Archive for mindset
Is everybody leaping
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So it is the end of February already and a leap year at that.
Maybe as one gets older the years get shorter, certainly seems that way anyway.
Interesting reading in the papers today. Apparently, if they are to be believed, the property markets in NZ, OZ and the USA are recovering.
Now how even a bad journalist can say that with a straight face is beyond me but maybe it is simply after 4 years of hell we are trying to talk ourselves into a recovery in spite of the facts. Any piece of positive data, no matter how flawed, gets paraded around like the Hope Diamond.
So the tricky part here is where is the line. It is true that we possess what we confess so it is good to talk positively before we see it. This is what hope and faith are about. But the flip side is that reality is reality and sometimes we have to look at the big picture and find our own hope without needing all the circumstances to change. I tended to live in the first camp but age and wisdom forces me to meet more in the middle these days.
The world is in a mess. That is going ot take probably a decade to fix, if not longer. So waiting for the market to change is a bad strategy. However finding good markets and opportunities in the midst of this global nightmare is a good strategy.
Maybe you have been like I was, sitting on stock waiting for the numbers to come right. I realised after 3 years they may not come right for another ten years, so you bite the bullet, feel the pain, take the loss but start to be able to breathe again. And suddenly an option like the USA market or a business opportunity or whatever appears that you couldn’t have considered before because you were in so much pain.
I hope this makes sense, it was very liberating for me to stop hanging on to stuff and on the other side of the pain there was life again! So let it go and make a note to think about again next Feb 29th 
Stay Inspired ~ Dean
PS: Only 24 hours to go CASHFLOW CITY
Perspective
Posted by: | CommentsI have always been fascinated with perspective in art and life.
Whether it’s something like this:
which is funny and clever, well brilliant actually, right through to people’s perspective on life and how that affects them.
For example it has taken me 2 years to change my perspective fully on property investing because I had to reframe my world view to allow for the US market. Even though I have done a lot of investing in New Zealand it has taken me a lot of “work” to stop being surprised at being able to buy houses for only 50K instead of 300K. And to stop looking at 10 to 15% net returns with a “too good to be true” attitude.
I have been amazed at how long it has taken me and just how hard it was to reprogramme myself so that I could look at this new market and learn to benefit from it without being starry eyed. And what I also learned was that cliche’s can be dangerous programming also.
I have often said and heard it quoted ten gazillion times: “If it sounds too good to be true it probably is”.
And in many ways that statement is absolutely true. HOWEVER it is true positionally but not situationally. What do I mean? Well avoiding shonky deals by applying this principle will keep you out of a lot of trouble, but if you uplift a set of rules from one country and drop them down in another country, change the situation in other words, then this principle itself becomes silly.
For example if you were offered a twenty five percent return property today in Auckland you would know immediately that there was an error in somebody’s numbers or there was something seriously weird/dodgy going on. But that very level of return is on offer every day of the week in the USA so it is no longer too good to be true, it is situation normal.
I have used the US example because it has been my recent journey but you will have mindsets and stories embedded in your mind that affect/protect and limit you everyday.
My encouragement to you this morning is to stretch yourself mentally. What is your biggest worry or daily issue, your reprogramming needs to start right there. What are you believing about yourself that is a lie??
Discover it, expose it, and then start changing it!!
Get Going and Stay Safe ~ Dean Letfus!!
What we need is a great big melting pot…..
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Or so goes the song. Certainly as we look at what is happening in the world we are indeed all in a great big melting pot of uncertainty, natural disaster and strangely, opportunity.
In New Zealand, USA and many other countries there are people going under and people going over. Trouble and opportunity all wrapped up in the same package.
So the important question is why? How come some people do well in difficult times and some fold. Obviously ones starting position and circumstances affect our ability to move forward but it is never as simple as that.
For example I have a client who is ten seconds from bankruptcy, however he saw the opportunity in the USA and begged and borrowed enough to purchase a property there. That cash flow is now helping him to stay afloat and he is very close to his second purchase.
So what makes one person take action in the midst of adversity while another rants at the sky?
I have concluded that it is all about our internal principles. These come to the fore when things are tough. For me personally I keep looking for solutions no matter how bad things get. The worst thing that can happen is I will fail but at least I know I have done my best. I have successfully turned terrible investments into good ones, learned form mistakes and viewed them positively as a growth opportunity many times and the fruit of that is that I am a happier, wiser person.
Some people conversely go looking for someone to balame and hunker down waiting for something to happen. And what happens is they get bitter, old and somehow “smaller”.
Man I have seen a lot of this in the last 12 months. One person going gang busters, another pursuing enormous energy on a no win situation.
So what about you my friends. Where does your internal clock sit. Are you looking for answers or looking for justice in your situation? And whichever way you answer ask yourself: “Is this working for me? Is this making me a bigger, better person?”
Get Going and Stay Safe ~ Dean Letfus
Long and winding road
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I was reading a guru’s website today singing the praises of finding the path of least resistance. The theory is that success comes fastest if you find the easiest route to success. Comparisons with beautiful flowing rivers etc. are used to make us think about how easy our life could be if we could just find this easy path.
