Skip to content

Posted almost 13 years ago

Not-so-Newbie Comes Clean

May 19, 2011

Hi Everyone,

Or at least I hope there will be an "everyone" this is my first blog post here on BiggerPockets.  I hope this blog will help me meet some people, entertain, and help motivate me to stay on my journey to financial independence.  Here's the quick and dirty biography:

I started investing in real estate as a fix and flipper in August 2008, just about the worst time ever, I finished my first project in March of 2009 and didn't make much money, I did sell the property though and as part of the deal I picked up my 2nd project in August of 2009 and sold it in January of 2010, again without stellar results, we bought our most recent project in February of 2010 and it is currently under contract.  This project took longer than anticipated because we kept taking remodeling jobs, including one out of state, to keep the lights on.  I love the work, but I realized that I was doing something fundamentally wrong and I needed to make some major changes if I was going to stay in this business.  So what did I do?

I started looking around for people who seemed to be successful doing what I wanted to do and who were willing to teach me how to do it too.  I also took a hard look at my financial situation and what I needed in terms of income to continue to do what I love to do.  One of my main motivations is to avoid going back to a desk job.

One of the pieces of advice I stumbled upon was that I needed to have a plan and I needed to be accountable for my plan.  So I figured, what better way to be held accountable than to post a blog for the whole world or at least everyone on this forum to see.

So on that note my current total debt load, including the heloc on my private residence is $135,086.87.  I'm expecting to net about 38,900 from the sale of my current project which will leave me with a debt load of $96,250.  My goal is to net $7,000 a month to pay off my bills, cover my current living expenses, and build a nest egg of $360,000 in cash in the next 8 years.  I would also like to amass a real estate portfolio that consists of 8 rental properties in that time frame to generate passive income as well as assets that can be sold off to finance another 40 years of living expenses.  

How do I plan to do that?  I plan to net $1,200 a month from my remodeling company after expenses, this works out to roughly $10,500 in jobs per month.  The remaining $5,800 a month I want to come from real estate investing.  

In order to reach those goals I needed some advice.  I purchased an investing program, which I'm a little skeptical about but I don't really have much to lose.  In this blog, I will take you through the steps that I'm taking and how things are working out.  I'm not going to name the program that I'm using and I'm not going to give specifics because I don't want to infringe on anyone's copyrights or intellectual property.  Mostly I'm going to give you the high level tasks I'm working on and the psychological ups and downs as well as financial ups and downs of my journey.

Please keep reading and post your comments.  It should be an interesting ride.

Tamara 


Comments (2)

  1. Look forward to hearing about your progress. The blogs are a great place to share your story and learning experiences. The forums are great place to interact with the majority of Bigger Pockets and ask your questions, share what you have learned and make connections.


  2. Thanks for signing up and for sharing, Tamara! Definitely jump on the forums if you haven't already, and get involved/introduce yourself there. I think you're going to find that you'll get a ton out of your time here on BP. I'm looking forward to learning more as you move forward and share your experiences with us. Let us know if you have any questions going forward.