Real estate is being added to the investment portfolios of Americans and more are looking for real estate to provide a passive income stream in their retirement years.  

Real estate investing sometimes gets a bad rap from investment advisers.  They often prefer REIT's and other supposed easier forms of investing in real estate because it's easy for them to track and control their clients portfolios.  I don't begrudge them for that attitude, I just think it short changes an investor and eliminates a very powerful source of income when investors will need it most...retirement.

I wrote this blog after reading an article in the local Memphis newspaper, The Commercial Appeal.     

Property management By The Numbers

I have been making a concerted effort to keep the numbers up to date each month on here for all our readers and clients.  But, I also want to make these posts as a way to give a lot of credit and praise to Premier Property Management.  By far, that is the most thankless part of our entire business from staff to clients and we all owe them a big thanks for the effort and attention they give to our portfolios...including mine!  There is a reason Premier Property Management is quickly growing into the largest Single Family resident management company in Memphis.

RealtyTrac is reporting that foreclosure activity inMemphis is up four straight months and even though some in Memphis are disputing that, the trends we are seeing follow the reporting from RealtyTrac pretty closely.

One of the biggest topics in real estate investing today revolves around property management and the struggles landlords have with either managing their properties themselves or hiring quality property management.  It stands as one of the biggest and sometimes most confusing and hard decisions for a real estate investor to make.

I make it a point to try and get as much information onMemphis, Tennessee and especially the real estate industry every day.  Often that means reading as many different newspapers, periodicals and blogs to make sure I am up to date and able to tell the most accurate story possible about investing in Memphis.  Every once in a while, I come across something that, even though it doesn't have anything to do with real estate investing...it does!

The Memphis Chamber of Commerce recently released their 2010 report outlining the successes of Memphis business.  I was struck by several of the projects and awards that Memphis has won and even more encouraged as a real estate investor by the dramatic effect these awards and projects will have on the over-all value of the city.  One major push I was happy to hear about was the push to move Memphis forward on the list of International business cities.