This is one of my biggest pet peeves. On almost a daily basis, I run into a situation where someone made a commitment to me, and didn’t live up to it. It is tiresome, annoying, and flat out rude. I don’t pretend to be perfect, and I’m sure I’ve made my share of commitments that I couldn’t keep, but we need to put this pattern of recklessness to a stop.

Just this morning, I can already count two instances where people made promises to me and failed to live up to them. The first one was for a weekly Friday morning meeting that we planned for brainstorming and masterminding — the other party has failed to show on three of three occasions (yes, I’ve already removed this from my calendar now) — and the other was from a writer who committed to provide articles to me weekly, but hasn’t in several weeks (and hasn’t responded to my emails, either).

If You Can’t Live Up to Your Commitments, Don’t Make Them!

I can’t tell you how many times I was really excited about doing business with another company and had to pass because we weren’t able to commit to executing on our side of the relationship. While at the time, these situations were disappointing to both us and the other party, in the end, being up front about it probably saved our reputation and relationships with those companies. I’m very aware of our capabilities and try to never make promises I can’t keep . . . I strongly urge others take the same direction with their businesses.

How do you feel about it?

Tags: business, commitments, relationships

Today was supposed to be a new beginning, but sometimes we have to deal with headaches from our past, and that appeared to be the case this morning, as I learned of a security hole that was causing bots to be able to spam parts of our site. The hole has since been closed, but I wasn’t planning on spending the first few hours of the day on that nonsense.

The Entrepreneur’s Life: Something ALWAYS Comes Up

If there is a lesson to be learned here, it is that no matter how well you plan things out, something will always come up to distract you. While many of these distractions can be ignored, often times you’ll need to re-prioritize your entire day/week/month as a result of others.

In my case, the loss of my developer this week means that everything else that I had planned to do has to be put on hold. We had some exciting upgrades to BiggerPockets planned, and unfortunately, they will need to wait until we can get someone new in house to execute. I was also working on some business deals, and these too must be put on hold for a short while until the number one priority – hiring – is complete. Of course, I’ve always got my backups, but it gets rough when you go through a period like I’ve had recently, with the loss of several developers over a short period of time. Then again, that’s how it often goes when you’re working with contract workers.

This is not something new for me. Dealing with unforeseen circumstances is the story of the last five plus years of my life, but if you’re an upstart entrepreneur, you better make sure you’ve got the ability to deal with such events, because they come up often.

Forward Planning: Plotting the Future of a Company

I’m planning on spending some time over the next days in linking up with other entrepreneurs to get a better idea of what size team to plan for when we start building things up. I’ve got a pretty good idea of our needs, but of course, it would be great to see what the experiences of those people who have been through the capital raising phase after bootstrapping are; most folks I know started their companies with financing . . . I’m in an altogether different place with a live, revenue generating and profitable business.

Here are some good reads I’ve found regarding team building as it relates to getting your startup off the ground:

• How to build a bulletproof startup
• Startup Hacks: Seven Ideas for Building Your Team
• Entrepreneurs: Team With People Smarter Than You

More to come . . .

According to Wikipedia, catharsis means a “cleansing”, “purging”, or “clarification.” I hope that today’s catharsis marks a new beginning for myself and my company, BiggerPockets.

With that in mind, I hope to share the journey moving forward with the rest of you.

I’ve ignored this blog for a long time, and I’ve really come to miss having a place where I can share great tips, tools, resources, and other info, as well as having a place to vent, and to let everyone know what it is that I deal with while running the business.

Moving Forward

This year started off with a bang, and along the way there were a few bumps in the road, followed by some boulders and a few mountains. I’m not going to get into the details, but just know that from today forward, the plan is to smooth out the road once again.

The first step in moving forward is to find a new ruby on rails developer for BiggerPockets. If you’re a coder or know of one, please check out the job description and shoot us your resume. Otherwise, the plan is to get working on the plan.

Simply put, I’ve been bootstrapping the business for long enough. The time has come to raise some capital and to take things to the next level. I hope to take you along with me on my journey.

Stay tuned.

Photo: *clairity*

Tags: biggerpockets, entrepreneur, raising capital

With every few upgrades of Wordpress or so, I notice that there is no longer a need for one of the plugins that I’m using. In may cases, Wordpress itself has integrated the functionality that the plugin was designed for. Occasionally, I’ll note that one of my plugins has become relatively useless to me or to my blog.

Upgrading Your Plugins

As the software has become more sophisticated, upgrades to both WP and to the plugins themselves have become much more simple. The latest incarnations of the site all have one step instant upgrades for both the plugins and WP.

With that in mind, upgrading has become a bit of a no-brainer!

When the software tells you to upgrade, just do it! It’ll help keep you protected from the increasingly sophisticated bad guys who are always on the prowl. This goes for both WP iteself and the plugins.

So . . . How Often Do YOU Clean Out Your Plugins?

Am I the only one out there chucking these things into the junk bin?

Photo Credit:

Tags: blog, plugin, upgrade, Wordpress

A few months ago I decided BiggerPockets.com would be a sponsor for a Real Estate Event that was slated to occur in mid-October. This was to be a one day real estate technology-themed event, and in return for the $250 sponsorship, we’d get our company name on the event’s website, and our logo on all publicity materials and banners; I was also promised a swag package including t-shirts.

Don’t Take Their Word for It

The day came and went, and from what I heard, it was a great gathering. Since I was unable to attend, of course, I wanted some proof that our company name did indeed make it on all the materials. I saw some pics and we were certainly present.

So, Why am I Disappointed?
Part of the verbal agreement that I entered into with the person who ran the event was that I would get some t-shirts — after all, it was the least they could do in return for the $250 we spent, right?

I was told on several occasions that the package was en-route. When it never arrived I was given excuse after excuse after excuse; this went on for 2 months. I was then told on January 4 that I’d get a shirt from a later event that took place 3 weeks ago, but low and behold that never happened either.

Why Should Anyone Care About a Stupid T-Shirt

This was about principal, not a $10 shirt. I entered into a business agreement with another, well known businessman in my industry, and he’s just blown me off. The shirt was something I had been promised in return for my money, and the right thing to do would have been to send it to me, as promised. This was someone who I respected and hoped to foster a deeper business relationship with, but how could I trust someone on large transactions when they never fully came through on this small one?

Lessons Learned?
I’d say that I learned one important lesson: Get to know better the people with whom you are doing business. The entire thing reminded me to look at how I run my own business and make sure I’m doing so ethically. I will never allow myself to take anyone for even a few dollars, because it all comes down to the fact that, your principals are how others will judge you and your company.

Who knows . . . maybe some day I’ll see my shirts. Don’t worry, I won’t be holding my breath.

Tags: agreements, business ethics, contracts, principles, promises, sponsor

Get ready to party, everyone!
A year from today, a new President of the United States will be Inaugurated!

Let the great global countdown begin!

Two days ago, I launched the latest update for my site, BiggerPockets . . .

The BiggerPockets Real Estate Social Network

After months of preparation, programming, problem-solving, we’re finally live! I’ve got to tell you . . . it is very exciting!

If you haven’t been to the site, stop by. Not only is it the premiere real estate investing community out there, but we’re transformed it into the premiere real estate social networking community!

When I get some time, I’ll try to share with everyone all of the details behind the building of the site, launch, glitches, etc. All I know is that I’ve got to double our server RAM to 8GB, and fast, because we’re pounding the hell out of our 4GB box right now.

See everyone over at the site!