Christian Osgood argues real estate investors must operate professionally, not as a hobby. Treating properties casually leads to tenants who know you by name, non-payment risk, and borrowing from family. Professional practices like acquiring well-maintained buildings and raising capital through institutional investors attract better tenants and returns.
Chapters
Treat your business like a business. If you're buying real estate, if you do this as a hobby, you end up with tenants who know your name personally. They have all their problems going to you. You have more non-pays. You end up doing stupid things like leasing to friends, borrowing money from family. Don't do any of that. Those are all like the biggest red flags that people have disasters on. You want to play the game. We're here in the office of my 44-unit building. You want to play the game at the highest level. Buy nice buildings in nice places. You want to raise capital, do it like an adult. Go out, create an opportunity, find a debt product, and from that deal, raise capital from people who aren't your friends and family because you don't want to burn bridges, and then buy nice places so you end up with nice tenants. This is not rocket science, but anyone who tries to skirt the system and go like, oh, let's buy crappy houses, make them nice, make them okay, rent to people, do stupid things, you get stupid prizes. Buy nicer properties, make more money.