WHEN PROPERTYMANAGEMENTMEETS MARRIAGE MANAGEMENT When you look online, you often see people posting about how awesome it is for them to work with their spouses. You see images of happy couples grinning ear-to-ear in front of beautifully designed Airbnb homes and cutely dabbing paint on each other’s noses. If you are considering this as a sound rationale for working with your husband or wife in real estate, you must understand immediately that the cute stuff is not where the cold, hard, bottom line lives when you work with your partner. The cute stuff is fun, but it is not the whole picture. The whole picture is not just working on your own business, but one or both of you working other jobs, or for the family, or in the home, and dropping everything to help out. Furthermore, dropping it with a willing, happy spirit. The whole picture involves figuring out where you both fit in the business and, furthermore, accepting you cannot both do everything or fill every role. Someone will be “in the spotlight” in most cases. Accept that it will seldom be both of you and figure out a way to make that work if the “behind the scenes” partner feels they are being overlooked. ASK QUESTIONS It is a good thing when spouses work together in real estate but do not always see eye-to-eye. After all, that is where the saying, “Iron sharpens iron” essentially comes from. It means that wise people should always question, encourage, and challenge each other. In this context, it means there is no better person to question, challenge, and encourage you to create the best investing scenarios possible for yourself and your family than your spouse, whose goals match yours. However, sometimes that sharpening can be a little tough to take. Here are a few basic questions you can ask each other when things are going smoothly to help pave the way for productive resolution when you do not see eye-to-eye: • When does your role take precedence over mine in decision-making? • How do we keep our bottom line and our budget firmly intact? • Do we agree to not “cave” on things that will ultimately hurt our returns and our projects? • Many husband-wife real estate investor teams never do get this part of the process down, and they lose a lot of money as a result.
COMMUNICATION IS CRUCIAL The way to work through issues like these is with a lot of communication, but that communication itself requires a certain learned skill set. Just telling each other what you each think until you’re blue in the face does not lead to appreciating property values or effective portfolio management. Instead, the art of communicating as colleagues and peers while remaining loved ones, life partners, and friends, is a finely tuned art that requires patience and practice. Every couple is different, and not everyone should work together. However, in the real estate sector more than most, the odds are good that you will find yourself either formally or informally working together at some point in your real estate investing career. If and when you do, keep in mind that your goal is so much more than generating positive returns; it is helping your spouse grow to be exactly who they were intended to be. If that remains your top priority, your real estate investments and your business will benefit. •
Tom & Becky Olson are based in Gary, Indiana. They have been investing in real estate for more than two decades and operate thriving businesses in multiple real estate-related sectors, including rehabs, turnkey rentals, and Airbnb rentals and sales. Tom is the founder and president of the Good Success Mastermind, a mas- termind for small-business owners and real estate investors dedicated to helping successful small-business owners and investors achieve fulfillment, live their life’s purpose, and give back to their community in productive and profitable ways. Learn more at GoodSuccess.com or email Tom at tolson@GoodSuccess.com.
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