DIVERSIFICATION & THE SMALL BUILDER The ups & downs of having many irons in the fire by Chuck Moriarty I'm a principal in a small welldiversified building company in Seattle, Wash. At the time my partner and I established our business in 1976, our sole purpose was to purchase, improve, and resell or rent single family residences within the city limits of Seattle. Our goal was to simply acquire enough rental property to provide ourselves with sufficient income to enjoy our "golden years" (you know-when we turned 40). We have since diversified into several related fields including property management, construction management, custom home building, design/ build, marketing real estate partnerships, home inspections, bookkeeping for small companies in related fields, and consulting for