My Plan to Purchase 100 Rental Properties by January of 2023 (Part One of Two)

Rental properties provide an incredible opportunity for people looking to multiply their wealth.  I have been a Realtor and investor for over ten years and I love the income my current rental properties provide me.  My original goal in 2010 was to buy 30 rental houses in ten years.  I based that goal on what I thought I could realistically achieve at the time.  I realized there was a huge flaw in this goal earlier this year.  It was based roughly off what I was making and how much I could save for investing. My income has been increasing every year for the last five years, but my goal assumed it would become stagnant.  I gave myself no room for improvement!  I  completely reworked all my goals at the start of 2013 including my rental property purchase schedule.  I now want to have 100 rental houses by January 2023.  I already have 7, that leaves only 93 more to go!

The reason I want so many properties is because of the income and freedom 100 houses will give me.  I am able to make over 24% cash on cash returns on my rentals and with 100 properties,  that will give me incredible cash flow.  According to my calculations I will be making over $900,000 a year from cash flow, have at least 60 houses paid off and have over 11 million in equity in my rental properties.  Those figures are unadjusted for inflation and assume no appreciation or rent increases.  That kind of income should allow me to afford whatever my family and I want and allow us to do whatever we like.  We only live life once and I want to get everything out of it I can.

This is part one of my plan to purchase 100 rental homes by January 2023.  In part one I talk about my attitude and why I think I can accomplish this goal.  I also talk about mindsets and tips to help people achieve goals and maybe improve their life.  In part two I talk about the numbers with a year by year break down of how I will accomplish this goal.  Here is a link to part two of my plan if you want to get straight to the numbers. 

If you are interested in how I make so much on my rental properties, check out my complete guide to investing in long-term rental properties.

Is it possible?

To be completely honest I do not know how I am going to buy 100 rental properties by January 2023.  Right now I do not make nearly enough money to buy 9 or 10 houses a year, I have not even been able to buy three houses a year which was my original goal.  I bought my first rental property in December of 2010 and I started my rental property purchase goal on that day.  I should have had 3 by December 2011, 6 by December 2012 and I should have 9 by December 2013.  I purchased 5 by December 2012, but I have 7 now and I know I can buy at least two more this year to get to that 9 number by December 2013.  That still leaves me woefully short of my 100 property goal, in fact it leaves me 91 houses short with 9 years to go.

Why do I think I can buy 100 houses by January 2023 if I am so far away now?  I started re-working my life goals earlier this year after reading and listening to a lot of books on how to become wealthy.   There are a couple of ideas that are repeated over and over in these books and audio tapes starting with Think and Grow Rich, by Napoleon Hill.  Think and Grow Rich was published in the early 20th century after Napoleon Hill followed Andre Carnegie around for a couple of decades.  Carnegie wanted someone to study the rich people in the world and write a book about how and why they became rich.  Carnegie was one of the richest people in the world and was able to grant Hill access to most of the worlds wealthiest individuals.  Think and Grow Rich is now known as one of the first self-help books and many of its basic ideas are still taught today by the world’s most renown life coaches and teachers.

Be positive all the time

Being positive is a theme that is repeated in every self-help book and audio recording I have listened too.  I am a strong believer that our attitude has a huge influence on our success in life.  The books range from slightly crazy to extremely scientific reasons for why being positive can greatly affect the success we have in our lives.  You may have heard of the law of attraction, it basically states the universe will return to us whatever we put out.  If we are positive and happy we will get positive and happy things back.  If we are negative and sad, negative and sad things will come our way.  I am a very logical and scientific person and was not sold on this idea right away.  I had to know why this would happen, how could being positive magically bring positiveness back into our lives?

I started doing research on the brain and how the law of attraction theories worked.  I found out it was not all magic, but there is scientific reasons for why the law of attraction works.  It is based on the subconscious part of our brain and how it operates our bodies.  We know that our conscious mind is only a fraction of what our brain is responsible for.  Our subconscious mind is constantly working to keep us alive by telling our heart, lungs, muscles and the rest of our bodies what to do.  Most of our movements and actions are performed by our subconscious not our conscious mind.  We don’t have to think about walking, talking, driving, writing or even most of our daily tasks.  We have programmed out minds how to do those things by doing them over and over.

