions, how she deals with her fears, what factors she considers. Perhaps this will give you some ideas on how you can approach starting something new. Please email Moneeka with your thoughts, feedback, and insights. If you would like a replay of the webinar I mention in this episode, just go to https://blissfulinvestor.com/borwebinarreplay.

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Listen to the podcast here

 

How To Pick The Strategy That Is Right For You! Journal #7 Real Estate for Women

Real Estate Investing For Women

We’re doing another journal entry. I’d like to talk a little bit about how to pick the exact right strategy for you. This is such an interesting topic. We talk about this a lot whenever I teach a course or we did this in the summit that happened earlier in 2020. I have gone on a completely what might look like a tangent. One of the questions that I got from one of you was, “Everything that we’ve heard, you focus on executive properties. You like to have very few doors.” That’s been my strategy. It keeps me blissful. “Why all of a sudden, have you decided to move to the BOR method with Roger?”

I want to talk about why I’m doing it and hopefully, that’ll give you an insight into how I chose to pursue this strategy. Here’s the truth. Every single week, I talk to another amazing expert on my show and I can’t help but get shiny object syndrome. There are many opportunities and cool things that we can do. One of my highest values is to learn more and to do new things and to have it venture. I’m tempted by all the different opportunities that come across my desk when I’m talking to people on my show. I can’t pursue all of them so I have to pick. You have to pick which ones you’re going to pursue.

I’m sure you go through the same things like, “This is another amazing idea,” but there’s only so much money that you have. There’s only so much time. How do you know if that strategy is for you? I have jumped both feet in with Roger. Let me tell you exactly how and why I chose to do that. When I look at a strategy, first of all, I look at, “Does it make sense financially? Am I excited about it?” In this particular case, I know you ladies have heard that I’m in an appreciation market. I have a ton of equity in the homes here in California, and now I’m looking to change to a cashflow strategy. Cashflow is not something that I’m good at. It’s not something that I focused on.

I made quite a lot of cashflow, but it’s happened because I’ve owned properties for a very long time. So much of my success has been because I’ve given myself the time to be right. A lot of the cashflow has come because I’ve owned these properties for a long time. The rents have gone significantly higher than what I pay in my mortgages and my expenses. I made cashflow, but I don’t make the kind of cashflow I could make if I better utilize the equity in these homes. This is a learning curve for me. I’m taking a look at what kind of strategy can I do to retire David? I’m looking at retiring in 2 or 3 years. For me, retirement is being able to retire David, so we can travel more, replace his income.

There are many opportunities and cool things that we can do. You have to pick which ones you're going to pursue. Share on X

I feel like I’m already retired. I’m already doing exactly what I want with my time. I’m cool with it. To be able to free up my husband and release us from the need of his income so that when we feel like taking vacation, we can. When we feel like taking a day off, we can. When we feel like there’s a different priority, like my parents or his parents, we can make that a priority. That’s what I’m talking about is trying to replace my husband’s income. If we’re going to do that, what am I going to do? On this show, we’ve had a lot of people talk about how to buy property. Here’s one thing that’s also interesting. Because we’re in COVID, lending practices have changed dramatically. I’m not able to get loans at all. Even before COVID, I was having trouble because I already have five loans in California. The way the laws work, when you have more than five loans, things become very expensive.

Those loans, I don’t qualify for it. It’s a roundabout way of saying that getting loans is not an option for me now. That will hopefully change and I’m okay with it. I was looking for ways to invest that did not require regular traditional lending. I’ve looked at some things, there are courses that you can take on private money. You’ve read that on my show. There are courses that we can take on no money down. You’ve read that on my show. There are a lot of different things that we can do. I’ve taken some courses. They’re all good. One of the things that I found is that I take the course and it’s good, but I’m not inspired enough to take action. This is a Moneeka problem.

I’m not inspired enough to take action. One of the things that I know for sure is that if I’m not inspired to take action, there’s something in that strategy that goes against my core values. One of my core values is freedom. I feel like I’ve spent the last many years paying my dues. I’ve done a lot of learning. I’ve done a lot of calling. I’ve done a lot of putting together systems. I’ve done a lot of stuff. I’m not particularly excited about taking on a full-time job again to create a new system, to make another strategy work for me. This is a Moneeka problem and not all of you, ladies, are in that same place, but I’m trying to show you that I’m recognizing my faults and the places where I fall down.

