Learn how to limit your trials and errors

I still remember seeing the black smoke rising from the building. It was hard to watch. I was actually supposed to be in the building, but I overslept my alarm and missed my train. It was a blessing in disguise, but it didn’t make me feel good. My business was about to literally come crashing down along with the multi-million dollar investment that was committed from the investor that was in the building that day. And then there were the friends and innocent people stuck in the building. People were actually willing to jump out of the building to try and save their lives or just escape the fire. I knew how lucky I was to be alive. I also knew I wanted to make a more valuable impact from that forward.

One month after the 9/11 tragedy, I started a Real Estate business with a new business partner. I was focused on making a difference in the world and I wanted to create a successful business.

After setting up the company and announcing that we were open for business, my partner stressed the need for us to do something to show people we actually in business.

The challenge was that we were new in the business and we lacked money and experience, so what could we do that would be a small win on the books?

Our initial strategy was to go to the foreclosure auctions on the steps of the courthouse. We very quickly learned that you needed lots of money and time to be good at this kind of business endeavor and most of the players were very well seasoned. We were fresh meat in the auctions and could easily lose our shirt if we weren’t smart.

So I began to do a lot of online research about real estate investing and what were low-cost, low risk, high reward strategies. Finally, I called my financial advisor and shared with him my new business venture and asked him what did he think the best real estate investments were for new business starting out.

He replied simply, “you can’t go wrong with raw land. It has little downside and lots of potential. You just have to pick the right location and the right price.”

That one conversation helped me accelerate our search for a quick win because now I had something tangible to focus in on.

Over then next few weeks I focused all my effort on looking for cheap land in locations I thought would be good opportunities to flip the land for a profit. Eventually I found land in Hawaii and California that fit our price range and requirements. It was an easy deal and I was able to use credit cards to make the purchases. We were suddenly new land owners and effectively in business.

This is one of the important keys to becoming a super-achiever, you have to find the most effective way forward and the figure out the best way to go in that direction to be successful.