Building Your Real Estate Investment Team – Part 9: Conclusion

This post was written for The Rentables Apartment Blog as the ninth part of a series entitled “Building Your Real Estate Investment Team.”

In the ninth and final part of our series on Building Your Real Estate Investment Team we will take a look at how to round out your team and provide a quick recap of our series. As your real estate portfolio grows, your need for additional team members may grow as well. Whether you need a second Realtor who is an expert in the new region you’re looking to invest in or want to add an administrative assistant to help with some of the day-to-day tasks of running your real estate investment business, the principles we’ve covered throughout this series still apply.

Real Estate Investment Team selection criteria
As we’ve covered in each part of this series, here are 6 criteria to consider when selecting members for your real estate investment team. Look for professionals who:

Own investment real estate themselves
Care about your goals
Have the appropriate qualifications
Have specific experience working with investment properties in the area
Have reasonable fees
Provide positive chemistry

Team Members
Throughout this series we’ve covered the details on selecting a number of professionals for your team. These pros include:

Mortgage Brokers
Realtors
Lawyers
Home Inspectors
Insurance Brokers
Property Managers
Accountants

As you progress in your real estate investing career, you are bound to work with several other parties to accomplish a variety of tasks. The good news is that you can still use our 6 criteria as an initial screen when seeking out new relationships. Whether you are looking for general contractors, painters, handymen, electricians, landscapers, administrative staff, or any other help, you can use the list as a starting point.

How to Find Quality Professionals
In each part of our series we provided details on how to find quality professionals. While there may be specific places to look for each type of contact, the local Yellow Pages or an internet search will provide an abundance of contacts in your area. The easiest way to narrow these names down is to ask for referrals from other investors or members of your team. Recommendations from fellow investors are more likely to turn up other contacts who own investment real estate themselves, and this creates a great foundation to establish a new working relationship. Referrals who are familiar with the rental business are more likely to share similar attitudes and are often more knowledgeable on topics specific to real estate investors.

Conclusion
While it may take some time to stack your Real Estate Investment Team with great professionals, having the right team behind you can make all the difference in your business. Having the right financial, property, legal, tax, insurance and operational advice can save you hundreds of dollars and hours by preventing problems before they arise. Work with competent professionals to ensure all of your bases are covered and your portfolio will grow faster while you sleep well at night.