How Powerful Habits Shape Your Real Estate Investing Success

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business

 I think we can all agree there is never enough time. We do so many things each and every day. Our lives are ruled by actions and habits we might not even think twice about. Well, now is the time to think about them deeply.

Analyze and ultimately shape these habits to make you more productive. The main focus on this site is to improve our real estate investing skills. Learning about and understanding the power of our habits not only gives us an advantage in business, but all aspects of life.

Charles Duhigg will make you smarter and I am a fan. He is a reporter for the New York Times, Pulitzer prize winner, and author or two of my favorite books so far this year:

• The Power of Habit – Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business (which we are discussing in this post)
• Smarter, Better, Faster – The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business (look out for a future post on this one)

Lesson 1: We are the summation of our habits

Who we are and where we are in life is shaped by our choices.

The way we think, the actions we take, the happiness we feel is a result of our personal choices. Some of them were good choices that worked out to our advantage. Some were terrible choices and we are still losing sleep.

A lot of these choices were because of habits that we formed. Some habits are fantastic and make us better people, business owners, investors, and friends. Some habits prevent us from being successful. So how do we identify the right habits and make them stronger while squeezing out the bad ones? There is a way.

Start with small habits can make our life easier and more productive.

First thing in the morning after waking up I make my bed. This gives me a quick win to start the day and I feel good about accomplishing at least one thing. I’m not alone in this belief, many other high level productive people do and recommend it (and who am I to argue with Navy SEAL Admiral William H. McRaven?).

Our real estate business runs on habits as well.

Let’s take something simple like phone calls.

• Do you pick up every single time no matter what you are doing?
• Do you answer them back immediately?
• Do you answer them back within a certain time frame?
• Do you not even know the password to your voicemail?

Through repetition this becomes a habit.

Here is another example which is actually an embarrassing story on how habits are formed on purpose.

One time I was out previewing properties for purchase. I have my REALTOR license so was able to access a vacant property through the lockbox in the front of the house. I used the key to unlock the house then placed them on the counter and walked around.

I opened the door to the back yard to check out the space and then I heard it. Click. The door to the backyard automatically locked behind me.

I couldn’t get back into the house.

Insert string of profanity.

It seemed like an enclosed backyard, no exit. I was going to have to jump the fence. I was about to start when I spotted a small latch at the far back corner, ok good, there is a way out that doesn’t look terrible to the neighbors.

I go back to the front door with some hope. That hope is immediately crushed. I had locked the front door right after I entered. This story ends with me shamefully calling the listing agent hoping she had spare keys. I had to explain everything and assure her that the property was secure… My apologies.

Now, do you think that I EVER put the property keys on a counter now a days? No, now as a habit, without me thinking, they go in my front right pants pocket, immediately.

We can choose what habits we want in our life. To achieve greatness in anything we must do them well and do them constantly.

Lesson 2: You can only change what you understand

First thing to being able to change your habits is a belief that you can do it.

It sounds so simple that I was skeptical when I first read that. Habits are like Santa Clause and if I don’t believe I don’t get the gift? Being a lover of all things practical I needed some justification.

Here it is. If you don’t believe in something you’ll either do a half assed job in the first place or not follow through to get it completed.

The reason belief is so important is that changing a habit (more on that in a minute) takes time and will power. Changing habits can be frustrating and if you don’t believe you can you’ll shortcut the process and fail, if you even try. This is why belief, the mindset of being powerful enough to dictate your future is so important.

Ok so you are on board, feeling good, feeling great, now what?

Understand the habit that you want to change.

This is what Charles calls the Habit Loop. You see a cue (something that triggers a craving) then you perform the routine (actions you take) and you reap the reward (these are the results).

Here is a simple example: you walk through the mall and smell the Cinnabon stand (delicious, tempting, cue), you buy and eat the Cinnabon (routine), your brain overloads with pleasure signals because of the sweet, sweet carbs (reward).

Now if you only do this once in awhile then no harm no foul go demo a house and work out the extra calories. But what if you grab a Cinnabon every single time you pass by? It become as a habit because it is automatic. It doesn’t matter if you are full and just had a meal, you are running late, you came to the mall for something quick…

The habit transcends logical thought. By the way this is a real example for me. One summer for a few months I had to have a Cinnabon at minimum once a week.

You don’t just break the habit. Once the habit it formed it is pretty difficult to quick cold turkey. It can be done but the more effective way it habit replacement.

Once I identified the habit I wanted to break I had to figure out what the cue was and change my routine to still reap the reward.

In this case my cue was boredom. I was going to the mall to have somewhere to be and go (I was in a military base in the middle of no where, not too many fun options). So when I felt that cue of boredom, I had to change my routine which was go to a friend’s place instead, and my reward was feeling entertained.

This worked because at the end of the day I didn’t need the Cinnabon, I was eating other healthy meals, I needed the pleasurable escape.

Same cue, different and more advantageous routine, same psychological reward.

See the habit, understand it, and modify.

Lesson 3: Be the mad scientist of your life

Alright, now you are hungry. Why does this matter and what does it have to do with real estate investing? The creation of habits boost productivity. The name of the game is mental automation.

Habits are systems and creating them removes the mental drain of having to make similar choices over and over which allows you to focus on more important matters.

The first suggestion I have for the busy real estate tycoon is not a habit itself, but the prevention of having one form in the first place.

One of the best things I have done for my work life is to turn off or remove all notification systems so that I can concentrate on the task at hand.

• There is no reason to see the flash of a new message on your phone or on the lower right hand of your screen.
• If you are in your inbox looking at emails then you will see it there.
• If you are doing something else and see the notification pop up it breaks your flow and your thoughts race to the message.
• Then you click the message, read it respond, and 4 hours later you step out of the rabbit hole having accomplished nothing and seeing the task you were first working on incomplete and incoherent.

Prevent this all and turn off the pop ups.

Winners in sports, business, and life are obsessive people. This can be a really good thing if you control and focus what it is you are obsessing over.

Constantly experiment on yourself and your business. The same way that you split test different marketing methods you can test yourself.

• Should you be studying your market first thing in the morning or last thing at night?
• Should you spend time analyzing properties before or after lunch?
• Do you feel best after 7 hours of sleep or are you one of those lucky androids that only needs 5?

Create the habit of testing everything so that you customize your business and life.

Next, the author discusses having the formation of the most important habit which improves your life.

This is known as the keystone habit.

For me, without a doubt, my single keystone habit for my life and eventually for my real estate business has been journaling.

Writing down the events of the day allows me to process what has been done:

• Who I met or spoke to
• The things that I learned
• What I wanted to do for the future
• How I felt about certain events.

Having to explain things in my own words helps me learn. That is the number one reason I write for this site. There are too many good books and in my life time I may never again read The Power of Habit cover to cover, but I can take 10 minutes to read though this blog post.

The same thing happens with my journal, I can remember the lessons that I learned and more importantly create a game plan using the knowledge gained from the simple process of writing it down.

Keeping a journal helps motivate me and keep me accountable as well. I know that I need to follow through on certain things for my business because I need to be able to write down something in the journal that night!

Habits are important. They make us who we are and if you go through the steps of identifying the habits in your life and forming them to guide you to your goals there is nothing unachievable.

Good luck and happy investing my friends.

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business