Did the title of the article get your attention?  I thought so.  Money does love speed.  Money in general loves speed.  That means getting off your “you know what” and putting in to action whatever it is that needs to be done in your business (and in life).  And the faster you do it, the more likely you are to be rewarded for it, financially.  This will be one of my resolutions for this year – act with more Speed.

Let’s face it. You’re not getting any younger, the clock is always ticking. And, the sooner you realize the inherent value of speed, I promise you this; the more seriously you take your goals, the more urgency you will build into your daily habits.

Ever watched a commercial for some gadget or concept that you had thought of in the past and said “hey – that was my idea”?  It may have been your idea and you should have acted on it.  Instead, somebody else did and now they are billionaires. (Yep – I thought of Facebook too, but Mark Zuckerberg beat me to it).

But I’m not talking about just ideas.  In general, things tend to work out better when you act on it faster.  I don’t recall ever succeeding at something because I got there last.

Naturally, I’m going to relate this concept to Real Estate Investing, where Speed = Money.  Because Money loves Speed.

If you are contemplating real estate investing, or trying out a new strategy in real estate investing (like Wholesaling) and you know you need to put out marketing, it behooves you to get your marketing out ASAP.  The sooner you get it out, the sooner the phone rings with sellers calling.

Just bought a new course on real estate investing?  Great – put into action today.  Don’t go get another course.  Just implement what you just learned.  Better yet, start implementing before you are even done with the course.  Learn while doing.  Did the course say “look up For Rent ads and call them”?  Do it now.

If you are doing your marketing and a seller calls you and leaves you a message, call them back right away.  You never know, they may go to the next ad in the phone book, or next search result in Google, or next bandit sign phone# and call that person – that person calls them back first and gets the deal.

When you get a deal under contract and you now need to get it resold to another investor before your contract expires (if Wholesaling), you better start selling it ASAP.  Get it out to your buyers list, craigslist, website, and put out your For Sale bandit signs right away.  Don’t get around to it.  Do it now.

You close a deal and you make some money.  Congratulations.  Now turn around and reinvest that money back into marketing or more real estate ASAP.  Don’t take the month off celebrating.  No time for that.  Reinvest in marketing or more real estate and get it back out there right away working for you.

When you are doing 5-10 deals a month and you are too busy to keep up, go ahead and hire that person to help you out.  Don’t wait – just do it.  Get into the habit of focusing on the 20% of actions that get  80% of your results (meeting buyers, making offers, raising money).  Hire out the 80% of the actions that only get you 20% of the results.  Hire it out ASAP.

Following are some of the more important reasons why I believe fast action (Speed) equals results and money.

1. When you do too much planning, there’s a tendency to think of one reason after another why what you’re contemplating won’t work.

Many of the reasons you come up with may be correct. But the important thing is that it doesn’t matter. Why? Because, as you move forward, circumstances continually change – and those changes often render irrelevant many of the concerns you may have before taking action.

In other words, don’t try to figure out steps two, three, and four before taking step one.   Also, don’t anticipate all the things you think might go wrong.  When you put it into motion, it will work itself out.

Real estate investing is an easy thing to get caught in the vicious cycle of contemplating and doing research; and eventually either nothing ever happens because you are stuck in “learning mode” or you just talk yourself out of it altogether (because it sounds too risky, or time consuming, or it probably doesn’t work, etc).  Screw that – just do it NOW.

2. When you procrastinate, you tend to lose your enthusiasm.

That, in turn, causes “standing still” to set in. “Standing still” is the tendency to live with existing conditions and avoid change. You get comfortable with the way things are and allow your business ideas or new projects to fade into the comfort zone of oblivion.

But when you take action, your creative juices flow faster, your resourcefulness kicks into high gear, and the things, people, and circumstances you need to accomplish your objectives are drawn to you almost like magic. This is not hocus-pocus. I’ve done it enough times to be able to assure you that it really works.  It’s hard to stay on a bike when it’s not moving right????  Get moving.

3. Speed trumps Size.

You see, in today’s world the old rules no longer apply. It’s not that the big eats the small anymore, it’s that the fast eat the slow. It’s the one true competitive advantage that the big competition cannot duplicate easily.  In real estate:  get your marketing out before the other guy, make the offer before the other guy, reinvest before the other guy/gal.  People will pay for Speed.  Be the one that gets paid for it.

• Speed of decision-making
• Speed of execution
• Speed of customer service
• Speed of EVERYTHING

4. Perhaps the most important reason of all for taking action now is that time is finite.

No matter how proficient you are, you can only accomplish so much in a lifetime. Every second that’s wasted reduces the totality of what you can accomplish by one second.

Some people maintain that a constant feeling of urgency to accomplish more is stressful, but I find the opposite to be true. I feel more stress when I procrastinate – when I’m not doing what I know I should be doing. There’s not a worse feeling in the world than to be conscious of the fact that your finite supply of time is ticking away while you’re cleaning out your inbox or re-reading that course to make sure you have it perfect.  Don’t worry about it – just do it.

Of course, nothing in life is perfect. There will be times when moving too fast can end up hurting you. Based on my own experience, what I gain from moving fast far outweighs any losses that result from too little planning.

That being the case, when you fall – and you will fall – simply pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and take more action. Money could care less about mistakes. Money loves action. Think seriously about making this your mantra for 2014.