About Me - My Biography

Dolf de Roos started investing in property while still at university studying Electrical Engineering. He noticed that engineers were not uniformly wealthy, and started to study the rich to find out what they had in common. He read biographies, autobiographies, encyclopedias, and research articles, and interviewed wealthy people. He found that they had very little in common: it wasn’t age, or gender, or religious beliefs, or whether they were born into a rich family, or which country they were born in. Rather, he could only find two things that they had in common: they were all people of high integrity, and they all either made their money, or held their wealth, in real estate. “I knew then that I should invest in real estate,” says Dolf.

By the time he graduated with a PhD in electrical engineering in the mid 1980s, Dr de Roos already had a substantial property portfolio and was on his way to becoming a property millionaire.

Although he does very little electrical engineering work these days (he still runs a technology transfer company), his engineer’s approach to investing led him to work with and develop software to analyse potential property investments. Reap has sold many copies and is used by real estate agents, valuers, and investors alike. His first book, “The New Zealand Investor’s Guide to Making Money in Residential Real Estate”, co-authored with Jan Somers, was a best seller, as was his subsequent book “Building Wealth through Investment Property”. Dolf became one of New Zealand’s best-known proponents of investment property – something that would lead him to clash with Reserve Bank Governor Don Brash, who accused property investors of artificially driving up inflation. Dolf’s practical book Real Estate Riches has been a bestseller in Australia, New Zealand and the USA, including appearing in The New York Times bestseller list.

Dolf is an experienced speaker and teacher. He has lectured in over 12 countries. He first shared the platform with many of the world’s top speakers. Dolf’s seminars and courses focus on the why and how of investing in property and are always well attended and make a difference to the lives of those who attend.

“One of my greatest satisfactions is hearing from someone who attended one of my programs and put what I taught them into action. Many times they’ll say to me, ‘It was so easy! We did what you said and now we own five or six properties, they’re all cash-flow positive and our future is assured.’ For me, that’s the reason I do this work. Changing people’s lives for the better.”