$1.3 million in deals done in 2 years from out of state!
293 Replies
George E.
Specialist from Dallas, TX
replied about 1 year ago
LEE...
in Dallas
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@GLENN SANTOS You’re too kind my friend! Thank you! Hopefully you guys can connect as well :)
Abas Ali
Flipper/Rehabber from Minneapolis, MN
replied about 1 year ago
@Elenis Camargo congrats on your journey! What was the marketing strategy you used to acquire these leads if you don’t me asking?
Allyson Edwards
Rental Property Investor from Goleta, CA
replied about 1 year ago
Elenis,
Love this story and how human it is.
congratulations!
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Brandon Chandler So happy to hear that! I am sure you will do that very soon. Keep us posted on your progress!
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Bernard Rooney I don't at the moment but I will let you know if I hear of anyone!
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Brandon Brador Thanks so much! I appreciate it :)
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Tom Phelan Would love to hear of your experience with partnerships. I do agree there is a honeymoon phase. It's been 10 months now so are we past it yet? Haha. But yes we wouldn't be able to do that with the partnership unless all parties agreed.
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Nate Hedrick We used Ditech, but they filed Chapter 11 shortly after so maybe that's why. I have heard of other smaller lenders that allow this. Right now I'm using Carrington.
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@George E. Thanks for reading!!
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Abas Ali Thank you! Although I have a background in marketing, I did not do marketing to acquire leads. I am active on BiggerPockets and posted a blog that got featured on their newsletter and homepage. It had over 16,000 views and I made a lot of my contacts that way. But it doesn't mean just because the article was featured that I instantly had all this business. It's all about networking! This is the article in case you'd like to read it :) https://www.biggerpockets.com/...
Elenis Camargo
Rental Property Investor from Jacksonville, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Allyson Edwards Thanks for saying that! I always try to make my stories as real as possible.
Glenn Verley
New to Real Estate from Victorville, CA
replied about 1 year ago
Awesome post! I'm pretty new to BP (joined in Nov, but recently decided to get active), and I love hearing success stories of how others got started. I love the idea of helping others and sending deals to other investors. It speaks volumes to your character! I just messaged you with a few questions about how you got started as I'm looking to do something similar to help my friends and family. Hope to hear from you soon! Again, SUPER inspiring post!
Chris H.
from Los Angeles, California
replied about 1 year ago
wow @Elenis Camargo , great story. I am at starting back at phase one now investing out of state. i had a few lucky situations over the last 10 years locally but now going for the long term buy and hold out of state. thank you for sharing your story, i hope to have one of my own in a few years :)
Megi Wiley
replied about 1 year ago
Eleni’s,
You started investing in 2018 (when the market was very good). I was just wandering, what do you categorize as a deal? What do you look for in your rental properties?
Todd Groom
Rental Property Investor from Tampa, FL
replied about 1 year ago
Your my first article I read since joining this web site / app. Thanks for your knowledge and insight. I hope I can be successful in this endeavor.
Todd
Tony Spears
Rental Property Investor from Antioch, CA
replied about 1 year ago
@Elenis Camargo great post thanks for sharing!
Benjamin Yankelove
replied about 1 year ago
Such a great post! I am trying to get started with real estate without giving up. I am in NJ where things are very competetive. I looked at 1000 properties today on Craigslist!
Paul Herrmann
from Pittsburgh, PA
replied about 1 year ago
@Elenis Camargo I am under contract for my first house to BRRRR, this is so inspiring to see your success!
Edward Ng
Rental Property Investor from Otisville, NY
replied about 1 year ago
Originally posted by @Elenis Camargo :When my husband and I purchased our first rental property in February of 2018, I never imagined that in 2 short years I would accomplish $1.3 million in real estate deals! It’s been a fun journey so far and I wanted to share the steps I took so that hopefully someone reading this and wanting to follow the same path can learn from it. This is how I did it:
After saving and learning about real estate investing for about a year, we acquired our first rental property in February 2018 for $90,500. This one and all of our other acquisitions were done with 30-year conventional financing. Some were with 20% down and others with 15% down. We continued saving and acquired our second rental property in October 2018 for $49,000. Then we got a HELOC on rental property #1 since it had $50,000 in equity (both from purchasing it at a great deal and doing a minor rehab) and used part of that loan, plus cash we had saved, to acquire the third rental property in February 2019 for $123,000.
