How Real Estate Accelerates Net Worth

I bought my first home in early 2000.  Much to my parent’s chagrin, I purchased a cold, hard loft in Chicago’s gritty Fulton Market neighborhood.  Surrounded by meat packing factories and industrial warehouses.  It was a condo conversion.  I paid $250K, with $50K down.  The $50K down payment was comprised of the fruits of my […]

How Real Estate Investing Keeps Your Taxes Low

An attractive element of real estate investment is that it creates a paper loss when in actuality you have gains. To understand how this can lower your taxes while increasing your income, here’s a quick example.

Rental Condo

Rent Collected
$15,200

Mortgage Pmts
(9,000)

Assessments
(2,000)

[…]

Lowering your AGI and keeping the real estate $25,000 passive income loss deduction

I made some good trades in the options market this year. In five months, I turned $15k into $65k. So what could possibly be the problem? Taxes. The man. Trying to get into my pockets again. Under tax law, if one’s Modified Adjusted Gross Income (MAGI) is over $150k, […]

Getting audited by the IRS

I always get anxious when walking through a security checkpoint, expecting the metal detector to beep even though I’ve emptied my pockets and removed every possible metallic object from my body. I get that same anxiousness whenever I see a letter from the IRS. In 2005, my feeling was justified. My tax […]

The Government Wants You to Become Rich Using Real Estate

In my opinion, there is no quicker, easier or safer way to build wealth than through real estate. In fact, the laws of this land are written heavily in your favor to purchase real estate, user real estate to lower your income taxes, and to keep most or all your investment gains. The […]

Blogging vs. Real Estate

Are you kidding?  Is this even a real comparison?  Ok, I admit that it’s a huge stretch, but as both a real estate investor and a blogger sometimes I wonder which one I should spend more time working on.
Alot of beginning real estate investors buy investments that yield negative cashflow betting on appreciation to make […]

The Two Sides of Stupidity

Of course, everyone would rather be smart than stupid. But not everyone can be so fortunate.
Stupidity affects your income, for sure. Someone lacking in brain cells is more likely to be an average or poor performer at work, which ultimately means less money in the paycheck compared to his or her cerebrally gifted […]

Why you should not buy a house in a flat or declining market

It’s the ago old question, should I buy or rent?  Most financial advisors and planners will always tell you to buy your own home as soon as possible.  You’ll start building up equity and have the pride of ownership. 
But that is not always case.  Mathematics will tell you differently.
In a today’s market, where homes in […]


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