Mapping out my plan of action

As usual, I have been coming up with ideas for moving forward, but no real sense of direction. I mean, yeah, move forward, but doing what? Wholesaling? Bookkeeping? Ebay? Getting my RE license? All of the above?

So I began to really think of our situation to get to the real bottom line of what I am trying to accomplish. And here it is:

Consisent Income and Debt Elimination

Now, my husband does well in his job, and we are able to keep up with basic expenses, of what Dave Ramsey calls "the four walls" - Food, shelter, clothing, transportation. But we are thrown a loop when we have Dr. visits, car repair, etc. We need to be able to put money aside for this so that these expenses don't damage the budget.

We also have about $19k in debt that needs to be killed, so we need to have extra income to slay this and get rid of it once and for all.

The good news is that my husband is eligible for larger bonuses than last year, so that will help, but I need to be able to add to the family income.

So, armed with this bottom line, I then decided to do a bit of cost/benefit analysis for each avenue of revenue (hey, that kinda rhymes! LOL)

Wholesaling - very little cost - postage, envelopes, paper, cell phone - maybe $60 a month. The downside is that the odds of revenue coming from this is slim. Would work well for the consisent part if I am able to really generate a lot of marketing, but then the cost factor goes up.

Ebay - very little cost - about $60 month for listing fees for 500 items. The downside is that it's time consuming, but once the original listings are up, then can be relisted and basically run on auto pilot. Not consisent - but the cost factor is low and more than likely I can at least break even on bad months, and make a good income on good months.

Bookkeeping - medium cost to start - need to get Quickbooks, John Hryre's KISS Guide to Bookkeeping which total cost would be about $600. No real downside - I think that there is a need for this for local investors. Would only have the initial start up cost - ongoing marketing would basically be free - posting to my local REIA Yahoo Group monthly to showcase my business. Consisentency odds would be high, as I could have monthly clients and bill monthly. 

Getting my RE License - I am really leaning towards this, as I would like my own MLS access, and the ability to write my own offers for REOs. Start up costs are a bit high - classes, license fee, E&O ins, MLS Fees, Realtor board Fees - about $1k  to start. Would not add to consistency right now, but could in the future.

So, in looking at all of these I have come up with a plan - first, Ebay offers the quickest and cheapest route to a consisent income for right now, so I am going to make listing a priority. Second, although it won't offer consistency, I am going to allocate some money to marketing to pre-foreclosures for wholesaling. I already have some stamps, so I'm going to use them to target a group of pre-foreclosures. Next in the process will be taking on bookkeeping clients, but I'm going to go small on this - maybe 2-3 for now. And finally, if I decide to go this route, I will put aside money to get my RE license and also the $1k for earnest money for REO properties.

I think I now have a sense of direction. :)