New REI, looking at Detroit and Dallas

[Melanie Nelson]

Hi!

My husband and I decided we want to take advantage of the equity in our primary home in LA County and start investing. We absolutely cannot afford anything local, but after visiting family in Detroit this summer we became obsessed with the idea of investing and/or moving out of state. We are torn between wanting to move to the suburbs north of Detroit and use our equity for a down on a house there (could afford something bigger and nicer and pay it off in 15 yrs vs our current 30 yrs), plus would be able to invest in more than one rental property with that much cash to play with. We are also considering just using a HELOC to invest if we wanted to stay put, and would want to do Detroit metro area or Dallas/Ft Worth area as we visit family frequently there and also have family members who could help as needed.

Our biggest problem with these strategies is that cost of living in LA is so high that we don't have a lot of monthly cash flow to cover the HELOC payment unless we took a major quality of life hit (like stopping all the kids extra curriculars and buckling our belts severely on spending, which we CAN do but I honestly would rather not if there's another way). Our other thought is that if we did move, it would be nice to rent out our current house as it already has an ADU and we could potentially cover the HELOC with rent from the ADU and the mortgage by renting out the main house, but the idea of the ADU not being up to code and something happening frightens me. It's a bedroom and bathroom legally added onto the back of the garage, but was permitted as a "game/craft room" not a bedroom and there's no kitchen facilities or even a permanent closet (though we could install one). It would be nice to have a house we could move back to if we absolutely hated it out of state lol

Would love to connect with anyone local who could help talk me through strategies! Been reading and listening to BP like crazy! 

[Michael Smythe]

@Melanie Nelson just to give you more to think about - you could sell and then rent wherever and buy several rentals with the sale proceeds. 

Would give you time to evaluate your new city to decide if you want to stay and if you decide to stay, where specifically, you'd want to live.

You might want to follow the "Deep Dive" series we're doing on our BiggerPockets blog about Metro Detroit cities, City of Detroit Neighborhoods and comparing Metro Detroit to other hotspots investors usually consider:

https://www.biggerpockets.com/member-blogs/3094/99854-deep-dive-into-metro-detroit-cities-ecorse

Our analysis is a template you can follow for any city, but doubt you'll find this much info for any other market in the US.

So, why would you invest remotely anywhere else?

How can we assist you further?