I recently read the book “Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson. As brilliant as
Steve Jobs was, I came away from the book not with a sense of awe about
the man who Steve Jobs was, but how despite his incredible success, how
idiosyncratic and deeply flawed a human being he really was.
Yes, he was a certifiable genius, although in some ways “certifiable” as well.
Yes, we’ll never see anyone else exactly like him, although Apple’s stock price has done quite well since his death
Yes, in American business, he will live in the pantheon of Edison, Einstein, and Ford, and he really thought he belonged there.
Yes, he did leave an indelible mark on our society – in fact, totally
revolutionizing five separate industries nearly simultaneously…but he
deeply hurt many people on the way in his rise to near mythic status.
Despite his greatness, he made tons of mistakes, cruelly alienated
lots of people including his own daughter, and did some curiously
unethical things in his relatively brief time on this earth. No doubt,
the further you probe into the true personal lives of your “heroes”
oftentimes the more you find, the less you like.
I came away from reading the book in a word – exhausted, but
exhilarated at the same time. In fact, it was refreshing in a way to
know that although Jobs was “Steve Jobs the icon”, he’s just a guy like
you and me. I realized that you don’t have to be perfect to be great.
And although there are many traits of Jobs I would never emulate in my
own life, I felt like there were so many brilliant lessons that can be
learned from him not only as a businessman and real estate investor, but
as many lessons in what not to do as a father, a husband and a human
being.
The bottom line is this: you, I and anyone can be great. There are
multiple paths to ultimate success in life and in real estate investing,
and there are multiple lessons Steve Jobs can teach the real estate
investor and which can be learned by you.
The Top Seven Real Estate Investing Lessons Steve Jobs Taught Us
1. Fear Not
Jobs was plagued by strange idiosyncrasies. His diet, his odd
personal habits, his driving without a license plate, his parking in
handicapped zones just to name a few. But one thing he was blessed with
was a total and utter lack of fear. Lack of fear comes from many things;
self-confidence, optimism, even delusions of grandeur (checkmarks on
all three for Jobs here). One thing’s for sure, he had enormous amounts
of self-confidence. He felt he was special and that he was put on this
earth to do great things by creating the technical marvels which
ultimately influenced and bettered the lives of millions of people.
Those innovations still affect us all each and every day.
Even in the face of terminal pancreatic cancer, he seemed to have an
almost irrational sense of self-confidence and lack of fear. His
self-confidence was so great; he actually thought that he could cure
himself with oddball diets and rituals, while shunning traditional
medicine – medicine that just may have saved his life. Incredibly, he
seemed to have a complete absence of fear of the one thing that most of
us are deathly afraid of…death itself.
It’s terrifying to buy your first house flip, for sure. But is it as
fearful as death? Keep things in perspective in order to control fear.
Think of the worst case scenario if you do what you’re fearful of. If
you can handle the worst case pain and aggravation, then do it. If Steve
Jobs could fearlessly stare down death, you can do the same.
If you’re just starting, then make your first real estate purchase.
If you’ve been around the block a few times, try a new investment
strategy you’ve never done before. When you face your fears and do what
you fear most, you end up controlling your fears.
2. Pick Yourself Up Even After Your Failures
Can you imagine the humiliation of being fired by the guy you picked
to run your company? In one of the most public firings in corporate
history, Steve Jobs was fired. This was big news when it happened,
sending shockwaves throughout Silicon Valley and the rest of the
corporate world. Jobs did wallow for a short period of time, sure. But
he picked himself up and created a new company that was ultimate bought
by the company and the successor he was fired by.
If you are new to real estate investing and you lose a few thousand
on your first deal because you overestimate your ARV, didn’t stick by
the 70% Rule or failed to tightly manage your general contractors, then
provided the few thousand didn’t bankrupt you, pick yourself up and try
again.
It’s not how many times we fail; it’s how many times we get back up after failure that counts most.
3. Marry Art and Functionality
Many of us have iPhones. If you have one nearby while reading this or
on the desktop beside you, pick it up. Feel the weight, notice the
elegant stainless steel wrapping, the Gorilla glass screen, the smooth
back. Swipe a few apps from side to side, browse the Internet, touch an
app and see how they all gently jiggle to be deleted or modified. If you
think all these enhancements and subtle artistic nuances of the device
(since copied by the Google platform) are random, think again.
Jobs dissected each of these features and weighed them for weeks and
months prior to being introduced by Apple. And each feature indelibly
bears his thumbprint – his signature. He married art and functionality
to create everlasting products and innovation that will affect
generations to come.
There are lots of posts on this website that discuss the “steps” to
real estate investing, house flipping, wholesaling, you name it. Follow
these steps here and learn as much as you can. But then, put your own
thumbprint on each of them – just like Steve Jobs did with each of his
creations.
Is there only one way to rehab a house for maximum resale? No way.
