mnrealestate's Blog: All Categories

When you've made the important decision to stop renting and buy your own home, you'll need a plan to get started on your search. While most real estate agents can advise and guide you through the home buying process, identifying exactly what you want and being clear about what you'll settle for - and won't settle for - will help you make the best decision for your long-term home investment.

You can get lost in the sea of choices presented by the home buying process. Choices require decisions: Where should I live? What type of home is best for my family? How big should my home be? All these decisions can overwhelm you but these can be managed easily by being as clear as possible about your wants and needs. Develop your own guideline for your ideal home…

Do you have jitters about putting your money towards real estate? After-all, the media LOVES to talk about what tumultuous times we're in right now. Home prices falling! Buyers beware! Protect yourself!

Never believe anyone that tells you an investment is 100% safe and smart. EVERYTHING that you do with your money has a certain amount of risk involved with it, even if it's just putting bills under your mattress; speaking of which, let's talk about what happens if you do NOTHING with the money you save (e.g., putting it under your mattress). That wouldn't be very smart-fire, flood, theft, etc. could make your money disappear very quickly with no hope for return.

Here is another scenario: what if you opted to put your money in a bank safety deposit box?…

How many times have you heard people grumble about taxes? Eventually, they get tired of simply complaining about how much money in taxes they have to pay and move on to how much money on taxes the rich DON'T have to pay. It can be frustrating, can't it, knowing that people with less money get fewer breaks than people with loads of money? It's frustrating because it isn't fair. And if you happen to be one of the people on the low-income/high tax-percentage side, then you may experience some resentment.

Unfortunately, simply recognizing injustices and complaining about them isn't sufficient to change the ways of the world. The rich will inevitably have money and therefore power, and they will use this power to stack the deck in their favor, particularly…

Those who aspire toward riches should know that, in order to achieve their goals, they will need to abandon much of the conventional wisdom passed on to them by parents, teachers, and others. You may, however, already be on the right track- that is, if you were lucky enough to have a role model who knew what it really takes to become rich.

In the words of Robert Kiyosaki of "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" fame, "It doesn't take money to make money. I often hear people say it takes money to make money. I disagree. We had no money when we started and we were also in debt. It also doesn't take a formal education."

Kiyosaki proceeded to cite the case of Bill Gates: the Microsoft mogul never actually graduated from college, but did that keep him from making his fortune?…

There seem to be two types of people in the world: office slaves who very nearly treat work as a religion and who are in danger of neglecting the very families for whom they work so hard to provide; and people who have adopted more of a slacker mentality, convincing themselves that money isn't important because they don't want to be slaves to the workaday world.

Robert Kiyosaki, author of the Rich Dad book series, has money and he doesn't agree. "Anyone who says money isn't important obviously has not been without it long," he says in his book "Cash Flow Quadrant."

He knows because he has been in both situations. For several weeks in 1985, he and his wife were so destitute, they were actually forced to live in their car, after which they moved into…

What exactly is it that separates the wealthy from the rest of us?  This is an essential question that isn't asked nearly often enough. On first considering the question, you may be tempted to give answers such as, "Having wealthy parents" or "Winning the lottery" or even "Working at a cushy, high-paying job." Indeed, anyone in any of the aforementioned circumstances can count his or herself among the very lucky.

The bad news for those lucky people is that being in those circumstances is no guarantee of wealth. In fact, according to Robert Kiyosaki, author of the Rich Dad book series, it isn't about how much money you bring in, but how much money you keep that determines how wealthy you are.

Kiyosaki's father, the so-called "Poor Dad," is a great example…

Now is a wonderful time to look for your next home! So many places are available at unusually low prices, and townhomes in Minnesota are no exception! Minnesota townhouses are a great option to think about if you are thinking about purchasing. What advantages do townhouses have over typical stand-alone houses? For starters, there's generally less exterior maintenance to worry about since two of your four walls are shared with neighbors and are interior. If you don't need much yard space you can find many townhomes that have minimal grass to mow, especially if you have a deck or patio. Sometimes the lawn-care is even included in your association fees and you don't have to worry about it at all! Many great extras are included in townhouse communities,…

Robert Kiyosaki, in his Rich Dad, Poor Dad books emphasize how much benefit one can reap from investing in property. Real estate investing, in addition to its tax benefits, allows you to multiply your wealth without doing anything. Sounds like a great deal, right? Most investors initially enter the business because of the idea that they can put their money to work making them more money, without doing any actual work.

Property investing success doesn't happen by accident, though; you first need to know the nature of the business. And what is real estate, anyways? Read on to gain a better understanding of real estate, and the different ways in which you can invest.

A parcel of land, and any buildings or structures that stand on it, constitutes "real…