So… think about it… do you own a company or a job?  Your first instinct is to say, “well, of course I own a company”.  Sure, that is what you intended when you first got all jazzed up about real estate. But… do you truly own a company or did you simply create yourself another job?

For the majority of real estate investors out there, they have no concept of what it truly means to own and run a company. There are the select few who have figured it out and have a viable business that has excellent systems in place to generate great profits.  The difference between those who truly own a company versus those who have just created another job for themselves is how they run their company.

Let’s take it from the average real estate investors prospective. 

They may have started a business, registered the name, have a checking account, advertise… and all of the things that it takes to have a viable and legal business. (notice I am saying business rather than company).  But, just having the skeleton in place doesn’t mean that you own a company.  You own a business. 

In your business you are the head honcho.  Well… the only honcho.  You are confident in your abilities and go out and find deals, make offers, organize the rehab, market the property, sell the property, collect the profits (the best part), take the profits to the bank to deposit them, answer the phones when someone calls, network with people, stage the homes for sale, hang up bandit signs, write your newspaper and radio ads, go to the courthouse to do the research, balance the checkbook, open the mail, drive neighborhoods looking for deals, plan the strategy and future of the business… did I miss anything? 

Wow!  You are a stud!  You can do it all and still keep the business afloat… not to mention make a bit of profit while you’re at it.  Or… in my opinion… you are stupid!

Why do I say this?  Do you see the paragraph above… the one with all of the tasks (I’m sure I only touched the surface) that you do for your business?  All you have done for yourself is create yourself another job.  You don’t own a company and barely own a business.  You own a job that you are slaving away at, probably putting even more hours into it than you did your “real” job that you left to create a better life for yourself with real estate investing. 

So why are you getting nowhere in your real estate business, but are working extremely hard to get there?  Simply that… you are working too hard.  No wonder you can’t build your business and make progress… you have so much stuff to do and only one you. Working too hard doing the tasks in your business that you can “farm out” to someone else who likes doing those tasks.  Someone who is most likely better at doing those tasks than you are.  I know, as an entrepreneur myself I sometimes think that no one can do tasks for my company better than I can… but I found out that there is always someone out there who can do whatever I do better than me, and are willing to be paid for it. 

Okay, now that I tore into you and told you that your business model is crap and that you only own a job rather than a company… what do you do now?

What you need to do is to build your business into a company.  Let’s first look at what it means to be a company.

The legal definition of “company” is, “an association of a number of individuals for the purpose of carrying out some legitimate business“. 

While the legal definition of “business” is, “the occupation, work, or trade in which a person is engaged“. 

By definition a company is simply more than one person carrying out a business.  MORE THAN ONE PERSON.  This doesn’t mean that you do absolutely everything in your business… even the stuff that you aren’t that good at… simply because you don’t think you are ready to hire people… or don’t think that you have the money to hire someone.

It means that you do what you are best at and what actually makes your company money…  and find people to take over the tasks that don’t actually MAKE the company money and that someone else can easily do.

I’m not saying that you have to hire someone on an hourly wage.  That is a pain sometimes and can be expensive if your company isn’t to a point where it can support it.  But… there are people out there everywhere that are willing to work on commission, part time, piece work pay, etc.  There are other companies who can take care of your medial tasks such as staging homes, doing the landscaping, handling the books, answering your phones, your marketing, and just about every other task you can think of. 

Action Step:

Your first task to complete to kick the new job you have created for yourself and begin running a company is to sit down and figure out what you truly enjoy and are best at in real estate investing.  Are you an excellent negotiator and deal finder?  Focus on that and find people to take care of the rest.  Do you love to sell the properties and network with other investors?  Focus on that and hire people to find deals, negotiate them, and do your tedious office work.

Once you find out exactly what you like to do and are best at… find those people who can do the rest for you.  The key to finding good people is to pay them well and treat them like gold.  Give the guy selling your deals a percentage of the profits rather than an hourly salary.  That means you don’t pay him unless he sells the place for a profit. WIN WIN!  Hire someone to come in for 5 hours a week to tidy up the books and take care of the other paperwork… you can pay them by the hour because it won’t amount to a whole lot… but will take a huge load off of your hands so you can do the things that actually make your company money.

There are a billion ways to free yourself from the job you have created.  Afterall, you didn’t get into real estate investing so you could work 50 hours a week and wear yourself down… did you?  HELL NO YOU DIDN’T!  You got into real estate investing so you could free yourself from that crap and live a nice lifestyle.  The key to doing that is only working on the stuff you are best at and letting others do the rest.

Later on I will write a post on how you can compensate your associates.  Once again, hiring someone doesn’t take money… it just takes good planning.

So…. if you have read this post and realize that you really don’t have a real estate investing company afterall… just another job… ditch that job by building a team of people who can compliment your strengths and enable you to work on the things that generate profits and make you happy.

Good luck… and check back for the rest of my advice on how to set yourself free from your job.

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