Crushing It in Apartments and Commercial Real Estate: How a Small Investor Can Make It Big

I have purchased many books from Amazon, but this is my first review ever. I work in health care and consider myself a fairly well read person. Prior to reading this book, I couldn't tell you the difference between DSCR and disco. Upon completion of the book, I have a working vocabulary and fundamental understanding of commercial real estate. This book was amazing in both the breadth of knowledge covered, as well as how Brian Murray presents the material. It was all done in a very well thought out and systematic manner, guiding the reader from the beginning to the end of a deal. I believe that the good formatting is a testament to Brian's past career as a teacher. The most important aspect of this book compared to some other real estate books out there, is that the author uses real numbers, and uses his own real world deals as examples. He has a legitimate real estate company with a website that you can go to and verify that he has actually done these deals.The advice he gives, especially the little nuggets learned from his own real life examples are priceless. Reading the book, I felt like I had a mentor teaching me, and walking through the process. He has these great appendices in the back of the book with additional invaluable resources which I have never encountered before in a real estate book. I found the material presented so meaningful, that I would have gladly paid twice the price for it.So to anyone reading this review, if you really want to get an insider's mindset on how to enter the commercial real estate world and the methodology behind doing a deal, get this book. Not once does Brian ever try to sell you anything; there are no webinars, seminars, additional books, etc.Brian, thank you for taking the time to write this book and giving myself and others the chance to learn both from your successes and challenges.

Need a side hustle to make ends meet? Been thinking about owning, renting or moving some real estate to see if you can turn a profit? If so, then this book is what you need to read to get practical advice, real-life examples of successes and failures and simple, down to earth business strategies. Brian Murray tells the reader about his own personal experiences from his beginnings as a new investor, to dramas with his renters, to nurturing his investments as an entrepreneur to his present position as a successful businessman and investor with a multi-million dollar business. That's some side hustle!!And the amazing thing is, that's how it started – he had too much month at the end of his money and needed to supplement his teacher income. So, he took a simple interest and turned it into a money maker. He started small but soon realized that with some simple business math (outlined for the reader in his book), common –sense and a little creativity, he could invest in larger properties and turn bigger profits while also making a difference in other people's lives including his own. Brian spells his simple strategies out in this book and provides supplementary resources to help the reader out. He wants everyone to be as successful as he was and believes they can. He admits and even revels in the fact that, because he started as a non-professional, he didn't know his approach was different that other large commercial property investors – but, this is the key to his success. He was small and, therefore, more nimble than other bigger investment houses in the same space. His story is inspirational and practical giving the reader all the tools they need to start out investing in the commercial real estate market and making their own dreams of success come true.

I just finished reading Crushing It. If I am to describe it in one world, I would say it is: Real! I absolutely loved the book because of that: keeping it real. Throughout the book, it kept reminding me of Shoe Dog. Although very different, but both books struck me as genuine on so many levels.Brian simply shares his experience in the book, the good and the bad, and all the lessons to learn from that. He keeps it simple, and shares some resources on his website, as well as a summary of simple and practical financial formulas, a real estate glossary, team members skills you would need, and other practical stuff. He gives what I think is the right dose of encouragement coupled with a caveat on what a real estate business really takes. It certainly is not a get-rich-in-a-week magic prescription, nor in a year nor in five for that matter. But with the right dedication, knowledge, and hard work, it certainly an investment that pays off on the long run. He is very much pro a long term approach, and even discourages a buy-and-flip approach (of course depending on what your overall strategy is). I liked the fact that he bases his long term strategy on adding value to your assets then extracting equity and re-investing again, rather than betting on value appreciation by pure market factors. I also enjoyed what I thought were hilarious -albeit super weird- stories about some of his tenants.He shares some of his personal experiences as well as the values he holds. That also resonated a lot with my personal experience and my values. It is a book I thoroughly enjoyed flip to flip, and I certainly recommend. I hope he writes more, and perhaps get into some details of financial modeling and different property market specificities.