Being new to real estate investing, I'm reading, re-reading and learning something new everytime.  However, reading can only provide so much knowledge.  It's not until you're actually out there pursueing deals that you REALLY start to learn.  Book smarts and real world smarts are two different things.  For years I've been reading real estate material.  I kept telling myself that I will start taking action once I feel I have enough knowledge to do so.  Book after book, web site after web site, newsletter after newsletter, it seemed that I was learning many new and useful ideas and techniques, but I never felt I had enough knowledge, I needed to learn more.  It wasn't until I made a commitment to myself that I had to start taking action and learn as I go by actively pursueing deals.  I've learned a lot from all of the real estate investing material I've read, but you can only learn so much from a book, web site and/or newsletter.  I've come to the realization that to really learn, you need to take action in the real world.  Reading how to talk with sellers is one way to obtain knowledge, actually talking with sellers is a whole different learning experience all together.  Reading how to put a deal together is one thing.  Actually working on putting a deal together is an entire different learning experience. 

A few weeks back I wrote about taking action, something that all of us need to do sooner or later.  The sooner the better for those of you who haven't made that transition yet, trust me, I've been there.  It wasn't until I started making a few calls and had a few interested sellers contact me through my web site that I began to really learn how real estate investing works.  Having a real conversation is a learning experience you will not get from reading a book, it will only prepare you.  It's something you learn to do as you go.  Each conversation will be different from the last and you will find that there are things you won't have answers to.  This is a great learning experience because it's trial and error, something you will only learn as you go.  No amount of reading will prepare you for actually doing it, once you take that first step and start taking action, you will understand what I'm talking about. 

When you were a young child did you learn to ride a bicycle by reading about how to do it?  What happened when you took action and got on that bike for the first time?  Like most of us, you fell, scrapped your knee, maybe cried for a bit and then got back on that bike and got a little farther until you fell again.  It wasn't until you actually started to ride that bike that you learned how to do it.  Real estate investing is the same process, you will learn as you go and most likely fall a few times as you're doing it.  Not all deals will work out, but the knowledge you will learn from the experience will be priceless, something you won't learn from a book.

Fear holds us back, if we don't learn to control our fear, it will control us.  Knowledge is the best way to overcome fear and the only way you can acquire knowledge is by learning.  My advice is to finish reading this, take action and learn as you go!

See you next week...

Your friend,

Daniel Durham

www.regionrealestateresource.com