Throughout the year of learning and the first year of investing, I was very active on BiggerPockets. After acquiring the third property I wrote a blog titled “How We Purchased Our First 3 Rental Properties Out of State in 1 Year” and it got featured on the member’s blog homepage and on BiggerPockets’ newsletter as the featured article! I networked A LOT after that article being featured with both newbie investors and experienced investors. This is when I decided I would get my real estate license in Florida where I was investing. I took the online course and passed the Sales Associate exam while I was 7 months pregnant with my first baby in May 2019.
From my networking, we created a partnership with one of the people I met from the article feature who wanted to invest in Florida. Together we acquired our fourth, and his first, rental property in September 2019 for $95,000. We plan to acquire 20+ properties in the future under this partnership.
Through the article feature we met another investor, who lives out of the country, that wanted to work with us. We helped her acquire her first rental property in Florida in November 2019 for $91,875. I also successfully managed the rehab process for her and am currently working to help her acquire two more properties in 2020.
One of my BiggerPockets friends wanted to work with an agent on the ground since he lived a few hours away from Jacksonville. I referred him to my agent and he acquired a rental property in December 2019 for $136,500.
Throughout all of this time we saved more money and with our rental income we acquired our fifth property in January 2020 for $195,000.
I work very closely with my agent not only on our own deals, but with helping other investors find properties. I talk to him on a very regular basis either by email, phone or text. He knows how much I network and brought me an off-market deal of three multifamily properties in a very hot area of Jacksonville that only he had access to. I had the perfect buyer for him and within a couple of days they signed the purchase agreement in February 2020 for $535,000. I met this buyer last year and simply stayed in touch with him. I will be assisting this investor while he manages his first rehab from out-of-state with the contractor that I referred him to and I am sure we will do many more deals together in the future as well.
Add that all up and it’s $1,315,875 in real estate deals!
I didn’t go into this planning on doing deals with other investors or helping other investors acquire properties. I simply enjoyed meeting other like-minded people and talking to them about real estate. The partnership we created and the other investors I helped with acquisitions were not deals that happened overnight. They each took months, and one of them took one year of keeping in touch, to make it happen. The moment I met these people I didn’t know I would find them a deal down the road and they did not know that I would be providing them with a great deal in the future. This is what is so fun about this business. You never know what will come from the next person you meet and start talking to. It could be a quick conversation or it can turn into a life-long partnership with many deals to come!
Another fun part about real estate investing is connecting people together. The contractor that I referred to the multifamily deal is someone who helped me on our very first acquisition. Our tenant abandoned the property and he helped us rehab it. He was always someone I wanted to send more business to as he helped me a lot along the way by going to different properties that we wanted to acquire and providing feedback on the condition. None of the properties he gave me bids on worked out, but he continued trying to help me and now I was able to send work his way. When you are honest and help others, you attract other likeminded people. I’m excited to continue working with these amazing people and with new people that I’ll meet in the future.
Feel free to reach out with any comments or questions, I love talking real estate with new people!
Elenis, Congrats on the accomplishments in such a short time! Wondering if your acquired properties are in Jax, or different areas in FL. I may have missed that info if others had asked already. My wife and I have tried to work with RE agents in Jax, they don't seem to be investor friendly or we are probably not good at articulating our goals. Most given were MLS that we had no trouble locating. Would like to connect as potential partners of yours.
Kind regards
Olu Oyelade
Rental Property Investor from Oakville, CA
replied about 1 year ago
Truly inspiring ..
Jack Albert
replied about 1 year ago
@Elenis Camargo great post!
Where was your first rental property?
Hannah Rubin
Rental Property Investor from Pompano Beach, FL
replied about 1 year ago
@Elenis Camargo this is really so inspiring! I live in south florida and I have been looking to invest for a while but so far I have not found a deal that will cash flow. What part of florida are you based out of? It seems south florida is not the area to invest in and I am worried as a newbie that I will be in over my head by investing long distance.
Jonathan Soto
Rental Property Investor from Newark, NJ
replied about 1 year ago
awesome work :) keep up the great work.
Free eBook from BiggerPockets!

Join BiggerPockets and get The Ultimate Beginner's Guide to Real Estate Investing for FREE - read by more than 100,000 people - AND get exclusive real estate investing tips, tricks and techniques delivered straight to your inbox twice weekly!
- Actionable advice for getting started,
- Discover the 10 Most Lucrative Real Estate Niches,
- Learn how to get started with or without money,
- Explore Real-Life Strategies for Building Wealth,
- And a LOT more.
Sign up below to download the eBook for FREE today!
We hate spam just as much as you