I need to find a strategy that allows for that. I am not one to fight myself because the more I fight myself, there’s another part of me that digs in my heels and says, “I don’t want to do that.” I’m spoiled. I needed to find a strategy that aligned with my lifestyle that I like and my core values. When I talked to Roger initially about the Buyer’s Club, there were a couple of things that he said that allowed me to consider this as a possibility. First of all, it required very little money. I had some money put aside that I could invest. I couldn’t buy anything here in California. I needed to get loans if I was going to do that, but I did have this cash that I could use.

 

One of the things that was amazing was that the full price of the house, I could buy several of them with the money that I had put aside. We’re taking a look at sort of the specifics of the strategy. That was good. The other thing that I loved is that basically, I could buy the property for very little money and then I would carry a note. We sell it as a seller carryback. I carry the note of the loan for the person that buys it. They’re purchasing it with a seller financing deal contract. The nice thing about notes is that they’re very low risk. I have this property, I carry a note, that’s a very low risk. It makes me less vulnerable, which I love.

The other thing is I don’t like having to manage my properties. Up until now, I’ve always had executive properties because I don’t like having to manage the properties. I like the tenant to manage the property. If someone is buying the house and I carry the note, now I’m the bank. They are responsible to manage the property and fix it up and do all of those things. Here’s an example of what I mean. If you buy a home and you get a loan, somebody carries the loan. Let’s say one of the banks, Bank of America carries the loan. If something goes wrong in the house, like a light bulb goes out or you need a new kitchen appliance or the tub gets all blocked up or the toilet starts to overflow, you don’t call Bank of America and say, “Come out here and fix this. This is a problem in the house.”

Bank of America is going to say, “Why are you calling me?” They are carrying the note. They’re just the lender. In this particular strategy, that’s exactly what’s happening. I become the lender and not responsible for all of those things in that house. That’s also amazing. It’s low maintenance. It’s aligned with the way that I like to own properties and make cashflow. I don’t have to manage the property. I love that. It’s very low risk and it’s a high return on investment between 33% and 52% or something like that, depending on the property and how you structure the deal. That’s all stuff that Roger will teach. Anybody who’s doing this with me, don’t worry about all of that languaging. Those are the things that I love.

The key here is that it’s a cashflow property. I can take the equity from a home, invest it and then I get a huge amount of cashflow relative to what I’ve invested. I can do that. I can scale it so I can make the income that I need to make to replace my husband’s income as a software programmer. There are many amazing things. There are a lot of good reasons to do it, but those reasons are reasons. That’s all intellectual. The reason that will more than anything else keep me moving forward in a strategy and keep me motivated and help me when times get rough, because no matter what business you’re doing, no matter how good it looks, there are going to be things that go wrong, challenges, rough spots and bad days.

No matter what business you're doing, no matter how good it looks, there are going to be challenges, rough spots, and bad days. Share on X

The thing that helps me to move forward on that, first of all, is I have a lot of confidence because I use my bliss strategies regularly. I’m well practice of those and you should get there too so that when challenges happen, I have strategies that will help me to keep myself low stress and calm so that I’m resourceful and I can find ways to fix problems in a way that doesn’t make me crazy or make me lose sleep at night. That’s one of the things. The other thing is to know how this fit into my core values. I’ve said this many times before and I want you to see how this works in my own life. Your core values are going to be the things that determine whether something is aligned with you or not, whether you’re going to feel pulled or whether you’re going to feel aligned.

When something goes wrong, are you going to want to dig your feet in because you’re stressed out or are you going to be pulled forward because it’s a beautiful alignment with who you are and what you want? The best way to do that is to look at your core value. Let’s do that. Some of my top three core values are learning, adventure and trying new things, and giving back. How does this strategy fit into that? First of all, it’s new. There’s a lot of learning that needs to happen. I love that. It’s not complicated, but there is learning and there is expansion. This is the very first time I’m looking at investing out of state. I’ve looked at it a couple of different times with turnkey and stuff like that. I probably will pursue that when I have more cash.

For me, the turnkey thing is not viable because I can’t get loans and that’s what I would need to do. For now, that’s not an option for me, but what I can do is this. I’m going to learn about investing out of state. I’m going to learn about a cashflow strategy, which I’ve never focused on before. There’s a lot of learning for me that I’m excited about, and it’s not going to take a huge amount of time. That’s the other thing is I like to learn. I like to have adventure, but I don’t want it to consume my life and stress me out. It’s not so much that it’s going to consume my life, stress me out, make me feel stupid, but there’s enough that it engages my mind, my heart and my excitement. That’s the other thing about adventure. I like to try new things. This is something new for me.

