The biggest mistake I have ever made in my investing career was selling. The next biggest was waiting to buy because I thought prices would come down. If you sit on your assets and wait for the time to be right, you’ll never own any real estate.

The interesting thing to me is that there are plenty of people making good money in this economy, because they have the right cookie cutter for this market. And if you are stuck, or if you don’t know what to do next, then you need a “jump start.” Well, here are some ideas to help you JUMP START your investing, and these apply to you whether you own 50 rental homes or are looking just to buy your first house for you to live in. It doesn’t matter, we all occasionally need a swift kick to get going:

1.Find someone who is experiencing success right now and find out what they are doing, then do it. I recently heard from my former student Mike Cherwenka , who tells me he now has over 80 rental homes and has positive cash flow on every one of them. He is now my hero. Mike tells me the key is to make my profit on the way into a deal by always making a low offer. If the seller won’t sell at the right price, just walk away.

2. Learn a new way of meeting sellers. We all fall into patterns of behavior, and begin to think that there is no other way of reaching potential sellers. If you are finding it hard to locate sellers who really need to sell, you might want to focus on chasing foreclosures for a few months. There are so may homes being advertised as going into foreclosure that there really aren’t enough buyers to go around. As a result, homes are going begging at the county auctions. I know this sounds crazy, but it’s true. Last month, there were over three thousand homes advertised as going to the steps in the 13 county metro area. Pick a hundred next month and knock on every door. I bet you’ll be amazed.

3. Do something entirely different. Pick a lower middle class neighborhood where you would like to own a rental property if you could buy one for the right price. Show up on Saturday morning at 9 AM and start knocking on doors. Start at one end of the street and go up and down the block ringing the door bell. Say this: Hi, my name is Joe Blow and I sure do like this neighborhood. I’m thinking about buying a house here and I wondered if you might know of anybody getting ready to sell? Then be quiet, and see what they say. Don’t stop until you have talked with 25 residents. I bet you’ll be amazed. Again.

4. Do something else entirely different. Pick another lower middle class area where you would like to buy a home if you could get one for the right price. Have an agent print out for you the 50 lowest price listings in FMLS and MLS for that area. Then make a cash offer for 60% of asking price and fax it to the listing agent on each one. This will cost you nothing because the fax is free and the phone call is free. And I guarantee you will get some sort of response. If nothing else, you will find out quickly which agents are motivated and which sellers really want to sell. Make sure your offers are contingent on a full inspection to your satisfaction. Remember, the agent is required to present your offer to the seller only if the offer is in writing.

5. Meet new people. Go to the next meeting of Georgia Real Estate Investors Association, and commit to meeting at least five investors that you have not known before. Call all of them, and ask if you can take them to lunch for a hamburger one day. Ask them to show you their most successful investment house so far, and find out how it happened to come their way. Try to repeat their experience. For the first ten years of my investment career, I believed that each investment house I did was a unique accident. After a while, I discovered that these accidents happened more often when I was out looking for them.

6. Continue your education. Take a seminar from somebody who has been in the real estate business for a long time, but has had success in another town. For example, last year I flew to Tampa and took John Schaub’s two day course. Yes, it was expensive, and yes, I already knew a lot of it, but it was entirely worthwhile to hear it from a different source and get a different angle on it. If you don’t want to go out of town, take a new course being offered through Georgia REIA.

7. Another way to jump start yourself is to get some cash. There is nothing that motivates quite like cash burning a hole in your pocket. Call a local mortgage company, and meet with them to find out what your credit score is, and whether or not you might qualify to re-finance anything you now own. If you can pull a little cash out, then you become emotionally empowered to spend it on a down payment or maybe make some cash offers at next month's auction. At the very least, put a home equity line on your current residence and see if you can pull out some cash.