College Student looking to get started! Any tips?

I am fairly new to real estate, and would very much like to figure out how everything works. I am all about learning and besides my own research would like to hear about your experience and ideas!
What are your best suggestions on how I can gain experience with Real Estate investing while at University?

Invest in some real estate investing training. Become an expert at ONE strategy and work that strategy until you’re successful at doing that one strategy. I’m not sure it makes any difference what strategy you start with, as long as you’re willing to start.

Of course, it makes more sense to focus on a strategy that dovetails with the current market conditions.

When I first started, the market was flatter than a pancake and the investor psychology was lethargic. It was relatively easy to buy and there was less competition. It was a long term play with fairly quick cash-flow for me.

If the market is falling, it’s even easier to find and negotiate deals with motivated sellers, and the competition more or less sifts down to the professionals and sophisticated die-hards. The amateurs disappear into the mist.

If the market is hot, it attracts every “me too” Tom, Dick and Harry with a real estate seminar under their belt, driving prices higher, and making it ever harder to negotiate something sensible, and not dependent on fast appreciation speculation, etc.

So, you need to know your market conditions.

If you want to bypass most of the competition, and speed up your investing, learn how to creatively finance real estate. If you PM me I’ll send you a version of Robert Allen’s “No Down Payment Formulas” that will show several dozen ways to structure financing without coming up with any money, or none of your own money to finance real estate.

My personal favorite way to finance real estate, and one I advocate, and one that I’ve specialized in since about 1992, after buying commercial properties, and later single-family, is taking over the seller’s loans.

Many sellers will let you take over their payments, if they trust that you’ll make the payments. Other sellers will walk without any equity. The right sellers will sell to you without any money up front and give you their deeds. You can finance any property with an existing loan this way.

I would have started with this strategy if it had clicked in my mind that it was very, very close to the old FHA non-qualifying assumption type loan with which I was familiar.

Probably the most valuable element in taking over loans, is that you don’t need credit to do it, and if you learn how to present yourself as honest and trustworthy, you won’t have to cough up a down payment.

Meantime, the better you are a finding deals that aren’t listed, and getting sellers to call you, instead of calling them, the more profitable deals you’re’ likely to make.

Also, learning to drill down to motivated sellers will make your negotiations that much easier.

Bottom line; find your own deals, get prospects to call you, sift to the motivated, develop trust and tailor an offer that will solve the seller’s problem(s).

Hope that helps a little bit.

In fact, even an experienced investor does not always manage to learn all the nuances, especially when it comes to an unfamiliar market. In this case, it is better to be safe and work only with those who are well versed in this market. For example, if you work with local agencies, you can learn and make money at the same time.

do a lot of research, you’ll learn from trial and error as well tbh

As many suggested, you’d need to do property market research. Though there are many advanced tips. I will quote only the most basic yet important ones, First, Know the market price, Growth rate and other details of the area in which property is present. Then, visit the property which you would like to invest on your own, verify the ownership and other documents carefully.

As you have mentioned that you were a college student, I would suggest you invest in real estate through crowdfunding platforms. Because Real estate investments require huge initial capital so to avoid risks you can approach through crowdfunding real estate. In most of the countries, real estate crowdfunding platforms were present. Do check within your area/state.

Just do it. Reiclub is a great resource of information as well as bigger pockets.

Bigger pocket has everything you need. However, I would not advise focusing on real estate while in college. It requires dedication and a lot of work to break through.

As a college Student, it is not a good idea to think about real estates I think.

Why is that so? As far as I can tell, most people just ‘think about real estate’ without actually doing it.

When I was in college, I was doing a LOT of thinking about real estate, and studying how to invest in it, and my parents owned income property, and I was involved in managing it.

I think it’s great to think about real estate, and then start investing asap.

My friend Gary was still in high school, using the proceeds from a delivery route to come up with ‘down payments’ to take over FHA loans, when there were non-qualifying assumptions still available. He found sellers with very little equity, gave them enough to walk, and rented out the houses. Four years later, while a freshman in college, he sold his first house and used the profits to buy a Porsche 911 from the dealership. (This was 1979)

Well, imagine this college student offering to take over the payments on bread and butter houses, from sellers with very little equity, just like taking over FHA loans …and renting out the houses?

