Real Estate Investments
Solano County, San Francisco North Bay, Ca. USA

Advantages

There are many gurus out there that contend that real estate is a panacea where you cannot lose money. Although this is false, there are a number of advantages to investing in real estate.

The first big advantage is that it is an extremely expensive product. Each sale you make generates more profit potential for this reason.

Leverage, or the ability to borrow based on the value of the property, is probably the second greatest advantage. It is much easier to finance real estate than any other product. While investing in most assets requires the purchaser to have the full purchase price available for the asset, in real estate investing, one only needs to have a fraction of the purchase price available (like 5%, 10% or 20%) as a down payment. Therefore, real estate, although incredibly expensive, is still easier to buy than say, a piece of industrial equipment of the same value.

Local advantage is rarely discussed but it stands to reason that you know your neighborhood better than a real estate investing expert would if they were in another part of the world. This creates an advantage the beginner can exploit in his market.