How do you start a real estate club in your area? You have all seen the infomercials where everyone is making big bucks in real estate investing. There is usually a free session where they talk a little about investing then they go into hard sell mode and try to get you to sign up for their 3-day “boot camp” or “training session” to learn all the secrets. The training only costs a lot of money so only the audience plants get up at first and head back to pay for their training session with their plastic or checkbook in hand. Then the herd mentality sets in and others get up to follow the leaders to pay for a course they will never implement. When you see how many people that show up for the free session, you realize that there is a real interest in making money in real estate. Get together with people from your area and set up your own investment group. Here is what you need to do at your first meeting:
The first objective is to determine exactly why you are at the meeting. Are you there to learn more? Are you there to teach others not to make the same mistakes as you did when first starting out in real estate investing? Perhaps you are there to find business partners to buy a larger sized property than you could buy as an individual. Each person in attendance may have a different reason for being there but the bottom line is the interest in making money in real estate.
The second objective for your group is to decide on a name for your group and it always helps if it can be shortened into an easy to remember acronym. Start by taking down all suggested names for the group. Take the five most popular and have the group pick the one they like the most. Now that you have a name for the group, there are other things to consider.
The third objective is to choose officers for the first year of operations. For any additional years the group is active, the officers would then need to be elected by votes from the General Membership. To start, try and limit the number of officers to a minimum and then as the group expands add additional officers and duties for those officers. You should select a President, Vice-President, Secretary, Treasurer and a Membership person to start. If you want to also publish a newsletter by email or start a website, perhaps you would need to add an information person.
The fourth objective is to assist the newsletter person in getting a newsletter together to let members know about investment opportunities, upcoming guest speakers, dates of meetings, etc. The newsletter person brings extra copies to the next meeting to hand out to everyone that is a member as well as to guests who are considering becoming a member.
The fifth objective would be to decide on guest speakers for the next 3 meetings. Decide the topics you want to hear about and then find someone qualified to speak on that subject. Schedule these to be your guest speakers. Always, let them know the time limitations that they have to talk and to leave time for questions and answers at the end.
The sixth objective is to decide whether a membership card is needed or not. Does that piece of paper make you a better investor? Perhaps not, but it is a way of introducing yourself to others that you are in the real estate investing world.
The seventh objective is to decide on the specific day of the week, place, and time for the monthly meetings to be held. Always reserve the meeting area to allow time before and after the meeting for members and guests to network, socialize and possibly work out some real world investing deals. Networking with others in your field is the main purpose of having the investment group in the first place.
The eighth objective is to decide on whether the group will be a non-profit or a for profit group. Whichever way is decided, the paperwork needs to be filled out properly. Then the group needs to assign some members to work on drawing up the Mission Statement and the By-Laws for the group. These will become the foundation for future members to follow as a guideline for the purpose of the group.
These guidelines can help you get a real estate group started in your area. It has been said that more heads are better than one to think up creative ways of investing in real estate. Pool your talents and strong areas with someone who has different talents and strong areas and you can become an invincible investing machine together.