Take Time to Be a Dad:
Recently I was riding with an experienced 81-year-old investor. He grew up a poor sharecropper in Mississippi. What he’d learned from his meager beginnings was how to work. I mean, really work. He would pick 300 lbs. of cotton a day. He kidded that he was the slowest out of his 12 brothers and sisters.
You know, I always admire guys like him. Nothing was ever handed to him. He worked his tail off to get where he is and wouldn’t have had it any other way.
As you might expect, he did well for himself. He was able to put his heart, sweat, and earnings into a vehicle that allowed him to retire at a good age. That vehicle was paid-for rental properties.
As he drove me around his empire, he told me some of the great things that had happened to him: people he’d met, relationships he’d had, and even medals he’d won while serving in the Air Force. He even confided in me what he called “the great tragedy” of his life, the untimely death of his only son.
After lunch, we headed down I-75, where I noticed a billboard that read “Take time to be a Dad today.” After hearing the teary-eyed account of losing his 24-year-old boy, that billboard hit me between the eyes. You see, I have a 2-year-old and 3-year-old at home.
Investments are vehicles for wealth. Vehicles are meant to take you places. Think of a vehicle in your mind. You may imagine the car that took you on your maiden voyage to… freedom!
Maybe you imagine a convertible taking you to the beach with the warm salty air washing over you. Perhaps it’s an old pickup truck hauling you to the campground for the weekend that comes to mind.
What ever it is, vehicles often take you to a place of freedom. Rental properties, to me, are the investment vehicle that gives you the most freedom -that is financial freedom.
Rental properties pay you 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. Because of that, I don’t have to punch a clock anymore. This gives me what I call true freedom, freedom with my time.
Because of rental properties, I have the freedom to spend my time being a dad today. Every Wednesday, we have family morning where we go to the Chick-Fil-A playground or to the park. If I had a J.O.B., I wouldn’t be free to choose when and where I spend time with my family. Now that I can, what could be freer than that?
I have heard that you will learn to be a landlord one of two ways:
- You will take a few landlord courses before or as soon as you buy your first rental property. You will make a few mistakes but will have a firm foundation to build on.
-Or-
- You will take a course in hard knocks, make huge mistakes, and possibly end up in the hole. You will then swear off anything to do with tenants or rental properties and get rid of the very thing that should be bringing you freedom.
Abraham Lincoln said, “Give me six hours to cut down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening my axe.”
I learned property management from David Tilney. He has one of the best courses available today. It is called Hassle Free Property Management. My football coach used to say, “Do it right, do it light. Do wrong, do it long.” Go sharpen your axe by visiting David’s website at DavidTilney.com so you can do it right.
If you are doing it wrong, there is still time to fix it. If you are passed that, give me a call. I would be glad to help you out.
Joe and Ashley English invest in real estate in Northwest Georgia. For more information or to ask a question, go to www.cashflowwithjoe.com