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Private Lending Credibility Kit: Common Mistakes to Avoid

By Michel Lautensack

Republish: EasyPublish™ Published: 02Sep2009 Word count: 723 Viewed: 114 time(s) Get Free Content For Your Site

There are some things to avoid when you are organizing a credibility kit. Some of the mistakes that I've seen over the years are:

1. Not being organized or systematic about how you develop your credibility kit.

I would take the course outline or any of the various documents that I'm giving you and create a binder with all 12 of those various folders. That way whenever you get something that fits in one of those categories, throw it in there temporarily, and once you put together your credibility kit you've got that document right there. Do it in an organized and systematic way.

Try not to be haphazard about it. Just get to it when you get to it. Occasionally, every few months when you think about it, you scramble around and maybe you find a document or two, then you kind of forget about it for the next few months. It really should become part of your thought process just like any other part of your investing business. You should be thinking about it all the time.

2. One of the other things you'll see occasionally, people will put their kits together very quickly and very sloppily. Don't do that. If you're going to do it, do it the right way.

Don't do three pages with food stains and drink stains on one corner and scramble out the door to a meeting with a couple of crumpled up pieces of paper.

You can't sit down to breakfast with a fellow who has a million dollars in his portfolio and you're handing him a piece of crumpled paper with some food stains on it. That's very unprofessional! Basically that lender will never deal with you. This is a credibility issue, this is a trust, and this is something you need to impress these individuals.

They have money, they have options, and they don't need you to invest. There are other options out there. You need to stand out from the crowd. You need to show your expertise in this business. Showing up with a small kind of sloppily put together credibility kit is certainly not the way to do that!

You need to relate it to the first point. Take your time and build this thing up right. I understand that it's never finished—it's always a work in process. But spend a lot of time and make sure the kit is put together well.

3. A weak bio or a bio that's too much of a résumé.

The bio must tell a story. It obviously must give some of your background. I think I've worked quite a bit with the coaching students on this. It can't just be a pure résumé—"My name is...I went to school here...I've worked in this field in this profession...."

There has to be a bit of a story. There has to be a story element to it. There has to be this building up of your skill set and what you've been doing.

Do not include as your bio just your job/employment résumé. That's really not what I'm saying here. It must be an interesting story. It must have something compelling to it. Somebody must read it and want to say at the end, "I would like to hear more about this individual and his program."

4. The last mistake with the credibility kit which I see all the time is not doing one at all, and basically just saying, "You know what? I'll just explain to the guy when I get there. I'll explain it to him. I don't need to have a kit. I'll just tell him my background."

That is a death blow because you haven't done the work. You haven't prepared for that meeting or any of these meetings. Like I've said before, these individuals have options. They do not have to invest with you. If they're not comfortable and they don't trust you, they're not going to be investing. So trying to take a shortcut by not doing this step is ultimately going to result in a very low likelihood that you're going to get a private lender.

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