The problem with this wonderful idea is that it is total bollocks .
We were designed to push against resistance from cradle to the grave. We had to fight our way out of the womb, our muscles only develop when we use them and paths of least resistance have to violate the fact that most things left to themselves become increasingly chaotic. Look at the back of your garage for example.
It’s a bit like another semi myth called “passive” cashflow. Now don’t get me wrong I am a great believer in passive income but it is rarely ever going to be completely passive. If you spend a lot of time, energy and money building a great property portfolio you would be stupid to hand it over to property managers and never have any interest in your properties ever again. You would manage the managers, keep a watchful eye on the markets etc. and generally make sure your investments were being looked after right.
So let’s get off this fantasy train of success being easy, attractable and hard work being somehow second best.
I have learned that by doing now what others won’t do, that is WORK HARD AND SMART, then when I am older I will be able to do what everybody else can’t do, ENJOY MYSELF AND BE FINANCIALLY FREE.
Enjoy yourself along the way of course but if you keep looking for the silver bullet you just might end up on the receiving end of it
If I was looking for the path of least resistance I would have a sex change, have as many kids as possible and let the government pay me to do nothing!
OK rant over, back to work. But remember, work hard now so that you can relax later. Don;t look for the short cut, look for the best way to achieve the long term result!!
Get Going and Stay Safe ~ Dean Letfus
Where will it end?? You can help!
Posted by: | CommentsWe never received any coverage in the USA of the latest round of quakes in Christchurch so it was devastating to see even more damage this week. On top of the last 2 to 3 years of economic challenges it is just heart breaking for locals to have to endure even more emotional pain and uncertainty.
There is nothing clever anybody can say and not even much one can do to really help except to love and support those you know and pray for the city if that is your thing.
I can imagine the dilemma going on behind the scenes now too where the reinsurers must be literally out of money and the government can’t afford an insurance default 5 months out from an election.
I hope that at least home owners can get some firm ground in terms of payouts and recovery or demolition ASAP so they can move on with their lives.
But most importantly we all know someone probably in the affected area. Understand that the mental anguish this must be placing on them is terrible. Pick up the phone, go and visit them, take their kids for a weekend, fly them up to see you, do SOMETHING to break the anguish they are feeling and to make sure they know they are loved by somebody, even when their own land seems to be turning on them.
Remember………
Get loving and Stay Safe ~ Dean Letfus
Permanent potential
Posted by: | CommentsI was discussing property investment in the USA with a property manager friend and he commented that New Zealanders, in his experience in hos business, suffered a lot from “permanent potential” syndrome. His company had lots of inquiries from multiple countries and he had many, many happy investors owning property in Phoenix from all over the world. However kiwi’s tended to inquire, “ooh and aah” over the numbers and then eventually do,,,,,,,
absolutely nothing!!
Potential: “Latent qualities or abilities that may be developed and lead to future success or usefulness.”
Permanent potential means never turning this latent opportunity into action or results. It is a great phrase and accurately describes many of us doesn’t it?
We see an opportunity and a couple of years later nothing has changed. We meet someone who is getting a great result in a particular area, they offer to share it with you and you just cannot get to a point of doing anything.
It may be a part of our culture but isn’t it time we break out of it and well………
Get Going and Stay safe ~ Dean Letfus
PS: I have new lists today of investments in 3 top US cities. If you are ready to take some action email me and I will send them to you. But only email if you are serious about getting your cash flow going with heavily discounted quality property returning 10 to 20% net returns
Culture-ism
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It is fascinating to observe how different cultures respond to different situations. As I spend time in Asia, the USA and New Zealand I see very different cultural responses to the current global financial situation. As I alluded to in earlier blogs New Zealanders seem to be becoming increasingly depressed and angry, lashing out in frustration and creating a field day for litigators.
This is most uncharacteristic behaviour but increasing daily.
In Asia they see the current situation as an opportunity to make money and diversify into other areas. They simply work harder, get better educated and take better action. A great example of this was when i sent out my example of a 22% return property in the USA I sold 3 to Asian investors within an hour of the email going and had around 200 enquiries from kiwis, not one of whom has yet taken any action .
And in America they simply don’t have a clue that anything is really going on and they continue business as usual. They are quite happy generally because everything is Obamas fault but they still have their 15 credit cards and 60 inch televisions.
Same situation, equally relevant in each country and 3 totally different responses.
So what this tells me is that our environment and culture have an enormous impact on how we respond to adversity and opportunity.
And what that tells me is that we have to learn how to break out of our cultural responses to get a different result in our lives.
Step 1: Understand that a lot of what you think is not what you really think, it is what you have been trained into thinking. And the power to change starts with thinking about what you think about . More on this another day!
Get going and Stay Safe ~ Dean Letfus
PS: I have private lists of some awesome properties in the USA. If you are keen on investing but cannot join us next week I am happy to inspect and send photos etc. for you and get your foot on anything you like. Email me if you’d like any help before Friday!!
