Single-family rental (SFR) investors often struggle to determine when it’s the right time to scale their portfolio and acquire more properties. After all, buying a property is a big commitment, whether it’s your first or your fiftieth.

With only a few weeks left in the year, it’s time for real estate investors to finish strong. You may be a passive investor, but as you know, passive doesn’t mean disengaged! Think of yourself as the captain of a ship. Your crew ensures you get to where you’re going, but you set the course.

Right now, you have the prime opportunity to review, assess, and strategize for the coming year. There’s plenty of legwork for investors to get done, so don’t miss out on these important financial strategies.

Whatever you choose to invest in, regularly assessing and adjusting your portfolio is key to financial success. This is true of long-term investors, too: sometimes you’ve got to shake things up to stay on the right track. Whether economic conditions, new wealth ambitions, or a simple change of strategy have you reconsidering your portfolio, these are the aspects that really matter.

Does the idea of growing your portfolio sound appealing? We've surveyed the real estate investors at Memphis Invest and for most, it does! Real estate investors should be able to have a strategy for future growth and look forward to a flourishing, successful business. That said, there’s a danger in growing too quickly. The best way to set yourself up for success in real estate investment is to maximize the efficiency of what you have, whether it’s two properties or twenty.

When you have investing in real estate down to a fine art and everything is working as well as it can, then talk about adding more investment properties to the mix.

It takes a lot of time, hard work and dedication to build up a solid passive investment portfolio. None of us find success just starting out — patience and consistent efforts are key here. Once we get our portfolios in a good place, it doesn’t mean we can take out hands off of the wheel. Not entirely, as 100% hands-off investing is a myth.