"You're a brave soul"

Hey Dudes and Dudettes

As our time in Utah is winding down, the time until we arrive in NY is also winding down. As most of you know, I am doing a Masters program in Real Estate Development at NYU. Whenever I tell people this, I get lots of mixed reactions. Today's blogpost is focused on this issue.

Most people are cool with me doing real estate (at least they appear that way), but a surprisingly big group of people will respond with, "are you sure you want to do that?" "Wow, you're a brave soul for doing real estate right now!" "Isn't that kinda scary?" You get the point.

Now let me explain why I love when people say things like that to me...

First of all, real estate development will never go away. People will always need places to live and places to work. There will always be schools, hospitals, stores, churches, etc. Yes, development is slow right now, and will be for a while. The good thing is that this scares people, especially people my age, from going into things real estate related. What does that mean? More market share for me! Enrollment in graduate real estate programs are down huge across the country. I couldn't be happier.

On a side note, for those who argue that the earth is becoming too developed, first of all that's false (unless you live in Phoenix or Vegas, etc), second of all, sustainable development (green building) is rapidly becoming a high priority for countries all around the world due to global warming... sustainability is my concentration.

The opportunities are plentiful now, even with a down economy. But people are too scared to try. Not to mention when the market is back in full swing and our generation is at our prime...where will the leaders and innovators in real estate be? There certainly won't be many, cause they are all too scared to study it in school. That is exactly my point.

Also, another thing to clear up about real estate. It bothers me when I see books and seminars and whatever where the author talks about how they got into real estate just because it was an easy way to get money and how they wanted sooo bad to have a rich person lifestyle. Just so everyone knows, that's not why I'm doing real estate, I'm doing it so that I can single handedly stop global warming. joking

PS we got an apartment on Roosevelt Island, right off the upper east side of manhattan! see picture above.

Love you guys,

D