Transcript:
Welcome to the Tax Sale Podcast, where tax sale investing is made easy.
I’m Casey Denman, a tax sale veteran, the author of the tax sale playbook, founder of the tax sale academy, the leading tax sale expert and trainer and your host right here on the tax sale podcast.
Thanks for joining me on today’s podcast. This podcast is provided completely free to help teach you about tax sale investing and is made possible through The Tax Sale Academy. If you’re looking to learn about tax defaulted real estate, in a comprehensive, step by step basis then head to TaxSaleAacdemy.com and click on join. Again, taxsaleacademy.com and click join.
Today, we’re going back to the basics. We’re going to the beginning of your tax sale career. If you’re just starting out, this will be an incredible episode for you. If you’re already a veteran, this will be an incredibly episode for you as well as you reevaluate yourself and your business. Today, we’re talking about how to start. How do you begin your tax sale business? What do you need to do?
And those veterans out there, again all of this applies to you as well as you need to continually reevaluate your business right down to the very basics.
How Do I Start, or some sort of similar question is one that pops up frequently for me. I get in through DMs, through YouTube and Facebook comments, through email, everywhere someone asks me something about this. I’ve got many many YouTube videos, podcast episodes, a book, so many resources, but nonetheless, the startup question is always asked. So I wanted to do an episode on this topic today. I’m going to lay out a five step plan for you to begin. While this can be followed step by step, it’s difficult to make it as comprehensive as it should be in a simple podcast episode. So understand that there are numerous steps within each one of these, but my goal is to be as simplistic as possible so you don’t have any excuses when it comes to starting.
The first step, learn. So this tax sale thing sounds interested to you? You’ve just heard about tax liens and tax deeds. And you know that you can acquire tax foreclosed real estate for potentially pennies on the dollar. That’s fantastic. Unfortunately, however, if this is the extent of your knowledge you will find yourself in a lousy investment and one that has the potential to financially ruin you. There I said it. If this is all you know about this business, you will fail. Yet, so many people whose knowledge is nothing more than this get involved in this business. It’s the equivalent of deciding to become a professional boxer one day and stepping into the ring with Tyson or Mayweather for 12 rounds the following day. It’s foolish at best and suicide at worst.
Before you do anything, anything learn what you’re doing. There are so many aspects to this business – and most of them you don’t even realize exist. What’s the saying? You don’t know what you don’t know? This is not the business where you learn by doing – this is the business where you learn before doing. Take the time to learn. Go use the resources that we offer. Find a local mentor, let us be your mentor whatever you do go take the time to learn. And don’t rush this process. Don’t rush through any training or any learning just because you’re so eager to get started. Be patient here – you’re trying to create the earning of a doctor or lawyer with many years in school, but you want ot have it in a week. Understand that learning about the process, your state, your strategies, your laws, your everything . . . that is the most important aspect to becoming successful in this business.
Number two – Determine your approach. Once you know the process, how everything works and are gaining that required knowledge start determining your approach.
Here are a few things to consider? Should you invest in tax liens or deeds? Liens usually require less work with lower returns, while deed provide higher returns and require more work. How much time do you realistically have? If you have 5 hours every months your approach should be a lot different than the person that have 5 hours every day.
How about the next one, it’s kind of important . . . how will you fund your investments? Yes, you can buy properties extremely cheap – that requires patience and being extremely selective. Maybe you’re using a credit card or some sort of personal loan. Perhaps you’re looking for a partner now.
Now is the time to answer all of these questions and more. There is not a single approach that works the best for everybody – every has different answers to the questions that will help determine your approach. All of this stuff when accounted for properly will help you determine the best approach for YOU.
Next Step – Involvement and Practice. Just being in the action is helpful – whether it’s hanging out at the baseball field as a kid, or being around friends who have specific skills, just by being there you can learn. Tax sale investing is no different. One of the major sugestions I have for investors who have learned or are learning this business is to go to an auction. Find an in person auction hopefully, and just go. You can even register if you want so you gain that experience as well. But go to an auction, pay close attention to everything that’s going on. Watch the bidders, listen to the rules, listen to the chatter, talk to attendees, get involved. This is where you really start tying the computer learning into real world learning.
On that same token, start practicing. Use monopoly money here. Pretend your investing. Research a list, determine comps, really ask yourself would you buy this property? And if so, what would you pay? Then follow up the results at the auction to see if you would’ve been competitive? Then do this same practice is previous auctions from a year or so ago – go back, research them, determine a bid, see what was paid and then research some more to see what that investor ended up doing with the property, if anything. Get involved and practice. Nothing like the real world stuff.
Next one – Prepare For Opportunity. I’ve always spoken out against putting yourself on an artificial timeline to buy real estate. There is just too much out of your control – the auction dates, the properties offered, the competition, and so much more. I just don’t agree with the approach of buying a property within 30 days or 60 days or whatever you set. Instead, here’s my suggestion . . . set your goal of being ready to buy a property in that time period. Tell yourself, “If the right opportunity comes, I will be mentally and financially prepared to take advantage of that opportunity.” Everything up to this point should have you prepared. Should have you ready. It’s just time to really hone in on what you’re doing. It’s time to get focused, time to dig deeper, research more thoroughly, review more lists, do whatever you have to do to gain the undeniable confidence that you must have to be READY to take advantage of opportunity. And this is something that should continue indefinitely. You must constantly be learning, studying, gaining the experience (whether it’s practice or live experience), all while preparing yourself for the right opportunity.
The last step is to take action. And believe it or not, this can be difficult for many. First off, if you get to this step and you don’t’ have the confidence required, if you just aren’t comfortable, then you did something wrong getting here. You either don’t have any practice in place, or most likely you didn’t learn like you should’ve. Others get to this step and nothing meets their objectives – they just don’t feel like the properties they are seeing would work for them. That’s ok – You Have two options: choose to be patience and wait for the right property, because it will likely come at some point. Or you can just start modifying your objectives – change areas, change properties types, go to more auctions, just modify your objectives in small amounts until you do see the success you desire. But whatever you do, take action. While every single step to this point in paramount to your success, this is the only step that will actually create it for you.
So, there you have it five steps to getting started. Learn, learn learn, second one was Determine The Best Approach for You, third step was to Become Involved and Practice, fourth step was to Prepare for The Opportunity, and lastly take action.
Learning to be a successful tax sale investor is something that take time, effort and discipline. I’m confident that if you follow these steps thoroughly, you’ll see that success.
Thanks so much for joining me on today’s episode. Inside The Tax Sale Academy this is a topic that we disucss in depth – we know many of our student are new investors and we’re ready to teach you how to profit from this incredible business. If you’re interested in signing up, you can get started by going to TaxSaleAcademy.com and clicking on Join. Again, that’s TaxSaleAcademy.com and click on join.
That’s it for today, if you enjoyed this podcast episode please take just a few moments out of your day to leave us a positive feedback rating on whatever platform your currently listening on. We read every single comment, notice every single 5 star review and are so thankful for each one of them.
Have a wonderful day. Take care, bye bye.