The other thing is giving back. Everything that I’ve invested in, with one exception, is in a redevelopment area. I like to invest in areas where I’m uplifting the community, where I’m creating something fabulous for a neighborhood that needs that new energy. Most of my homes are executive homes. I put somebody in there, uplift a neighborhood, buy a place, fix it up, put in people that are going to love the home as if it’s their own. I uplift the community. In this particular case, I’m creating housing for people that are on the opposite side of the spectrum. In one place, I’m doing executives and on the other side, this is people that are in trade jobs.

 

They’re in the trades. They’re doing a lot of the manual labor. They’re in construction. They’re doing things with their hands. How is it possible that I can use one strategy with executives and that this works? Here’s the thing. This plugs into my desire to uplift communities and to give back and to help people. I’m buying a place that has been auctioned off. It’s boarded up. It’s often an eyesore in the neighborhood and that’s true with my executive properties. That’s the kind of properties I often buy there too. I don’t usually buy them from auctions. I buy them as REOs from banks. Here, I’m buying it from an auction house. When I purchase that place and I sell it to somebody, they’re going to go in and fix it up because they purchase it.

I sell it as is. They purchase it. I carry the note. Now, they’re responsible to fix it up. They take down the boards, fix it up, make it livable for them and their family. That then uplifts the neighborhood. Here’s the other piece. Roger told me in one of our conversations, and I think he said it in our webinar. He said he once sold one of these places to a husband and wife of an adorable little family in Florida. When they went over to sign the contract and turn over the keys, the woman started crying. She had a tiny little baby in her hands and she was pregnant with the next child. She was standing in the driveway and she started to cry and Roger was like, “What’s wrong? What happened?”

She says, “These are tears of joy.” When her first baby was born, there were many medical problems, they didn’t have the right coverage, and they were buried in medical bills. After that, they’re paying off their medical bills. She couldn’t even fathom ever being able to own a home for her beautiful little family. Now, here she is, signing a contract and getting keys to her very own home. Roger has 5 or 6 of these stories that he can rattle off the top of his head. I’m sure there are more. His thing was, “I want to be a part of more of those stories,” and I’m with him. I want to be a part of those stories. I want to give back to communities and I want to uplift people’s lives.

This is an opportunity to create housing for people that normally wouldn’t be able to get housing. It’s amazing to me. After taking a look at all the different opportunities that are out there for me and narrowing it down to a few, and then looking at this one with Roger, I was able to dive all in, into this strategy because it aligns with who I am, what I need in my business, whether the numbers work. What do I need? What are my goals? What are my resources? What’s my emotional desire around this and what are my core values? What’s my big why? This particular strategy aligns with all of those things. Of course, I’m all in. No matter what level of frustration there is, no matter how much I have to learn, this feels like a full body, “Yes.”

That may not be true for you. You’ve read a lot of our strategies on my show and out there in the world. This strategy may not be good for you, but when you’re looking at a strategy for yourself, when you’re looking for a way to invest in real estate, take these things into consideration. What is your goal? What do you need? What’s your big why? What’s your emotional desire? What are your resources, time, and money, and ability to get loans in my case, your relationships? What are your core values and how does this line up? That’s why I needed the choices that I’ve made about choosing this new strategy to create the cashflow that I’m looking for in my life. How are you going to do it in the future when you’re looking at a strategy for yourself? Think about that.

I hope this was helpful. I hope this gave you an idea of what’s going on for me and how you can utilize that in your own life. If you happen to be interested in joining me in the Buyer’s Club with Roger so that you can do this same thing, you can listen to our webinar that we have a replay of. To do that, go to BlissfulInvestor.com/borwebinarreplay. Whenever you have any questions, please email me and then either Roger or I will respond. The other thing is I do teach a lot of this stuff about how to determine what strategy is best for you. I’m talking about core values, resources, your big why, all of those things. I do teach that stuff because it’s such a big piece of what my coaching has always been, whether it was with executives or with coaches or with you, ladies.

Real estate investors in my coaching for the last many years, I’ve always used that as a very first jumping off place for people. It’s the foundation. If you’re interested in that, email me and I can send you some links to some coursework you can take a look or you can go to BlissfulInvestor.com, go to courses or events is also another place to look. You can take a look at the coursework that’s available and see if that might be interesting to you. No pressure. You can go with what I’ve talked about. I pretty much summed it up. I hope that was super helpful, ladies. Please let me know if you have any questions. Always remember, goals without action are dreams. Get out there, take action and create the life your heart deeply desires. I’ll see you soon.

 

Important Links

• BlissfulInvestor.com/borwebinarreplay

 

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