Is our mission to make money or to solve people’s problems?

Obviously we have to feed our families and we want our real estate investing efforts to do so much more; namely, provide us the FREEDOM of doing something we love and getting paid enormous amounts of money to do it…. BUT we only get paid if and when we help people by providing valuable, creative, and timely solutions to their needs.

Of course, we can make a buck without a care in the world about solving people’s problems. But we do so at the risk of making everything about the money. When people around us—employees, partners, sellers, buyers, other real estate professionals and business people—begin to sense that money rules our every decision, they will resent it and our business relationships will enviably suffer. And there is something even more frightening—our soul will shrivel and die. “What does it profit a man,” asked a poor but insightful carpenter from Nazareth, “to gain the whole world but to forfeit his soul?” The answer is no less true today.

Doesn’t money represent security for most people? It’s insurance that we will have what we want and what we need–we’ll be taken care of. But are you going to trust that a certain number of digits in your bank account will actually do that for you!? Maybe this begs the larger question… I mean the really BIG QUESTION. When people gather around at our funeral to say nice things about us what would want to hear—he/she did a great job at making money or he/she really made a difference in people’s lives? It’s not an EITHER/OR here. It’s BOTH/AND: He/she looked out for other people and in so doing he/she got what they needed… and wanted!

There was a book written twenty years ago now entitled, Do What You Love, The Money Will Follow. There is much truth in that and the same can be said about prioritizing our mission: Serve People in the Moment of Their Need and The Money Will Follow. Turn these two around and your business will suffer as much as your soul!

Stewardship Properties’ byline is to serve people in their housing needs.

Stewardship Mentors’ byline is to serve investors in their business needs.

We mean them both. Our successes comes from our service to others, our long-term success comes from a genuine heart of service. When you find a way to solve people’s problem you will find yourself handsomely rewarded for it. And if you don’t, well, you’ll live to serve another day.

It will be Big. No, it will be GINOROMOUS!

PUTTING IT OUT THERE: It’s Thanksgiving, 2008 and a long time between now and March 1, 2010. As a matter of fact it’s still three months until March 1, 2009. But make no doubt about it, March 1, 2010 is coming. And when it does we’re going live with… well more about this later.

In the mean time RealEstateRiches.com is committed to becoming A FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH in the real estate investment world. You know… like a earthquake, a volcano, a hurricane–something that doesn’t leave the landscape in the same way it found it.

Sure there may be some things that get destroyed along the way–like old fashion, been-there-done-that, unproductive real estate investment strategies. But overall the plan is to rearrange the landscape in such a way that real estate investors, and those who want to be, start employing the most shockingly useful, money-producing, and time saving real estate investment strategies known to man, or to woman, for that matter. And we want YOU to be there with us along for the ride.

So, stay tune. This may get bumpy but it should also put a lot more O’s behind those numbers in your bank account! I suppose Overstock.com has trademarked, “It’s all about the O’s.” We’re just planning to actually make it happen for…  ALL OF US.