Donald Trump Real Estate Guru Review
What kind of Real Estate Spy would I be if I didn’t deliver a legendary look at Donald Trump and his dealings? So, let me at least highlight the good points that you can learn from this monster mogul (and I mean that in a good way.)
It’s easy to be a critic. It is easy to sit on the sidelines and critique every player in the game. But it is a whole different when you gotta play the game. It’s even a different story when it comes to coaching a player to greatness. I believe there is a dynamic difference between telling someone they suck and showing them exactly how to get better.
So here goes.
I have scanned the web looking for some unique angle on Donald Trump that would provide you some marvelous insights for your real estate investing activities. Note, I often believe that you shouldn’t do what the gurus tell you as much as do what they are doing.
Does that make sense?
So let’s talk about Donald Trump the Billionaire Real Estate guru, and what you can get out of this review.
I started with a couple of questions, and I find it helps if you keep the same questions in the back of your mind as you read along.
What’s his true secret? How did he become wealthy? Who is he outside of his TV and Internet persona?
and most importantly…Can you be “Trump” rich?
I had a lot of questions and I think I came up with some pretty good answers.
Let’s face it…when it comes to Donald Trump I can think of like 10 Billion reasons to listen.
Donald Trump Real Estate Investment Strategy: 10 Billion Reasons to listen
It was 3 AM on a cold January morning. The phone rings.
Who could it be? Is it an emergency? Did somebody die? No… on the other end of the phone was a voice that quickly made it clear who it was. It was Citibank.
It was a crisis and they could not wait any longer. Donald put on his clothes and realized there was no getting out of this. The time had come.
The $9.2 billion that he owed could not be deferred any longer.
He had taught others never to personally guarantee any loans. However, he had broken his own rules by guaranteeing $1 billion personally. An Ally at Citibank told him that the only way to get through this was to contact all of the banks that he owed money to and attempt to work out a reasonable plan. That was what he was going to do.
In the publicly available documentary on Donald Trump, he tells the story of walking out of his apartment building and walking 15 blocks a little after 3 AM in the morning through the freezing rain on a New York January morning. He arrived wet and defeated looking. It was his absolute rock-bottom.
The media had their way with him in the 80s and portrayed him as losing it all. He was surprised that so many even seemed to enjoy the fact that he had fallen on hard times.
It just shows how much envy lurks. As a side, one of the cars I own is an exotic car. I find that the response I get from people who see my car is a mixed bag. Only about 20% of people (maybe even less) are actually happy for me.
Back to Trump:
He attributes his downfall as simply losing sight of what was important. He had left his eye off the ball. He now says that you must focus on your business at all times. The key is focus. When times get hard… focus even harder!
Donald later explains that when he was down on his luck, he remembers walking by a homeless man and he realized that the homeless man was $9.2 billion richer than he was.
The 80s were crazy times for him but by the mid 90s he came back with a vengeance.
He truly is the epitome of the successful real estate investor. He had learned the basic skills from his father and has passed them on to his son and daughter.
You can see an interview (which can be seen by clicking on the image above) with Donald and his son and daughter here. What I really noticed about the way that he talks to his children is that he always is sending a message of hope, however, he is very clear and concise the way he deals with them.
I believe that this communication style is partially the key to his success. He talks about how you need to be concise and to the point. He also recommends that you don’t fluff anything, and that you having short meetings that are designed to get things done efficiently.
After reviewing quite a bit of information on my own I discovered that he really has a soft side too. We often look at him one dimensionally as the “billionaire, you’re fired guy.” However, he has relationships that are long-standing with so many people. He loves his employees and cares for them but also knows he’s there for business.
If you spend any time watching the wildly acclaimed show: The apprentice, you might associate with Donald Trump as being the hire and fire/hatchet man. However, it doesn’t seem like he has any joy in firing people. He is just clear on what needs to be done.
And in his audiobook (available online) he discusses that hiring people is always a gamble. He says that sometimes people just interview well. When you interview them you want to give them the vice president position. Later on you might discover that the only thing they’re good at is interviewing.
But Mr. Trump makes it clear that if you hire the right people in your organization you’re going to save yourself a lot of headaches.
Some of the advice that I’ve been able to glean from Donald Trump is that one of the keys to investing is determining what the property is going to be used for. Once you have decided, (and you can leave yourself room to change your mind in case you decide that the property is better suited for another plan) then make it absolutely wonderful.
This is not the first time that we have encountered this concept of improvement. Pretty much every guru out there suggests that you improve the property. However each one’s take is slightly different. I like how Dolf de Roos mentions that there are 101 ways to improve the property without spending a lot of money whereas Donald trump seems to Trump him by saying make it absolutely wonderful. Hidden in these words sounds like a lot of expenses, but Donald obviously knows what he’s doing and probably would not risk spending too much money to over improve the property. Those are beginners mistakes.
That was what I did with a property that was originally built in 1932. I bought it in an area that I felt was up-and-coming. At the time in Florida there was an area that was very similar to the one I purchased in, and it did very well.