Is there only one way to round up funding for your next apartment building? Not a chance.
Virtually anyone can become a real estate investor as long as they
have the desire and the ambition, but to become a massive success, it’s
going to take more than just what you learn from others. Its going to
require you to put your own indelible stamp on every deal you do. Think
like Steve jobs in how you can make your flip or rental a little bit
different, enhanced or beautiful…marry art with functionality.
4. Listen to Your Inner Voice
When you are new to real estate investing, you have no voice in your
head. If you do have one, that voice is usually screaming to you “don’t
do it!”
However, the more deals you do, a different inner voice starts to appear. This is the voice of experience.
Maybe you are thinking about becoming a real estate investor and
there’s something that has stopped you from doing it. You went to
school, you got a good job in finance or sales or maybe you’re a doctor
or a dentist – but there’s something missing. When we don’t listen to
our inner voice, we mail it in, we do what we do on autopilot.
You’re reading this blog most likely because you want something more.
You want to create the life you’ve always wanted. THAT is the inner
voice calling you.
Ignore it at your own peril.
Jobs’ inner voice screamed “change the world” – a pretty dramatic
vision and a pretty big voice. He built computers to do it. That was his
plan.
What’s yours?
One thing that’s abundantly clear with Jobs is that despite his many
imperfections, he lived his life with very few regrets. He followed his
inner voice. Whatever that voice is telling you, it would be smart to
listen to it. Even if it tells you to quit your job, become a full-time
real estate investor, move to Tibet or become a gourmet sushi chef,
listen to it.
Live life with no regrets.
5. Expect More from Yourself and From Others
Jobs was a real prick sometimes. He would berate people. He would
yell at people. He would throw little temper tantrums. He was a totally
obsessive control freak.
And of course, he was an absolute perfectionist.
He demanded this from himself and he demanded the same from everyone
who worked for him. I am not saying that the WAY Jobs did it was right,
far from it. He seemed like a real jerk to work for.
But one thing’s for sure, he pushed people to places where they never
thought they were capable of going. He expected this of himself and he
expected it from everyone who worked for him.
Do it in your own way and do the same thing in your real estate
investment career. If you need to get upset, do it. Don’t overdo it or
you will find nobody will want to work with you, so be careful. But
shoot for perfection and settle for excellence at the very least.
Jobs built products that revolutionized the world using this
philosophy and he did it in his own way…so you do it in your own way.
But don’t try to be him. Be yourself and expect a lot from everyone and
most importantly expect the absolute most from yourself.
6. Surround Yourself with the Most Talented People You Can Find
Steve Jobs gets all the credit when you think of the legacy of greatness at Apple. Sounds good, but it’s simply not true.
Yes, Jobs made the ultimate decisions in all matters Apple from the
type of sandstone used in Apple stores to the kind of glass used on
iPhone screens. But what’s less known is that he surrounded himself with
some brilliant minds that simply made him and Apple better.
Jobs surrounded himself with serious talent: the true mastermind
behind the iPhone and iPad design Jony Ive, now CEO Steve Cook, Apple
co-founder Steve Wozniak, Toy Story creator John Lesseter, just to name a
few. These super-talented people (not the faceless minions kowtowing to
Jobs every whim as we may want to believe) don’t get the credit they
rightfully deserve.
In real estate investing, surrounding yourself with an incredibly
talented and knowledgeable team, including lawyers, real estate agents,
general contractors, etc. – people in many cases who know far more than
you – is just as important in real estate investing as it was in
building one of the great companies of our generation. Steve Jobs
realized that he couldn’t do anything without great talent around him.
How about you?
7. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish
Success in anything in life is consistently looking to improve, to
grow, to build and also to have fun. If you’re going to do it for the
majority of the time you have in any given day, shouldn’t it be fun too?
Jobs summed up this philosophy of innovation, creativity and fun in his
memorable 2005 Stanford commencement address (check it out on YouTube
if you haven’t):
“When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The
Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It
was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo
Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the
late 1960′s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was
all made with typewriters, scissors, and Polaroid cameras. It was sort
of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it
was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.
Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth
Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final
issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of
their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the
kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous.
Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their
farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I
have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin
anew, I wish that for you.
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”
We can be just as special as he was and although we may not all build
the next Apple; we can build excellence in what we do every day as real
estate investors. As was previously reported on this blog, we as real
estate investors not only enrich the lives of thousands of people every
year with quality housing, but we create jobs and opportunities to the
tune of $9.2 billion per year as well.
What we do as real estate investors matters. Jobs would agree that is
a worthy dream to pursue. And we all can learn much from him – both the
good and the bad. But best of all, you don’t have to be perfect in to
be wildly successful like Steve Jobs.
In fact, anything’s possible in life if you continue to follow the simple lessons laid out above.
Author: Mike LaCava
