2008 Business & Investing Goals

Below is an overview of my 2008 Business & Investing goals, along with the current status for each goal and sub-goal. These goals were originally laid out in a May 2008 blog post:

1. Buy My First Piece of Real Estate (Personal Residence)

While more a personal goal than a business goal, the benefits of buying a personal residence as my first piece of real estate will provide me a deal of knowledge about the tactical aspects of real estate acquisition. Proceeding through a first RE deal will help me understand the entire acquisition process — locating properties, negotiation, due diligence, the lending process, and the closing process.

Goal Status: Completed

2. Create a Formal Business and Management Structure

This goal is all about setting up a formal structure that will provide both tax and legal benefits for my investing activities. As I expect that I will be building multiple businesses over the next couple years, ensuring that I get this part right the first time is very important; I plan to work with several accounting and legal professionals to ensure this goal is carried out correctly.

Specifically, this goal will include:

• Define my business structure

Goal Status: Completed

• Register my business structure

Goal Status: Completed

• Create a plan for accounting and management of the business

Goal Status: Completed

• Set up bank account(s), credit card(s), and other services as necessary

Goal Status: Completed

• Understand and plan for tax implications and expense accounting

Goal Status: Completed

3. Complete my Business Plan

I wouldn’t even consider buying my first investment property without completing a full Business Plan for my RE business. This should include my business goals, strategies, tactics, and risks. It should go into detail about investment criteria and how I will potentially work with outside investors and supporting team.

Goal Status: Completed

4. Build a Reliable/Aggressive Team

To be successful, I need to build a strong supporting team. At the very least I need to identify (and retain) the following team members:

• Certified Public Accountant (CPA)

Goal Status: Completed

• Attorney

Goal Status: Incomplete

• Real Estate Agent

Goal Status: Completed

• Property Management Company

Goal Status: Incomplete

• Insurance Agent

Goal Status: Completed

• Title Company

Goal Status: Completed

• Property Inspector

Goal Status: Completed

I will create a set of criteria and questions used to judge the ability of each team member to support the company and make us successful. I will use that criteria and question list to find the most complementary team members.

5. Identify an Investing Location Using Formal Analysis

While I’ve already identified the area where I will be living (Atlanta), it’s not yet clear exactly where I will be investing. It would certainly be convenient to invest in the Atlanta metro area (and if at all possible, I will), but the decision on where to invest should be based on much more than just where I live.

I will do some formal analysis of various location criteria to determine my primary investing location(s). If Atlanta proves to be my preferred investing location, I will do more formal local analysis to provide direction on which specific local areas I should be targeting.

Goal Status: Completed

6. Purchase At Least 10 Units of Investment Property

Once I identify an investing location, it’s time to start buying property. Unfortunately, until I actually start trying to locate and acquire property, I have no baseline to determine how many units I can/should expect to acquire over a given period of time.

Additionally, being new to REI, I don’t want to rush into large investments just for the sake of owning units. Instead, I will acquire properties at whatever pace feels natural, and only when I find properties that meet my criteria.

All that said, I think it’s important that I state a goal for how many units I plan to own by the end of the year. Based on the fact that I don’t yet know if I will be buying single family homes, duplexes, triplexes, 4-plexes, apartment buildings, or apartment complexes, I don’t want to be too specific with this goal. But, I think it’s reasonable to set a goal of 10 units (where a unit could be a single family home, half of a duplex, or single apartment unit, etc) for the remainder of the year.

I will likely revisit this goal as I continue to learn and gain experience.

Goal Status: Partially Complete (3 Properties Purchased)