INTRODUCTION .

PART I: 75 REAL MISTAKES TO AVOID IN REAL ESTATE.

MISTAKE # 1 Not Getting Started in Real Estate Investing Early Enough.

MISTAKE # 2 Not Paying Attention to the Cycles of Real Estate: Prices, Price Increases, and Price Decreases.

MISTAKE # 3 Not Becoming Active in Your Local Real Estate Investors Association.

MISTAKE # 4 Thinking about Short-Term Results Instead of Long-Term Results When Starting Your Real Estate Investment Business.

MISTAKE # 5 Not Having a Written Plan for Your Investment Business.

MISTAKE # 6 Expecting to Have Equal Partnerships in Your Real Estate Investment Deals.

MISTAKE # 7 Being Frightened to Do Large Deals.

MISTAKE # 8 Being Unclear Whether You Want to Sell or Rent a Property.

MISTAKE # 9 Letting Your Business Get Out of Your Control and Run You.

MISTAKE # 10 Not Budgeting for Your Real Estate Education.

MISTAKE # 11 Failing to Review Your Finances, Progress, and Overall Activity at Least Once a Week.

MISTAKE # 12 Thinking That Real Estat e Is Risky.

MISTAKE # 13 Not Creating an Exit Strategy for Your Real Estate Business.

MISTAKE # 14 Wasting Time on Activities That Don’t Make You Any Money and Simply Aren’t Any Fun.

MISTAKE # 15 Not Having the Right Insurance to Properly Cover Your Investments.

MISTAKE # 16 Being Underinsured on Your Auto Insurance Coverage.

MISTAKE # 17 Not Taking Advantage of Affordable Legal Services.

MISTAKE # 18 Not Developing a Long-Term Plan to Protect Your Real Estate Assets.

MISTAKE # 19 Setting Up an Asset Protection Plan Improperly.

MISTAKE # 20 Missing Out on Special Loan Programs.

MISTAKE # 21 Running Out of Cash and the Bills Keep Coming.

MISTAKE # 22 Not Having the Proper Team in Place.

MISTAKE # 23 Not Establishing Good Relationships with Those in the Investment Business and Service Providers.

MISTAKE # 24 Getting Stuck with a Rehab House That Won’t Sell or a Rental House That Won’t Rent.

MISTAKE # 25 Failing to Include a Contingency Clause When Putting Together a Contract.

MISTAKE # 26 Not Negotiating with the Decision Maker Who Can Really Help You.

MISTAKE # 27 Lamenting That Your Property Isn’t Selling Fast Enough.

MISTAKE # 28 Making the Contract Process More Complicated Than It Has to Be.

MISTAKE # 29 Negotiating a Good Cash Offer on an Attractive Piece of Property, but Leaving Money on the Table.

MISTAKE # 30 Not Verifying Everything with a Third Party.

MISTAKE # 31 Making Only One Offer on a Property Instead of Three.

MISTAKE # 32 Spending Too Much Money on a House That You Bought to Fix Up and Sell.

MISTAKE # 33 Analyzing Properties Too Much and Too Long.

MISTAKE # 34 Overlooking Bad Houses and Bad Neighborhoods.

MISTAKE # 35 Not Making Sure Buyers Are Preapproved for a Mortgage.

MISTAKE # 36 Using Only Short-Term Financing.

MISTAKE # 37 Not Having Multiple Sources of Financing so You Can Transact More Deals.

MISTAKE # 38 Spending Too Much Time Talking to Tenants, Worrying about Repairs, Doing Paperwork, and Making Very Little Money.

MISTAKE # 39 Not Having a Systematic Way to Run Your Rental Business.

MISTAKE # 40 Not Setting Up Minimum Standards in Writing When Selecting Tenants.

MISTAKE # 41 Not Charging Tenants for Damages to Your Property.

MISTAKE # 42 Not Screening Tenants Well Enough.

MISTAKE # 43 Not Doing a Credit and Criminal Background Check on Everyone Who Receives a Key to Your Property.

MISTAKE # 44 Not Having a High Enough Cash Flow from Your Rental Properties.

MISTAKE # 45 Penalizing Bad Tenants but Not Rewarding Good Ones.

MISTAKE # 46 Not Learning about Government Programs for Low-Income Tenants.

MISTAKE # 47 Not Inspecting Properties Regularly.

MISTAKE # 48 Attempting to Perform Your Own Evictions and Collections, and Getting Sued.

MISTAKE # 49 Not Using Licensed, Bonded, and Referred Contractors and Repair People.

MISTAKE # 50 Paying Too Much for Repairs and Not Getting Written Bids.

MISTAKE # 51 Paying for a Repair or Construction Job before It’s 100 Percent Completed.

MISTAKE # 52 Not Having a per-Day Penalty for Contract Work That’s Not Finished When Promised.

MISTAKE # 53 Assuming That the Way You Think and Do Business Is the Way Other People Think and Do Business.

MISTAKE # 54 Selling Your Property Instead of Holding It.

MISTAKE # 55 Relying on What People Tell You, Not on What They Do.

MISTAKE # 56 Letting Fear and Hesitation Keep You from Getting the Deal.

MISTAKE # 57 Not Choosing and Working with Partners Wisely.

MISTAKE # 58 Not Understanding How to Deal with Real Estate Agents as an Investor.

MISTAKE # 59 Not Understanding the Difference between Being a Real Estate Investor and a Real Estate Speculator.

MISTAKE # 60 Not Having Enough Rent Coming in to Cover All of Your Real Expenses.

MISTAKE # 61 Not Setting Up Separate Bank Accounts and Accounting for Each of Your Real Estate Activities.

MISTAKE # 62 Not Knowing Why You Are Really in Real Estate or What You Will Do with the Money You Make.

MISTAKE # 63 Working Only on Making Big Deals When the Little Ones Pay the Bills.

MISTAKE # 64 Thinking and Worrying Too Much, Then Losing the Deal.

MISTAKE # 65 Not Understanding That Real Estate Investing Is a People Business.

MISTAKE # 66 Not Making a Real Commitment to Being a Successful Real Estate Investor.

MISTAKE # 67 Not Having a Mentor or Coach.

MISTAKE # 68 Missing Out on Lots of Deals and Thousands of Dollars Because You Stopped Following a Deal.

MISTAKE # 69 Not Making Additional Income from Deals That You’re Doing Anyway.

MISTAKE # 70 Not Focusing on the Activities That Will Make Money for You Today.

MISTAKE # 71 Letting Your Emotions Rule Your Choice of Rehab Projects Instead of Analyzing the Numbers.

MISTAKE # 72 Overrehabbing a Property.

MISTAKE # 73 Not Finding out the Underlying Reasons Why People Are Selling Their Properties.

MISTAKE # 74 Getting Too Greedy When Flipping to Other Investors.

MISTAKE # 75 Not Being Generous with Your Partners and Coinvestors.

PART II: THREE BONUS MISTAKES.

MISTAKE # 76 Not Knowing to Ask for Owner’s Terms.

MISTAKE # 77 Failing to Aggressively Market Properties You Have for Sale.

MISTAKE # 78 Not Giving People More Than They Expect.

APPENDIX A Almost Every Possible Way to Find Great Deals.

APPENDIX B The Top-10 Real Estate Mistakes We Make Every Day.

APPENDIX C Robert’s Six Basic Rules of Negotiation.

APPENDIX D Lease Optioning as a Money-Making Strategy.

APPENDIX E When Your Investment Business Needs Help: How to Build the Perfect Team.

INDEX.