Investor-influencer Grant Cardone was recently in hot water in the form of a class-action lawsuit alleging fraud and false promises through his real estate investment fund. You can read all about it on Bigger Pockets (linked above) and other news outlets. Regardless of how the lawsuit has turned out, we see it as a cautionary tale to passive investing hopefuls.

Due diligence is a simple concept to understand but challenging to execute. It’s anticipating and mitigating risk, gathering accurate facts and data for informed decision-making, and doing your best to ensure you’re building your wealth and managing risk exposure.

Every successful real estate investor is supported by the unsung heroes of the industry: financial and portfolio advisor, property managers, contractors, and turnkey professionals. Not only do far too many investors neglect the wealth of professional resources at their disposal, but they don’t always make the most of the ones they have.

If you’re a go-with-the-flow real estate investor, you’ll never reach your full potential. You can be perfectly comfortable with average results, but is that really what you want to be? Average? 

Although 23% of Americans believe that investing in real estate is the best way to build wealth – more than stocks, starting a business, or getting a side hustle – only 12% bought real estate in the last year.

As a nation, we’re moving through uncharted territory. The first modern pandemic is spreading in the United States. As a result of COVID-19, we’ve seen emergency declarations, travel bans, stock market disruptions, ailing businesses, and canceled events — from sports to conventions and worship gatherings to schools.

Our investments are infinitely valuable. That might sound like we're overselling it a little bit, but think about how much people really put into their investments. When people choose to pour their time, resources, and money into investing, they are striving to build up financial security and resources often not only for themselves but for their families.

When we embark on the journey of investing in real estate, we all have some sort of vision for ourselves and our financial future. For many of us, it looks like a worry-free retirement, escaping the rat race, or supporting our family's future. Maybe we're looking to take vacations or pay for a child's education. Whatever the motivation is, we have this in common: we want to take financial control back.

In real estate investment, scaling your portfolio is absolutely essential to your long-term investment success. We don't ride bikes with training wheels forever and we don't stay in the shallow end of the pool.

Portfolio diversification is one of the keys to a successful real estate investment career. When new investors call us for the first time, one of the things we discuss from the get-go is the fact that we are not a real estate broker—we are in the business of building portfolios.