ETR: You May Be Tired of Hearing This...

Issue No. 14 - $1.91	Saturday, October 31, 2009
My partner Peter and I bought another property in Delray Beach this month. It's a 1,400-square-foot, single-family home. It has three large bedrooms, two baths, and a modern kitchen. It's near the railroad tracks, but the neighborhood is not bad and the price was right. We paid $90,000 for it. A new coat of paint, carpeting, and some landscaping cost another $5,000. (Peter's become an expert at finding good tradesmen who charge reasonable rates.) Long before the bubble, Peter bought and renovated a house across the street from this one. He sold it three years ago for a nice profit. It still looks good. We have put a bid on a third house on the same block. We were told that the bank wanted $145,000 for it (the appraised value). We offered $100,000 cash. We like buying houses in proximity to one another. You can fix them up and create a mini neighborhood that attracts quality tenants who pay higher rentals. Prices in Florida are as low as I've seen them in 20 years. Our investment strategy is simple. We buy well-built homes in solid, working class neighborhoods for about a third of what they were selling for at the height of the bubble. When Peter and I tell people we are buying property these days, they often look at us like we're crazy. But, as a contrarian investor, that is the reaction you want to see. Remember, the people giving you those looks are the same ones who were buying property like crazy when it was 200 percent and 300 percent overvalued. Unemployment is already at 11 percent or 16 percent, if you do the right sort of accounting. In this type of environment, people lose jobs. Even good, hardworking, loyal people. Don't make the mistake of thinking your job is secure. You don't want to get to work one day and find a pink slip on your desk or, worse, the front door padlocked. There are two things every smart working person must do immediately to secure his or her financial future. Become an invaluable employee. Develop valuable skills that can be used to get another job or start a business. There is a difference between a good and an invaluable employee. Good employees come in to work every day and do a good job. They have a good attitude. They work overtime when asked. They don't complain. Invaluable employees are instrumental in producing profits for their business. Salespeople, marketers, copywriters, and profit center managers -- if they are really good at what they do -- are invaluable. If you are working in customer service, accounting, or engineering, your salary is on the expense side of the ledger. You may be great at what you do -- but when a business has to cut expenses, employees who fall on that side of the line will always be let go sooner than employees who are bringing in the bacon. But if you demonstrate a superior attitude by volunteering to do extra work and showing an interest in the profit side of the business, you may be considered "potentially invaluable" when it comes time to chop off heads. (When I consult with clients about cutting down payroll, I ask them to focus on individual people and their potential, not their current roles.) The core profit-driving mechanisms of every business are salesmanship and direct marketing. So I recommend that you study one or both of these skills. The more knowledge you have of them, the more potential you will show for becoming invaluable one day. This is also a good time to look into home-based business opportunities. If you have spare time in the evenings or on weekends, why not put it to good use by developing a second stream of income? Between the programs that we have developed at ETR and those we endorse from American Writers & Artists Inc., you have the following "second-income" opportunities available to you right now: Copywriting Internet Marketing Small Business (online or offline) In every big city, there are three kinds of hotels: Business hotels Tourist hotels Quality hotels Business hotels are efficient and sometimes luxurious, but they tend to treat their customers impersonally. The Ritz-Carlton in New York's Battery Park is a good example. Fine furnishings. Everything you need. But there are so many concierges that you rarely see the same one twice. So, of course, they never remember your name. Tourist hotels are horrible. They are usually tacky and crowded and populated by people who dress like your schleppy Uncle Marvin. There are, indeed, luxury tourist hotels. But they are horrible for different reasons. They charge way too much for everything, and they are populated by people who act like your pretentious Aunt Bernadette. Like business and tourist hotels, quality hotels come in all price ranges. What defines them are exceptional ambiance and service. And, of course, the absence of guests who remind you of Uncle Marvin or Aunt Bernadette. Examples of quality hotels include the Ritz-Carlton in Madrid and the Crillon in Paris. I like to stay in quality hotels. But I often end up in a luxury business hotel, which is fine so long as I'm on business. Sometimes I make the mistake of booking myself into an expensive tourist hotel. That leaves me feeling like I've been fleeced by a Las Vegas hooker. Strike that. I can imagine -- but I really don't know what it feels like to be fleeced by a Las Vegas hooker. When booking hotels, it pays to do some Internet research. It doesn't take long to find out everything you need to know about a hotel, including room sizes and configurations, amenities, charges, and what previous customers say about it. The Fasano Hotel is considered the best hotel in Rio. And in many respects it is. The lobby is nice, the rooms are beautiful, the bed linens and towels are extra fine, and the service is topnotch. But during a recent five-day stay, I was disappointed to discover that it is, in essence, a tourist hotel. Here is what happened. After a pleasant business dinner at a very nice restaurant, I returned to the hotel. I was not yet ready for bed, so I stopped by the lobby bar for a quick drink. I pointed to a bottle that I thought I recognized and said, "I want that -- the Hennessy Paradis." The bartender poured me a drink from the bottle I'd pointed to (which, as it turns out, was not Hennessy Paradis). When I got the check, it was $550. In my most