An extremely informed and encouraging blueprint for getting into real estate investing.
Meyer presents a guide to personal real estate investing.
The author breaks down the basic principles of real estate investment through the use of what he calls the “Resource Triangle,” consisting of money, time, and skill. Meyer details these three elements as well as many other finance concepts; for example, he clarifies the difference between transactional income (working for money, converting effort and attention into income) and residual income (residual-generating stocks, payments from rental properties), noting that “when people talk about financial freedom, they are almost always talking about residual income.” Using charts and other visual aids, he steadily increases the depth of his discussions, moving with deliberation into the deeper waters of inflation, market fluctuations, and risk (he regularly brings these discussions back to basics, as when he elaborates on the Finance 101 metrics of risk vs. reward in any kind of investment). Meyer explains everything new real estate investors need to know, from the principal (the starting point, the money used for starting any investment) to the choice between raising equity from outside investors or taking on debt to finance a new project. The overriding goal driving all of these discussions is to familiarize readers with the amounts of time, patience, and money they’ll need to start investing. Meyer writes with an appealing humility and sense of perspective, far from the take-no-prisoners, master-of-the-universe tone found in many examples of this kind of book—he admits immediately that his own real estate portfolio is modest compared to the major players in the industry. The author is agreeably direct, telling his readers that the point of his own investing activity is to provide enough income to give him free time for more fulfilling things; “Money doesn’t buy happiness,” he writes, “but it can buy a liberating amount of choice, flexibility, and convenience.”
An extremely informed and encouraging blueprint for getting into real estate investing.Pub Date: Jan. 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781960178060
Page Count: 384
Publisher: BiggerPockets
Review Posted Online: Feb. 13, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
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These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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