Get networking - try Meetup

You have to build a strong cash buyers list before you ever buy your first property.  My coach at the three-day workshop told me to attend real estate auctions.  That's about the only advice she gave on how to connect with people.

So I said to myself... What about Meetups?  We used them for our marathon running groups and charity fundraising all the time.  So why not join Meetup groups for wholesale real estate investing?  I was SHOCKED to find about a dozen groups in the Denver area.  There was a happy hour coming up and an all-day workshop, with OUTSTANDING speakers, for a whopping $10.  So I signed up for the groups that fit my schedule and, yes, I am going to the $10 seminar this weekend.  Not bad for my Week 1 To Do List.

Here is a list of some of the groups I found in the Denver area.  Take a look at Meetup groups in your area to see if that gives you some networking options.

Denver Real Estate Investor's Happy Hour Monthly Meetup

Real Estate Investor Success Summit Fall 2014 $10

John Fisher's Breakfast Club for the Real Estate Investor:  Feed yourself and your mind with our real estate investor community!

Did you start this way?

About two weeks ago, a friend of mine invited me to join her at some kind of event at a hotel where you learn about real estate.  It was a free dinner and Bath and Body Works gift card, so I went!

It turned out to be focused on women, empowering women, and featured a woman who is fairly famous around the U.S. and even internationally for helping women.  So, there was some instant credibility to the event.  Not to mention, they were inviting us to get into wholesale real estate investing.  We saw the value right away.  I am nearing my retirement years and all the 401k contributions and matching in the world will not help even so much as to keep my home if it is not paid off by the time I retire, let alone my hobbies and giving and medical expenses and fitness and family...  So we signed up -- and paid $2000 -- for a three day workshop the following weekend.

The workshop was awesome.  To be honest.  It was awesome.  Totally lit my fire.  Blew my mind with the options.  For example, mobile home parks.  I had no idea mobile home parks were such a big deal.

And financing.  I have watched real estate DVDs before, seen the late-night infomercials on TV.  I've always wanted to try it.  But I never understood that you could get started without using your own credit or your own money.  Signing up for the course gave us access to their transactional funding source.  You use their money (with some do-able caveats).  Now THAT was cool.

The workshop wanted people to sign up for more training, coaching, and mentoring, where they hold your hand through it all.  Pricetag:  $20,000 - $70,000.  Just not possible for me, right now.

By not being able to go forward with more training and support, they actually did us a favor.  If we had signed up for the workshops, we would have started to believe that we could not do this without this support organization.  We would have WAITED until we had gone to the big weekend in Las Vegas and just messed around talking about it and reading.

So, instead of WAITING, we DIVED RIGHT IN.  We formed our own group of mentors and we will each bring something to the table.  My friend and I made friends with another couple of ladies.  We teamed up and said, Let's help each other DO THIS.

We set some goals about first steps and by when we wanted to conduct our first transaction.  (You get a refund from the workshop if you complete a transaction with 100 days, again, with a few caveats).   We know you have to very quickly get out of the preparation and learning phase and put the petal to the medal.  So, this is Week 1 and a LOT is happening.

I've set up this blog to give us a place to share links and lists.  Obviously, we have a behind-the-scenes discussion going on.  But my Word doc is getting mighty unwieldy so, hey, everybody wins.  I'll put what I can on this blog.

Hope this helps you all build YOUR own wholesaling business.