Rents right now often exceed the piti even on highly-leveraged houses. Of course, the college student will have to end up doing repairs and management at his own expense, but …he’ll control real estate, and capture appreciation, and do it with very little money up front.

Actual investing doesn’t take that much time as a rule. Finding and negotiating the deals is the time-consuming part.

You can’t really invest in real estate without actually controlling real estate.

*** Never mind that it’s wiser to pull in a partner that can cover hiccups.
*** Half a pie, is better than no pie.
*** Grandma can be a great money partner. And she’ll die soon, and so you end up with ‘everything’ anyway! Yay you! j/k

It will be difficult to truly understand real estate investing as a college student. It takes years to become adept in just one specific RE market. That being said, it would be good for you to start thinking about potential investment strategies and deciding which work best for your financials/time. The RE world has many specific markets and it is up to you to decide which is best for you. As others already said, you need to do property market research and understand the terms that are used. I would recommend reading the book Investing in Real Estate Private Equity by Sean Cook. This is a great book for introductory investors which helps with understanding the fundamentals of RE and some of the terms used. The most important thing you can do now is read as many books and do as much research on real estate investments as possible.

Working with another investor I think is great way to start!
For example we hired a birddog that wants to move up to the actual investing so in addition to her being a birddog for us our owner also trains her on the backend on how investing works too.

I personally have learned so much from doing the marketing end of the investing business as well.

Hello,
I study Finance at The University of Kentucky and I need to prepare for my first debate on real estate topic (Political bias and real estate business investments). What books would you recommend to start with? Do I need to analyze political papers in the first place?

I was in my undergrad when I first got my feet wet in real estate. I started with an internship at a local property management company for some cash and experience. That PM company helped set me up to get my broker license while I was in school. Then I would read and listen to various REI resources for more exposure. It ultimately led to the network I needed to join an REI investor/brokerage team upon graduation, which is also when I bought my first house doing a duplex “house hack”. All in all, there are various avenues to gain REI experience while in college even if you aren’t investing at that point.

Let mě see if I’m following this. You’re going to college full time and plan to be a real estate investor, another Full-Time activity while funding your second full-time activity with yet another job? What could possibly go wrong?

I appreciate and admire young ambitious people but in this, I would recommend making education the priority. The failure rate among inexperienced and/or under Funded Investors is High. In this case, the would-be investor is not only both, he’s distracted with School and a job on the side. Yes, young people have the energy to multitask well. In this case, the amounts of money required for college or for real estate investment are large.

Join Biggerpockets. Read books like Rich Dad or any of the BP books. Great for beginners.

Some tips for you:

  1. Find rental properties in emerging neighborhoods
  2. Diversify your investments
  3. Do your homework before listening to paid advisors
  4. Leverage the experts
  5. Get to know your market
  6. Set a budget and timeline (and expect to go over both)
  7. Treat your investments like a business
  8. If you can’t beat the price, beat the terms
  9. Maintain contact during escrow to secure your deal

I can tell you please don’t use politics in your first debates. This topic is to wide and so much annoying now…

The main tip is making good research before going to do exact stuff

I’d highly suggest to first go and work for one of the already successful companies in your area. Perhaps the best choice would be to find a real estate wholesaling company with at least few people on the team (not a single wholesaler that does everything on his/her own). The reason being is that when you work with a wholesaler with a decent team, the chances are they already have the system in place, in particular - the acquisition guys, deposition guys, transaction coordinators, etc. This is extremely important, especially for the newer real estate investors, to understand an effective structure of any successful real estate investment company. So before you jump into it on your own and make tons of mistakes, better go and work for someone who already successfully does what you want to be doing. Hope it helps.

It will be difficult to truly understand real estate investing as a college student. It takes years to become adept in just one specific RE market. That being said, it would be good for you to start thinking about potential investment strategies and deciding which work best for your financials/time. The RE world has many specific markets and it is up to you to decide which is best for you. As others already said, you need to do property market research and understand the terms that are used. The most important thing you can do now is read as many books and do as much research on real estate investments as possible.

I absolutely agree with you.