If you have a favorite real estate book you think I should read, please leave a comment. I’ll be the first to admit I haven’t read every book available.

The biggest overall comment I can make about the book is that it is dense. There is just over 300 pages of material here with almost nothing to break it up — no diagrams, no illustrations, nothing. The Monopoly theme does, however, do a good job or organizing things in a more readable format. The book is divided into three sections; Getting In [buying], Getting Around [investment property] and Getting Out [selling] each of which deserves its own review.

Getting In is a solid overview of the buying process. It starts by explaining the many types of homes, and a bit of their history. From there it goes into mechanics — why you should look for in an agent, a home inspector, a mortgage broker and the other professionals you may run into. Follwing that is a good overview of the entire process from the opening offer to closing. By the time the reader is done with Getting In he should have a solid foundation to buy property even if he was a complete novice when he opened the book.

Unfortunately, the same can not be said of  Getting Around, which is doubly disappointing given the books subtitle – “Rules and Strategies for Profitable Investing.” This section has some really strong sections such as the section on REOs, some really weak sections, such as the section on “Leasure Time Property” [castles?!? gentleman farms?!?], and a couple of parts that are dangerously wrong. Two of the latter deserve particular note;

• The section on what to offer for a rehab property is dangerously flawed. following Ms. Janik’s advice would leave an investor dangerously susceptible to unpleasant, expensive surprises.
• I am simply stunned that a book published in 2009 would endorse the strategy of buying an investment property, rehabbing it to maximize its value, and then sucking out all the equity to buy more investment property. that is the kind of over-leveraging that, in part, got us into the housing crisis we now face.

Getting Out takes us back to solid ground with a good overview of the selling process. There is some excellent advice about staging and decluttering, suggestions on finding a good listing price, and a fair discussion about using a Realtor versus going it alone. It definitely ends the book on a good foot.

So, in short, The Monopoly Guide to Real Estate is a good book if you need to know how to buy or sell a home. If you wanted to learn how to invest in real estate, I would strongly suggest another book