Investor · Kansas City, MO · Member since 2017 · 791 posts · 1k+ votes
My first real estate investment was in 2010. I kept acquiring properties, sometimes using the BRRR strategy. I've been without a day job for 1.5 years looking for more deals and got a couple large portfolios in 2016. That hit our passive income goals but we had to recoup cash buffer.
It's officially official, we are free and neither of us have to work!
Looking forward to living life with my wife and both of us being able to do what we want when we want.
Celebrating with a well aged cigar from the year it all started. And some of my top shelf bourbon.
From someone who is just scratching the surface education, not even investing, congratulations to you and your wife's success both now and in the future. This was certainly an inspiration to read.
@Austin Fruechting Congratulations on achieving your goals. So what are your plans now? Will you continue to increase your portfolio or go enjoy umbrella drinks on a beach? lol
Also, would you mind sharing some nuggets of wisdom for those of us just starting our real estate journey? I would appreciate any helpful insight you could provide. Thank you.
@Manvir G. - I'm happy to share anything. What do you want to know? I'm going to try share what I've learned at goodlifeinten to help others.
I will keep looking for and analyzing deals, but nothing that requires a lot of time input running/managing something, just things where I can sit back with my computer and excel and quickbooks. I really enjoy doing the strategy sides of things. One of my dreams with real estate (after I have more deals to cover the costs) would be to do something along the lines of buy some land, put up a bunch of tiny homes, and rent out at/below cost to help people like homeless veterans get back on their feet.
Congratulations, @Austin Fruechting! I'm new to this forum. I only started a little bit with conventional loan. I'll learn from you and other investors!
@Bryce Jackson Zachary - thanks! A big part of that came from sitting back and really thinking about the the life we would ideally live that would provide the most happiness for us. Then we calculated the income needed for that lifestyle. That number ended up much less than our arbitrary goal we had started with (about 50% less!!)
Figuring out what our ideal life to maximize happiness was HUGE. Not only did it give us a hard number target to shoot for, we also had the idea of ideal day to day life. Great motivator to keep pushing me forward.
@Austin Fruechting Congrats! How did you get to 70 properties when there is a limit to the number of mortgages you can have in your name? I'm closing on my first property at the end of the month, and looking forward to acquiring more, but curious about how to scale. Thanks!
Austin Fruechting Could you explain the "many LLC" you have? Sorry I'm new at this and I'm not sure of getting an LLC before I purchase my first property or if I should wait later on when I get several. Thank you for your help and Congratulations! 😊
Congrats Austin Fruechting ! Happy to hear that this can happen! I have yet to purchase my first property but looking forward to what this journey will bring.
What kind of cash flow did it take for you two to fully retire? Feel free to PM me as well if you'd rather not share here. I'm looking into the buy and hold strategy as well.
Congrats again!
@Austin Fruechting I love your story and my wife and I have decided several months ago that we would follow the same path. Since then we have bought a couple buy and hold houses. I have 100x questions for you:
How did you handle the student loans? Did you buy a ton of houses then just crush the debt after? Or did you focus on that first? How would you suggest another investor handle that?
Were you and your wife making very strong income in your jobs that you were able to save a ton and use it for down payment? When did you really feel the compounding effect? How many houses did you own yr 1 , yr 2, yr 3. etc..
It sounds like it took you 7 years? Can you map out a plan (for me ;) ) that you (or anyone) could do it faster? Could you recreate your result or do you feel like you got lucky - sounds like you were proactive to find the nail in the coffin deal, but other than that?
What type of equity do you have in your places? Do you OWN them or are you still financing? If financing, do you feel there is a strong risk retiring with potential liabilities of that magnitude?
How much money in "reserves" do you feel comfortable with? I've heard SO many rules of thumbs, I'd be curious to know what you use.
Wow!!! Congratulations! You must have studied hard and worked even harder! Sounds like it was much deserved! Very inspiring. I'll be graduating from Penn State as a mechanical engineer this May and I hope to soon begin my own journey in REI. What did you do to get your foot in the door? My thought is to buy a duplex with an FHA loan and live in the other half for the first year.
Wow! Woke up to a lot of support and congrats here. Thanks everyone!! I will try to get through everyone's questions!
First up @Jackson Sandland - I have 107 units, 49 properties. Although that doesn't mean 49 loans. I did some package deals where I bought many properties under one loan. HOWEVER - the limit of number of mortgages is typically just with the big banks that sell stuff off. I use a mid-sized local bank that is a "portfolio lender" and the only stipulation is there's a $$ cap on what they will lend any one individual (including any LLC they're a member of). I can still borrow a lot more before I hit that cap.
@Elizabeth V. - Definitely get an LLC. As you grow and have more and more properties you might make a new LLC every once in a while. Just as your first LLC to protect your personal assets, the assets of one LLC are protected from the other LLC.
Also, after I had proved myself, I attracted capital investors. Every new investment structure has a different LLC. So between a few of my own and a few with partners. THEN I have one LLC that represents my ownership in all the other LLC's, lol <-- that one is just for additional tax right offs
@William Kim - that number is all personal man. What I mean is the life that makes me most happy is different than the life that would make you most happy. And where are you going live and housing costs for that? You have to really know yourself and start with figuring that out your ideal life, then work backwards to figure out what you need for that. I'll PM you some good info. Our number was just around $7-8k per month. We didn't skimp on anything, we figured out the point in everything that would maximize our happiness. But Rolex's and Lambo's wouldn't make us any happier.