The home values had gone through the roof and I expected the same kind of trend to occur in this other area. My reasoning was simple. I believe that the other markets were getting too hot and the costs for homes were over inflated, so naturally the trend would progress toward the south and encompass this extended area outside of Orlando. So, I grabbed the property and I dumped $40,235.00 to improve it.
The problem was really in the purchase. I had not considered exactly how much would it would take in order to rehab this property well. It wasn’t just painting the property, it was way more. You can read more about what not to do and the rest of the story here.
In an interview with Robert Kyosaki and Donald Trump about leveraging debt to invest and make money in real estate, Robert reiterates the fact that he believes that houses are liabilities and not assets when we live in them. He basically says that if you were living in a house and can pay your mortgage then you’ll find out very quickly that your house is a liability. It is most likely the biggest one you got.
The concept is that you have to have debt in order to thrive in the real estate market and play a bigger game. (So much for all of the no money down, bad credit rags to riches ideas.) However Donald warns that it can be very dangerous, and you have to be very careful when dealing with debt as leverage to buy.
Another Important Message: Donald trump’s message is that he doesn’t need much to live on this earth. He recommends that you simply transform what you already own into something that makes sense for you. For example he has an amazing two-story apartment in Manhattan. He says it was part of the building that he owned. He said he had the choice of either selling that space or turning it into something that he liked while keeping what he owned.
He decided to just keep it.
This type of practical wisdom and thinking is displayed in so many places where Donald speaks.
He just has the nuts and bolts understanding of the financial world.
Donald Trump Millionaire Mindset…make that Billionaire Mindset:
When it comes to mindset Donald Trump talks about a friend that he had that always flew first class. At the time he wasn’t very successful and he said that he needed it in order to feel like he was important. He said he didn’t really agree with him at the time but this man is now very successful, and so he admits, it worked for him. Donald recommends doing whatever works for you in order for you to change what’s going on in your mind so that you believe in yourself.
The one thing that is really clear for me related to Donald Trump is that he always has an opinion. It really doesn’t seem to faze him when he sees people like Arnold Schwarzenegger having affairs or Beyoncé lip-synching, he just has a absolute opinion about it, and even through friendship calls a spade a spade.
I think this is probably another one of the key factors that made him so successful in life. He’s just not wishy-washy. He knows what he thinks and he’s clear on it. He’s also clear on communicating with other people.
He says that you need to be glib but not too glib and you need to communicate with brevity.
Trump University aka Trump Initiative Critique
You might’ve heard about the story of Donald Trump being sued by the New York Attorney General. There’s actually a lot of information online about this.
I don’t really want to spend a lot of time on this because it has been the subject of too many blogs already. So let me not beat a dead cow, but just in case you don’t know what this is about I’ll explain it in my two second Cliff Notes version.
Donald Trump was sued for $40 million by the Attorney General based on the concept that his training course defrauded many individuals out of between $1,495 and $35,000.
Students were allegedly made to believe that they would work directly with Donald Trump.
The Trump organization lashed back at the Attorney General saying that this was a politically charged lawsuit. I think there must be some validity to this based on the fact that there are so many other gurus out there that have a similar course plan and they are not getting sued by the attorney generals in their states.
Bottom line for me is that any education that you provide for yourself should increase your ability to offer the marketplace skills. I learned from Dani Johnson that the marketplace only pays for one thing “skill.”
I firmly believe that these courses if done properly and put into action would increase the students ability to make money out in the marketplace. So I have no beef with the process or the seminar or the costs.
After all Donald Trump is the billionaire and if he selects the information that would be important for you to learn the chances are you’ll learn something or at least something about yourself.
Trump Real Estate Advice Summary
Top 10 keys to Success as I see it from Donald Trump:
- Be Clear and Concise
- Get things done efficiently
- Focus, when things get tough, focus harder
- Brevity is the brilliant part of good communication
- Have options in business. Create a multiple choice for yourself.
- If you find that something isn’t suited for your initial goal, change it to suit.
- Think like a billionaire (abundance mentality)
- Do whatever you have to in order to switch your mental focus to possibility oriented thinking
- Don’t lose the human touch
- Be glib, but not too glib
Donald Trump Branding
This has to be my 11th (bonus) tip! If anything, it might be the best tip. If you think about one thing that Donald Trump has done well what would come to mind?
For me, it’s the name, the hair, the brand. It’s iconic. It supersedes time and I believe it’s here to stay. It is synonymous with Macy’s, Tiffany’s, Howard Stern. You name. Donald Trump is a brand. He has executed this part beautifully. We could learn quite a bit from that.
Trump Foundation:
Hey before I sign off I just want to mention that Donald Trump believes in giving. The Eric Trump Foundation has given over $30,000,000 (that’s right…million) to the St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. I firmly believe in giving. I believe that is probably what has opened my hand to receive.
If there is one thing that you can adopt is the heart of giving. I see it in Donald Trump, and I believe it is a lesson to learn and live by.
All the best,
