Let me introduce you to Jim (not his real name).
When Jim and I connected, he had invested in houses and apartments, had had some success, but thought self storage would be a better use of his time. He wanted to get away from all the management issues involved in residential and multi-family ownership.
He had one problem. He was a salesperson making a mid-six-figure income. His and his family’s lifestyle needed the income, but in his words…” it is a soul-sucking experience every day, and the rules are changed constantly by people who can’t sell half as good as I do.”
Jim is a self-starter and go-getter.
It is hard to walk away from and jump into the self storage business. Still, Jim desperately wanted to figure out how to replace some, not all, of his w-2 income. By doing so, he would put himself into a position to have the freedom to get up every day and work on creating his and his family’s future.
He assured me he was not afraid of working hard.
Some version of this story is my story as well. Some version of this story is the story of many people I work with, perhaps yours as well.
In my world, the people I work with want to use self storage as the vehicle towards creating freedom and be rewarded exponentially more for taking the risk and stepping out than any job or other type of investment could afford us.
Now for the rest of the story with Jim.
Within a year, Jim began working full-time in his self storage business, developing two conversion projects.
He created a way to get development income while he was building, management fees for running them, once open, and his percentage of the cash flow.
Within three years, he sold one of the projects netting a very healthy profit in the multi six-figure amount.
But more importantly, his experience was he took control of his life and went for it. Who he is for himself now, how he shows up for his family members, and how he shows up in life are more aligned with who he wanted to be.
It was, and is, not all cherries and roses, but Jim now knows himself as a more powerful person who says how his life is going to go.
In my world, this experience of being alive this way is way more fulfilling than the money we can earn in the self storage business.
Not everyone experiences the success Jim has, but he certainly is not an isolated case at all.
The Challenges
In our last episode, we briefly discussed the small investor’s current landscape against getting into the business today.
Big money chasing storage keeping prices very high, making it harder to compete for deals.
We also discussed the solution. Specifically, we need to look for the type of opportunities today to not compete as much against these larger players.
If you didn’t see, hear, or read last week’s episode, there is a link here or in the show notes to get to the episode. It can be found on youtube or read here on the blog.
One thing in life I have learned is this; every problem I have today was the solution to another problem I had earlier.
By knowing what specific types of self storage opportunities to go after, Jim, myself, and all the people I work with had to learn how to look at existing self storage, or vacant land, or an existing vacant building, and know what could be there, the income it could produce, the approximate expenses to run it, and how much it might cost to create or upgrade.
My experience is that unless we feel we know this, we are unsure of what we can pay, less powerful in negotiations, and mostly just don’t get very far in today’s market.
There is nothing hard about it. We just have to be on top of how to analyze, determine cost today and the potential income (this value and cash flow) after we are done.
Unless you feel you have a handle on this, not much happens.
In our Self Storage Bootcamps, we spend a lot of time on this, using today’s current construction numbers.
We also go over what resources you can use for operating expense numbers and how to determine income potential.
We finally look at how to analyze a trade area or sub-market.
I can’t go into a lot of detail here, but when someone signs up for the Bootcamp, I send them two specific training videos on analyzing expansion and conversion opportunities.
I have them here. You can go to a page and put in the email address you want them sent to. If you are listening on the podcast, they are in the show notes.
This gives step by step on how I analyze these opportunities.
Be careful with the construction numbers I estimated in the videos because they constantly change.
What I will use in the upcoming Bootcamp will be different from the last one.
But what is way more important is the process.
Jim, for example, is not too worried about what those specific numbers happen to be today. He knows he can easily get them (you can, too), and they are always evolving.
Jim’s power, and yours, too, if you learn this, can be that he knows the step-by-step process of figuring out if a deal is really a deal. If it’s not, is it possible for it to become one, and what needs to happen if so.
Do you think Jim is guessing if he made the right offer on a potential deal?
However, this leads to another issue to solve.
How do Jim, myself, and other small investors find and create deals to evaluate?
We will discuss that question in the next Back To Basics Series For Small Investor Getting In Self Storage episode.
The QuickStart Self Storage Bootcamp
My goal here is to create valuable content that will support the small investor who wants to get into the self storage business or grow their self storage business in today’s reality.
And I certainly do not want you to feel you are always be sold to by me.
However, if you are new to self storage or just want more support, a viable option for you may be to participate in the next upcoming Bootcamp.
I wish I could have 100’s in the Bootcamp, but I have to limit the number of people, primarily because:
- I only have one person from any given part of the country so as not to have more than one person in the Bootcamp focused on a given market area or region. I just don’t want to create an environment where someone who has paid to be there feels like they have competition in the Bootcamp.
- Everyone needs the opportunity to get one-on-one support in certain areas of their development during the Bootcamp and in the three-month follow-up, and I could not do that with a very large group.
The Bootcamp isn’t for everyone, and many can get in or grow your business without the level of training this Bootcamp offers. But if you think this may support you, click below to get more information, and if you want to or feel you need to talk to me personally, there will be a link there to schedule a call with me to get any questions answered.
If you want to be in the self storage business in 2022, I want to support you however it may look.
Perhaps it is the QuickStart Self Storage Bootcamp on Feb 4th and 5th, 2022. If you hear or see this after Feb., go to CreatingWealthThropughSelfStorage.com and find out when the next one is happening, or explore the On-Demand Version of the Self Storage Bootcamp.
Click below to find out.