insane moments, I have never ordered a drink that cost more than $80. And although I like to think of myself as reasonably au courant on fine Cognacs, I had no idea that even the finest could go for $550 a glass. (And this one, believe me, was nowhere near the finest.) When I told the bartender "There must be some mistake," she assured me it was I who was mistaken. She showed me the bar menu to prove it. "Why didn't you tell me it costs that much?" I asked. "We are not allowed to," she admitted. "Management says it would embarrass the customers." "Well, that's nice," I thought. "Management didn't want to embarrass me. How do they think I feel now that I've discovered a gulp of that stuff just cost me more than the super-priced suite I'm staying in?" That's when I got the idea to admit what an idiot I was to the 900,000 people who read the MM Journal every Saturday. I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to warn my readers about the risks of touristy hotels -- the cheap ones and the expensive ones. (And just so you don't think I'm a bigger idiot than I've just proven myself to be... I didn't learn all of the following from personal experience. Some of these suggestions are from friends who fell into different traps than I've fallen into.) Here is a short list of what not to do: Don't assume that because a hotel has a famous name you are going to be given great service at a reasonable price. Before booking, shop for value. Never pay the official room rate. There are at least a half-dozen discounted prices for every room at any time. Never eat at hotel restaurants -- especially at fancy hotels. They are rarely all that good, and are invariably twice as expensive as the better restaurant across the street or around the corner. Never have your clothes cleaned at a hotel. The cost of laundering a T-shirt, for example, is almost always more than what you paid for it in the first place. Don't let it slide if all you can see from your "ocean view" room is a sliver between two buildings when you lean over the balcony. Demand to get what you're paying for. Never raid the mini bar. Not only are the prices outrageous, but now many hotels are charging restocking fees. Don't let yourself be rushed at checkout. Examine your bill for resort fees, pay-per-view movies, and room service. Many times other guests (or staff members) accidentally charge things to the wrong room. As I said, that's just a short list. I'm sure you've had "educational" experiences of your own with touristy hotels -- and I invite you to share with your fellow MM Journal readers here: AskETR@ETRFeedback.com. For most people, getting older means getting fatter. And there is a good reason for it. Our metabolism slows down some over the years. But that's not the only factor. There is something else that happens that most people don't pay much attention to. As we age, we usually get much less active. Think about it. When you were young, your parents almost had to tie you down to keep you still. You weren't going to the gym back then. You may not have been playing sports. But you were constantly moving. And when you weren't moving -- when, for example, you were "stuck" in class -- you felt fidgety. That's because your body just wanted to keep moving. And so you kept it moving every chance you got. As adults, many of us spend eight hours a day sitting in an office and then another three or four hours sitting on the couch. Add to that the time we spend seated while eating, and you get the full picture. We've switched our physical routines from moving around most of the time to exercising for, maybe, one hour a day. And when we exercise, we do aerobics and spin classes and weightlifting. None of these activities get our bodies into the zone necessary to build strong lungs and a strong heart. The other thing that changes as we get older is the way we feel about eating. When we were young, we wanted to eat only when we were hungry and only enough to satisfy that hunger. If we had been in charge of our eating back then, we'd have eaten very sporadically. But almost as soon as we were able to hold a fork, our parents began "teaching" us to eat properly -- which meant seated at a table. And we were taught to finish everything on our plates (because people in China were starving). That is a very bad, very unnatural way to eat. Yet it's been the traditional pattern in this country since the Industrial Revolution. Add to that the foods we eat today. "Our modern diet," Dr. Al Sears says, "is processed and full of additives and other toxins. [Those chemicals] throw off your body's 'fat signals.' These signals tell your body how much fat to make and store." I believe that anyone can counteract a slowing metabolism by sticking to a natural pattern of activity and eating. Natural means eating like cavemen -- our ancestors -- ate. Less frequently, less compulsively... and no artificial ingredients. More on this in future issues. But for now, you can check out Dr. Sears's book that covers, among other things, what you should be eating. Are You a Junkie Yet? My main essay on Monday, "The Junkie's Secret," generated a lot of reader feedback. Some people were dismayed that I'd praised the actions of drug addicts. What can I say? I was praising their work ethic, not their criminal behavior. Most readers got that. Here's one who did: "As a professional marketer with 16 years of experience offline and now 13 years online, yours is one of the few e-zines I can still learn a lot from week after week... "But 'The Junkie's Secret' is easily the best motivational piece I've read in years! It so concisely and precisely delineates the traits and focus needed for mega-success, yet puts it in terms anyone can understand and visualize. Kudos! "As an aside, let me say that not since first reading Robert Ringer's Winning Through Intimidation and Looking Out For #1 back in the seventies have I enjoyed anyone else's biz writings as much as I do yours. Now, being able to read both you and Ringer online enriches my day. So please accept my not-so-humble thanks for all you do. Keep it up, man! "To your continued success... " Doug Champigny Welland, Ontario [Ed. Note: Michael Masterson welcomes your questions and comments. Send him a message at AskMichael@ETRFeedback.com.]
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