A couple of weeks ago my wife decided to move our trash can.  The trash can had been in the same spot for three years without moving.  I knew where it was and my subconscious knew where it was.  Once the can was moved, I still went to throw away trash in the old spot every time.  My wife had the same thing happen to her, we could not remember to go to the new spot, even after a week!  We finally had to move the trash can back to the old spot before it drove both of us crazy.  This is an example of how powerful the subconscious is on a very minor immaterial part of our lives.  Once the subconscious mind learns a habit, it is very hard to get it to change and unlearn that habit.

tying this back into the positive thinking idea, if we are always thinking positive then our subconscious will too.  If our subconscious thinks we are happy all the time, the subconscious will do what it can to make us happy.  Why do we care what our subconscious thinks?  It is much, much smarter than our conscious mind.  The subconscious is responsible for handling millions of tasks at once while our conscious mind can only handle a handful of ideas at once.  If we let our subconscious know what we want it will help guide our lives and help us get it.  Whether it be love, happiness, money or material items, our subconscious has much more power than we think.  The theories also state you must think of what you want, not what you don’t want because our subconscious cannot tell the difference.  If you are constantly thinking about not having money then our subconscious will do its best to make that come true as well.  If you are constantly thinking of not getting sick, our subconscious will do it’s best to get you sick.  Think of being healthy, think of being rich, think of the good things not the negatives.

When to be positive

All the time!  Anyone can be positive when things are going great.  The trick is to be happy when things are going bad and you have every reason in the world to be angry or upset.  This is the time to change your life for the better by looking at anything positive you can and focusing on the positive and forgetting the negative.

Goals

Almost every get rich book will tell you goals are extremely important.  Without goals we have no direction, no path and no idea of what we really want in life.  There are varying ideas of how our goals should be constructed.  Some say we just need broad wide open goals like be as happy as possible all the time and whatever is best for you will come to you.  Others say be as specific and detailed as possible with your goals.  Then take you goals and break them into smaller goals.  Then give a time frame for when those goals will be accomplished, eventually you will have a detailed blueprint for how you will get to where you need to go.  Some people say you need realistic goals and others say you need outrageous goals.  As you have probably guessed I like outrageous goals!  The reason I like outrageous goals is they are challenging!  If I know I can reach a goal and exactly how I can reach it, where is the fun in that?  I want goals that make me think and reach for new ideas and systems.  I have no idea what opportunities or challenges will confront me in the future so why should I limit my future goals to what I can accomplish now.  I may have a huge increase in income or find a new system that allows me to buy houses cheaper.  I have no idea what could happen and that is why I have such a lofty goal.

Help from others

Many of the get rich gurus also talk about how we all need friends, co-workers or acquaintances to help us reach our potential.  Some use the term mastermind to describe groups of like-minded people who meet to help each other succeed by offering advice and motivation.  The idea is the more people there are to brainstorm ideas, questions, problems etc. the better chance a great idea or solution to a problem will come about.  I do not have a mastermind group, but I have recruited my best friend to come work with me and learn Real Estate.  He is a top-level manager in the corporate world and leaving his six figure salary behind to learn Real Estate from me.  I benefit by having a new mind to bounce ideas off of and get more help in the office, he gets out of the corporate grind and learns how to be truly wealthy.  He also gets a flexible schedule and is not stuck behind a desk all day.  That would drive me crazy!!!

Focus on one thing

The get rich gurus also say how important it is to focus on one task or goal.  All the greats had in their mind something they really wanted.  They didn’t let anything stop them until they got what they wanted or died trying.  I have always thought of myself as a multi-tasker, jack of all trades type of person.  So far it had worked out well, but I know I can do better.  I know there are things I can improve in my business to make it run better and make more money.  I always thought I knew everything about finding good deals in Real Estate.  After starting this blog I have realized there is a whole world I was missing out on in direct marketing to off market properties.  Instead of trying to manage 5 different sources of income myself I need to delegate less important tasks to my staff and focus on the real money makers.  If I can focus intently on a couple different areas of my work instead of skimming over 50 I know I can improve my numbers significantly.

Visualization

Many great athletes will tell you how important visualization is to succeeding in sports.  Great golfers will always visualize exactly how their shot will look before they hit it.  Basketball players will visualize hitting the game winning shot over and over in their minds.  The wealth gurus are all huge supporters of visualization.  They say visualization will give your subconscious a clear picture of what you want and then your subconscious will do it’s best to make it happen.  If you want to change your life, start visualizing how it should be every day.  Better yet, go see, touch and smell the things you want.  Test drive the car you always wanted, or look at your dream home, immerse yourself with the things you want and your subconscious will get to work.

Bring it all together

Based off the ideas I have just discussed I think I have a good chance of reaching that 100 number.  I still don’t know exactly how it will happen, but I know it could.  I have to train my subconscious to help me reach the goal, I have to be positive all the time, I have to think about my goal constantly and break it down into manageable pieces, I must have help and I have to focus more intently on my important goals.  I also have to visualize myself already achieving my goals and having everything I want.  Even if all of this does not make me rich, worst case scenario I am positive, determined, focused person who knows exactly what he wants.

My Plan to Purchase 100 Rental Properties by January 2023 Part Two

In part two I discuss how I will pay for and purchase 100 properties by January 2023 on a year by year basis.  I also talk about what circumstances may prevent me from reaching my goal and what techniques I can use to overcome anything that gets in my way.