Michael Russer

My real estate career began in the Spring of 1976 in Santa Barbara, CA (of course I was 12 years old at the time :o) Even back then the power of "targeting" was very clear to me as I quickly developed the reputation as the "FSBO Kid"; listing on average 1 out of 8 FSBOs and making very good money doing it. Being a restless young buck, I decided to then try my hand at residential and commercial investment properties, and once again did quite well, mostly through sheer determination. In less than two years I went from listing FSBOs to listing and selling 100 unit apartment complexes and triple-net restaurants.

Being young, dumb and full of you-know-what, my eyes strayed to even "greater" adventures in the business. In 1978 I thought I'd try my hand at limited partnership syndication. Let's just say that didn't pan out so well (moral: choose your partners carefully). However, being a serial entrepreneur I noticed that all limited partnerships must put into public record who their investors are, how much they invested and for what purpose. For the next 12 months I started and ran a small publishing business that sold this information to anyone who found it valuable. It was an interesting gig for awhile but it just didn't hold my attention.

So, in 1979 I got together with an investor and set off to Colorado Springs, CO to find fame and fortune by snapping up and flipping properties. What was supposed to take just three months ended up lasting three years. During that time my partner and I bought several properties including an abandoned JC Penny's building right in the middle of downtown Colorado Springs. We gutted the shell and in the course of about 18 months built the very prestigious "19 North Building" that offered premier restaurant, retail and office space. Unfortunately, during the hyper-interest rates of that time (about 17%), there was a huge gap between offering space and businesses being able to lease it. We ended up losing that property and then selling the rest of our holdings just to pay back everyone else. In the spring of 1982 I made my way back to Santa Barbara with little more than my clothes and a typewriter (even my car was totaled on the drive back from Colorado).

In the summer of 1982 I met my future wife, became a loan officer and taught myself computer programming. Within 12 months I became the top producing loan agent for the brokerage I worked for and wrote my own software to manage my production pipeline. Once again, my restless nature caused me to quit the loan business and work full time as an independent computer programmer. During the ensuing two years I got married and decided to start a "real" business. In 1986 my wife and I, and a silent partner founded what was to become one of the most advanced mortgage consulting firms in California. Combining my sales, marketing, loan and programming experience we were able to build a formidable mortgage company that captured the high-end of the market without advertising.

Even the success of that business left me sensing that something was "missing". Now, are you beginning to see a pattern here? Feeling very frustrated and unfulfilled, in 1993 I decided to retire from that business and vowed to not do another thing until I figured out "What I was here to give before I go." In other words, no more pursuing ventures until I was sure they reflected my sense of purpose. Now all I had to do was figure out what that was supposed to be! That journey lasted a full two years during which I threw myself into the inquiry of finding my purpose with an even greater focus than I had shown in any of my previous businesses. At the end of that two-year period, after much hard work it became clear to me that I'm "here" to help a great number of people through my speaking and writing. I knew this was the right path because I was willing to actually pay groups to let me speak, if necessary (fortunately, it never was :o). This career choice must have been the right one because I've been speaking and writing professionally since 1995, and have just as much passion for it today as I did when I first started. I had figured out how to turn my "Human Doing" into living and working as a "Human Being". And this finally freed me up to do my real work.