Real Estate Tip of The Month : Short Sale Pre-Foreclosures

Hello All:

Here is your July real estate tip of the month. When dealing with pre-foreclosures, and deciding whether to do a short sale, find out up front if the mortgage had PMI insurance! Why? If you were active in real estate investing in the late 80s early 90s when we were in a foreclosure cycle, but at a much lesser magnitude, most mortgages hadPMI insurance. This allowed lenders to take back properties and turn down the majority of short sale offers, and bring those properties into their REO inventory - thus lessening there financial exposure.

What's different in this cycle we are experiencing is that do to creative loans like 80/20s, the cushion is not there! So it stands to reason, if you know how to navigate the short sale process you will be able to get unbelievable deals ( just make sure you have someone in the wings to buy it).

If you stumble upon a deal that has PMI insurance you may want to move on to a property that doesn't have any! That doesn't mean that it is impossible to negotiate a good deal; just more complicated. If you would like to take your short sale skills and tactics to the next level, please do not hesitate to take a look at my investing tools at http://www.JGage.com and click on investing tools or products.

Be well.

New Resource: Negotiating For A Living

Hello All:

I hope you all had a safe and pleasurable 4th of July. Please forgive me for being away from the blog for the last couple of weeks, but I have been busy finishing up a web site that I have been trying to get up for a year or so! That being said, most of you know I have a background as an Arbitrator, which caused me to bring those negotiating skills into my successful real estate investing, and which I have imparted to my mentoring students.

I have started http://www.NegotiatingForALiving.com to teach individuals to do what I have done for 21 plus years! If you are looking for great way to fund your real estate deals, you owe it to yourself to stop by www.negotiatingforaliving.com and watch my video on negotiating for a living.

Until next time be well.

James Gage

Fishing Question

Hi All:

Just a quick post. Some of you know that I love fishing; actually that's what I do with most of my free time from real estate investing. That being said, some of you have asked me where I go for my fishing info?

I use http://www.thefishingsearch.com , I find more relevant links here then on the search engines.

Hope this helps.

TOP 10 REASONS TO BECOME A BETTER NEGOTIATOR IN REAL ESTATE & EVERY OTHER ASPECT OF YOUR LIFE! Part 4

Number 4 of our 10 points deals with: Avoid being cheated or ending up on the short end of the stick.

This tip is straight forward – do your homework. What I mean is, before you enter into any negotiation do some research on your opponent or the person or person (s) that represent their interests. Let me explain …

When lawyers get ready to defend a litigation, one of the first things they do after reading the case file or complaint is research where the opposing attorney went to school, when they graduated and what firm they work for ( this is done via a lawyers state resource known as “The Red Book” ).

Why is this done? Simple, get a leg up on their opponent! Let’s break it down so you will be able to apply it to any venue.

Question: Why does the lawyer care where his opponent went to school?

Answer: All education is not the same, or at least in the eyes of some. Say a lawyer from Harvard is going against a lawyer from a local, small town law school; even though you and I know some of the best people in the industry are from small schools and do laps around Ivy League graduates – they don’t!

So therefore, the Harvard graduate is going to point out where he or she graduated at every juncture, hoping this will psychologically affect their opponent causing them to roll over because they are out of their league- AKA “their out of their league”.

Question: When they graduated?

Answer: Again the opposing attorney wants to know whether he is dealing with a seasoned veteran or someone wet behind the ears. Can you see how important this information can be; remember novices make foolish mistakes.

Question: What firm they work for.

Answer: Once again if their opponent is from a small firm or hang their own shingle, the experienced lawyer, if part of a larger firm asks the opposing counsel over to their firm for the negotiations. Why? The psychological factor – home court advantage, along with the intimidation factor.

I think by this example you can clearly see how you can add this into any situation or industry you are negotiating for or in so you don’t end up on the short end of the stick.

Be well,

James Gage

TOP 10 REASONS TO BECOME A BETTER NEGOTIATOR IN REAL ESTATE & EVERY OTHER ASPECT OF YOUR LIFE! Part 3

Number 3 of our 10 points deals with: Maximize financial returns, while creating the edge in negotiations.

The person who mentions price first always ends up on the losing end of the stick. Let’s think about that for a moment. Is it a true statement? Over my 20 plus years of negotiating for a living and real estate investing I can say without reservation absolutely Yes!

Let me explain. When you make the initial offer you give up the ability to see how flexible your opponent is regards to the issue being negotiated, in addition your first offer may be too high and your opponent may accept it on the opening round.

If you are forced to put an initial offer on the table, make sure it is a low ball offer which will demand a counter offer from your opponent.

Be well,

James Gage

TOP 10 REASONS TO BECOME A BETTER NEGOTIATOR IN REAL ESTATE & EVERY OTHER ASPECT OF YOUR LIFE! Part 2

Number 2 of our 10 points deals with : "Achieve Desired Outcomes". This is where most negotiators go wrong and settle for whatever they can get in the negotiation process. The number one reason negotiators do not achieve the desired outcome they hope to achieve is because they fail to stick to their negotiating plan, and default to their opponents agenda. The kiss of death to any negotiator is to allow your opponent to take control from you during the negotiating process; it’s better for you to either stop the negotiations or ask for a break! You could use a ploy such as: “ I would really like to postpone this meeting until I have assembled some more information or documentation, so I may provide the most up to date and correct resources or numbers etc……”.

If you would rather just have a break use something like this : ask for a bathroom break, tell them you have to make an important phone call or start talking about something that has very little to due with the subject matter at hand – this in the legal arena is called a “side bar”.

The ploy or break allows you time to get back on track with your agenda and start with a clean slate. This will hopefully break or interrupt your opponents stride and or thought process and allow you to get back on track.

In conclusion, in order to achieve the desired outcome : 1. Never loose control of the negotiations; if so use a ploy or a break technique.

2. Always stay on track with your plan and never give control of the negotiations over to your opponent. Keep these 2 points in mind and you will always achieve your desired outcome.

Be well,

James Gage

TOP 10 REASONS TO BECOME A BETTER NEGOTIATOR IN REAL ESTATE & EVERY OTHER ASPECT OF YOUR LIFE! Part 1

Number 1 of our 10 points deals with : "More Personal & Professional Profitability". Plain and simple, it means the better negotiator your are the more your bank account will increase.

The first mistake people make is thinking that sales and negotiating are 2 different animals - nothing could be further from the truth. We need to treat negotiating as if we are a commission based sales person, that every step of the negotiating process is a matter of putting food on the table.
With that in mind we must change the way we approach the negotiating table and forget about getting to "yes" and get to "no" as soon as possible in order to make maximum profit and leverage time to our greatest benefit.
Instead of dealing with prolonged negotiations, determine upfront whether your time invested will bear fruit or establish whether you are on a hopeless quest leading no where. If you probe your opponent, you sound be able to know based on pointed questions, within 5-7 minutes, if you will be able to accomplish a winning negotiating session; this holds true in real estate, business transactions and personal venues.

" Negotiating is a "Million Dollar Skill".

Until next time be well.

James Gage