Frustration spawns online community for real estate investors.

• Author: Taylor, Mike
• Position: SMALL biz

SEVEN YEARS AGO, JOSHUA DORKIN WAS A real estate investor looking for advice on the properties he owned. He went to the library. He went to the bookstore. He searched online.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

"I realized online was going to be the place where I would gel the answers, because I had very specific questions," Dorkin says. "'Unfortunately with die sites I found, their focus was on upselling you. Essentially their goal was lo sell me on some gurus and get me to buy their course or their hoot camp."

Out of that frustration emerged BiggerPoekets.com. a site where real estate investors could share concerns, pose questions and get answers.

BiggerPockets.com started as merely a discussion forum. Dorkin, a former Realtor with a background in building websites, then sought to add more features and model it after MySpace.com, the social networking king at the time. Today, BiggerPockets.com boasts 85,000 members and attracts roughly 300,000 unique visitors a month. Dorkin describes the site as "a place where novices and experienced individuals alike can come together to learn, make deals, network and do business."

I checked out the site and found topics ranging from a landlord asking whether he, or the tenant, should be responsible for replacing a faulty shower head; to a poster asking for advice about investing in properties out of stale. The site also has 12-15 regularly contributing bloggers, property listings, investment-capital offerings (and requests) and other features.

Dorkin says one of the site's most popular areas is a deal-analysis forum where prospective investors are able to share die financials and get feedback on a property they're t [linking of buying.

"Savvy investors understand there's always going to be another 'deal,' but novice investors often have shiny-object syndrome and don't necessarily realize that," Dorkin says. "It's a quick way to lose your shirt if you don't know what you're doing."

BiggerPockets makes most of its money from advertising. Basic memberships are free, although there are paid memberships ranging from $5 per month to S15 per month that allow those members to pitch deals on properties, services or investment capital.

Dorkin, 36. says the site is profitable, helped by the fact that the only full-time employees are he and his wife, Julie...