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You need to find a group that physically meets in the area where you want to invest so you can go to meetings, talk to people, and put faces to names. Here in the Kansas City Metro I would suggested our local Kansas City REIA (Mid-America Association of Real Estate Investors).
If you are not in Kansas City, there are a few places where you will find lists of associations.
The best is the National Real Estate Investors Association found online at http://www.NationalREIA.com. This is a trade association of local REIA groups across the country that band together to present a united front when dealing with changing or influencing legislation, asking for discounts with national vendors that real estate investors use, and organizing members to present a uniform and professional way of doing business.
If you just can’t find a group in your area that is a member of National REIA, you will find other web sites that have been created to sell training material that have a networking piece as well as a list of groups across the country. Two such sites are www.CREOnline.com (probably the oldest) and www.REIClub.com. You do need to be careful with these two sites however as it is absolutely free to post your group on their site, no membership fees, no code of ethics, nothing. So the groups there might just be a front for a single trainer person, a realtor trying to sell their investment properties, or a scammer just trying to make a buck off of you. Not to scare you off as most of the member’s of national REIA, like our group here in Kansas City are also listed on these two sites. But I want to make you aware.
Now what if there just is not a group in the area you want to be. The only way you are going to attend a live group is by driving 2 or 3 hours. That’s when you may want to take a different approach. First join the local chamber of commerce and use the networking techniques will talk about in the next few articles and find people and businesses that work in the real estate investment arena or offer services for small businesses. This will give you live face to face people to meet with, then working with these like minded people, form your own Real Estate Investor Association and become a part of National REIA.
This article is a part of a series of articles to help new people and experienced people figure out how to utilize their REIA group and build their investing team. Please watch for our previous or upcoming articles:
1. Where to find a real estate investment club.
2. What to look for in a real estate investment club.
3. What to take with you to a real estate investment club meeting.
4. Get the most out of the vendors at the real estate investment club meeting.
5. Networking at the real estate investment club meeting.
6. Learning at the real estate investment club meeting.
7. Follow up after the real estate investment club meeting.
8. Beyond the real estate investment club meeting.
About the author: Kim Tucker is an active real estate investor in the Kansas City Metro area as well as the director of Mid-America Association of Real Estate Investors or MAREI. MAREI works exclusively with real estate investors who want to learn and success at real estate investing. Get more information at www.KansasCityREIA.com or www.MAREInet.com.
Photo:
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