S.E.C. Real Estate Observer

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I have finally learned the fallacy of experiencing everything myself. It took a small boy at an airport running his hand across the cyclone fence to bring it to me.

Having run my hand across similar fences and gotten cut on strips of galvanizing, I was urged to tell him this and save him cutting his hand. I did not, because I figured he would have to learn these things himself – like not to stick his tongue on a cold brass knob in freezing weather, or bite into hot apple turnovers or chicken just out of the skillet.

But then I thought – what if each generation had to learn everything from the beginning all over again by themselves? It would be ridiculous. Imagine each generation struggling along without the wheel, penicillin, welfare, rockets, music and arts.

It then occurred to me that there are certain things a person accepts for truth from older generations. These seem to be the things that take a long tine to learn and have a body of knowledge built up around them. In our lifetime it is not feasible to learn much of many fields let alone all in many. Leonardo Di Vince did, but the depth of knowledge in each area of his expertise was not very great.

In real estate – you can spend a lifetime going from sales, to appraising, to finance, to exchanging, to investments, to building and to counseling, to sub-dividing, etc. and never know it all.

Therefore, you need to pick a field that interests you and get to be an expert in it. When you wander into the other areas – consult with experts there. Find out the problem areas in their field and cover for them adequately in two important areas – capital and time.

Capital: Given enough of it and used property you can overcome many otherwise time consuming problems. Plan a generous cushion for each project. All planned costs have a nasty way of rising before the finish…. figure 25% over careful estimates.

Time: You need so much to devote to productive work and family and relaxation and sports, etc. You will need to plan chunks of time for each project and one of the real problems is not allocating enough of your time.

Now, there is no great body of knowledge built up around these two factors and I have found only one formula to pass on:

Intelligence + experience + feasible project + adequate capital + adequate time = SUCCESS.

But if you don’t want your hand cut on the wire fence – listen to this scared warrior for his hide bears testimony that he found out where the wire cuts.

Editor’s Note: Jim Misko is a former member of the Society and instructor for the Reno Education Foundation. He is a published author, outdoorsman, and one of the most creative investment and exchange brokers in the nation. He resides in Anchorage, Alaska and Palm Springs, California. This article was published in the original Real Estate News Observer and is reprinted with the permission of the author.