Two simple secrets to sustainable wealth

Some of the categorisations they've come up with are the frugal investor, the impatient investor, the burnt investor and even the Buffett investor. 

Personally, they have fallen under each of these categories and have learned that there is little correlation between the type of investor you are and whether you will win or lose in the property game.

Instead success - sustainable wealth - comes down to your approach and your attitude.  

According to Mr Harris: “It's just to try and bring focus and awareness to what type of investor you are now and, more importantly, what type of investor do you actually want to become.”

1. Your approach: Answer the ‘why’

As simple as it may seem, identifying your Point A and your Point B is one of the most important steps to take in your investment journey—but it’s also one of the most commonly missed by budding investors, Mr Harris said.

In fact, both Mr Harris and Mr Bateman agree that it remains as ‘the biggest planning folly’ in property investment.

But before jumping into markets and shelling out your savings for an investment, they strongly encouraged budding investors to take a step back and reflect on why are you investing in property?

Mr Harris said: “Everybody wants to make money. That's the standard default response, but what we worked out is that most investors haven't actually identified specifically what they're trying to achieve for their own circumstances.”

By knowing the ‘why’, you can take the complexities of property as an investment and bring it back to a basic level—thus easily answering the ‘where’, ‘when’ and ‘how’.

According to Mr Bateman: “Trying to bring wealth-creation back to a basic level means knowing why are you investing and what's the long-term outcome you're trying to achieve. Then, it's a matter of finding the opportunities that will best fit that outcome.

“We start with the why because you may not be ready to invest. Just because you've got some dollars in your pocket doesn't mean you should go and just throw them at the first property you see,” he added.

By knowing where you are and where you want to go, you can essentially just connect the dots through the right strategies, with the help of the right professionals.

“To get real results and long-term sustainable wealth, you need to get real with your situation and have a real understanding of what you're trying to achieve. Once you've got that clarity, the decisions that you make in your investing becomes so much clearer,” Mr Harris highlighted.

2. Your attitude: Be coachable

Aside from knowing your purpose as an investor, recognising that you can’t do it all yourself is a vital part of your pre-investment reflection, according to The Property Mentors.

While self-education is naturally encouraged, there’s only so much you can learn within a period of time, especially if, like many others, you have yet to become a full-time investor.

Mr Harris said: “As a property investor you've got to be understanding of the fact that you don't know everything. You don't know what you don't know.”

Know enough to have an educated conversation with professionals and reflect on their advice, but don’t push yourself to be an expert at every single facet of property investment.

After all, there are people in the real estate industry whose job is to help investors. Leverage on that opportunity by surrounding yourself with experts and professionals who are willing to understand you as an investor—your goals, capabilities and limitations—and commit to helping you succeed.

According to Mr Harris: “I'm not an expert in finance but I know enough about finance so that I can have a really good conversation with my mortgage broker. I'm not an accounting expert, but I know enough to talk to my accountant about structures and tax planning.”

“I think the main thing as a property investor, if you want to get high level results, you're going to have to get your education up to a high level.

“If you want your property investing to be a hobby, by all means, treat it as a hobby, but you'll get the results of somebody that's running a hobby. To step up to the next level, you need to increase your education and get an expert team around you,” he added.

At the end of the day, the ‘why’ is going to be your motivation. but your education, coupled with your team of experts, is what will get you going and drive you to the top sooner.

Take sportsmen, for example. They are dedicated to their craft and have bare bones talent. But without their support system, it would be much harder to dive into that pool, finish a 50-meter splash, win a medal and recover in time for the next competition.

Mr Bateman said: “Behind them, there's a whole raft of people—the Australian Institute of Sport, state-level institutes of sports, coaches from junior level all the way through to senior, support staff, chiropractors, physios, strength and conditioning coaches.

“There's a huge team that sits behind anybody that's performing at a high level. You can’t just say, ‘I can do it all on my own,’ ” he concluded.

Tune in to Matthew Bateman and Luke Harris’ episode on The Smart Property Investment Show to know how you can get the results you are trying to receive while protecting yourself from bad investment decisions.