5 Creative Ways to Improve Any Home’s Curb Appeal
By Tarek El Moussa
When Christina and I talk to students at our Success Path Education seminars, and whenever we meet new investors who are interested in achieving financial freedom through house flipping, I always emphasize that this is a lifestyle business. You can decide how much or little you work, whether you want to flip multiple houses at once, whether you want to make money from home with real estate wholesaling, or anything else.
How you set up your business depends completely on the lifestyle you want and how much time and energy you’re willing to put in. You don’t have to let house flipping take over your whole life and every minute of every day. You don’t have to work 12 hours a day to “make it” in this business. If you take a few important steps, you can set yourself up to have a better real estate investing business that does more for you without taking up all of your time.
Resist the Urge to DIY Everything
When you’ve worked in the 9-to-5 world your whole life, it can feel like everything is a balance of time and money—if you have a lot of one, you’re not going to have much of the other. When you don’t have a ton of money lying around, it can be tempting to do everything yourself to save cash. At the same time, when you let your work take over your life, you can suddenly find yourself with plenty of money but no time to enjoy it.
One of the things that I’ve learned over the years is that you don’t have to DIY everything and that sometimes it pays in the long run to spend some cash. Yes, we could probably “save” a lot by doing more of our rehab work ourselves, but it would take us a lot more time than it takes the pros. And that would eat into time we could spend finding new deals or being with our kids.
Find Ways to Work Smarter, Not Harder
Whether it’s using the calendar on your phone or an app to help you take measurements for building materials, or hiring a personal assistant to help organize your workflow, find ways to work smarter instead of harder. Take a few minutes each week to do some research on ways that people in the real estate investing business balance their lifestyles with their workloads, and find out what tools and techniques they use.
There’s nothing wrong with stealing a great idea or two when it comes to your approach to flipping houses to keep your new business from completely taking over your life.
Pace Yourself and Your Business
Whether it’s taking a break to go for a mid-morning run, spending time with your kids, or just stopping to get a cup of coffee at your favorite coffee shop, learn to pace yourself throughout the day and throughout the week. Christina and I like to split our work up so that neither of us has too much to do. Sometimes she’ll take a break and take our kids to the beach while I follow up on some leads. Sometimes I’ll go on a daddy-daughter date with Taylor while Christina works on design plans for a house flip.
Remember that you’re not working now so that you can enjoy your dream lifestyle later. Your goal should be to work smart and create the time and money you need to have that lifestyle now and in the future. Take these steps and get on your way to a better real estate investing business and more leisure time!
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