Property Investing basics: Invest in Yourself… First!
My Story
“By far the best investment you can make is in yourself”- Warren Buffett
Background
It was September 2018 when I finished my international project with Jaguar Land Rover in Slovakia, building JLR’s biggest manufacturing plant in the world. I was an Engineering Project Manager and team leader delivering the installation of the £150 million Body-in-White facility (the square building on the right in image) for the production of Land Rover Discovery & the all new Defender models. At age 28, this had been my biggest achievement!
It was during my last months on this project that I had started looking at investing in property to build myself a secondary income stream. I started researching, reading and listening to books over the winter months. The Audible app became my new best friend!
Being an engineer, I wanted to know absolutely everything there is to know within property investment; the criteria that makes a good investment, various investment strategies and learning from successful investors. I took the initial steps to utilise all of the low cost and free resources, before I embarked upon my investing journey.
Out of more than 30 books that I read within my first few months, I have listed below 5 of my favourite books that I recommend to anyone wanting to invest in property:
- Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki
- Think & Grow Rich by Napolean Hill (my absolute favourite even today)
- The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason
- Property Investing Secrets by Rob Moore and Mark Homer
- Property Magic by Simon Zutshi
If you want more recommendations, drop me a message.
Although books and free resources are great to build a foundation, they don’t always give away the working practices and detail, for which I now continue to attend many paid training courses for my personal growth and development of my skill set.
Why invest in Property?
The truth is, I have always wanted to be in business, and the 9 to 5 commuter life was not to my taste having experienced it for more than 6 years. I realised I wanted to be financially independent, and have the personal freedom to do things I loved such as Travel, Fitness and spending time with Family which are some of my core values and whatever I wanted in my life, had to have these values in the centre of everything I did. I also realised I may have developed an indirect interest in property since my dad is a structural engineer and was always exposed to construction from a young age. This mixed with my corporate career meant I enjoyed construction and installation activities, there was a genuine sense of satisfaction about seeing things from design to manufacture and install.
It was December 2019, when my mum got diagnosed with Cancer. This is when it really hit home and I realised how much being financially independent meant to me. It made me realise that being self employed and not having multiple streams of income could paralyse me if I wasn’t able to go to work. My mum has been an inspiration to me all my life, she has always supported me and to see her go through this emotional roller coaster and the prolonged chemotherapy treatments that follow, meant my WHY became much stronger.
I had an entrepreneurial spirit from a young age, having had a few start ups (with plenty of valuable lessons learnt) at ages of 17, 20, 23 & 25. These included businesses in selling oil paintings (my mum is an artist), Sub-contract manufacture of investment casting products which failed as my business partner had to re-located after only 2 months, Selling machinery online (being a Mechanical Engineer), and launching an app for University students (a one stop shop for all student events) which failed as it didn’t get the approval from university. However, I was never the one to get bogged down by failure and always took things positively as this made me wiser for my next venture.
In hindsight, those valuable lessons from previous businesses made me realise that I hadn’t taken the relevant steps in forming a new business. The excitement of being an entrepreneur meant I was always filled with ideas about how I can change the world, and wanted to make money NOW. We all know the reality of this. Even today, according to various web sources upto 90% of startups fail within the first year and I can clearly see why that is. Those valuable lessons meant I have spent over 9 months forming my business plan and learning from various mentors along the way.
I spent many months, reading, educating myself through an array of books on business, marketing, sales, autobiographies, and most importantly MINDSET. I attended plenty of free webinars, I slowly formed a strategy around how I wanted my property investment business to shape and grow long term. Over the past year I have been through many property training courses to gain sufficient knowledge and was ready to launch the business. At this point in March 2020, my services for Jaguar Land Rover as a self employed project manager also ended. The COVID-19 pandemic hit the world bringing big economies down to its knees.
Investing in myself
“Every day you must unlearn the ways that hold you back. You must rid yourself of negativity, so you can learn to fly“ — Leon Brown
The advice from Warren Buffett rings true with me everyday as I dedicate at least 30mins of reading time daily to self educate and always keep improving.
The most important thing before starting out in any venture is MINDSET. This is closely followed by HABIT, MASSIVE ACTION & CONSISTENCY. I religiously implement these core practices into my daily life.
My goal is to share insights on my business by documenting my progress and journey. I’d like to share content, give value to you, and reflect on progress. Watch out for my weekly posts and connect with me on Linkedin, Facebook and Instagram.
If you have found this information valuable please let me know.