Hello and excited to get started

[Julia Harmon]

Hi BiggerPockets community,

I've been listening to the Real Estate Rookie podcast of the last few weeks and decided that it's time to get started on this REI journey! I'm a W2 employee working in tech for many years and ready to plan my future of escaping the 9-5 grind and being in control of my own destiny. I'm willing to work hard at this and have realist expectations.

I'm not completely green. My husband and I bought our 1st home in San Diego in 2015, fixed it up while living in it and growing our family, then sold 2 years later and bought another true fixer upper that we've been living in for the last 7 years. We've done a mix of DIY and contractors (when it was beyond our expertise) for both houses. We've stayed in this house because life has been busy and because we love this location and our community. Plus, the property taxes here are insane and if we sold and bought new in this area our taxes would increase drastically.

My idea as a next step is to 1) Purchase a STR property in CA in 3-6mo (almost ready w the deposit, talking to lenders and agents); 2) Build an ADU on our current property and do a LTR. Since we already own the land and rents are high I think this is a good plan. 3) Expand into more rentals (thinking buy and hold) and build a portfolio.

I've always been interested in real estate and design. I'm addicted to Redfin and Zillow and constantly doing real estate math as I drive around neighborhoods and see fixer uppers. I'm not adverse to risk and currently have a decent size paycheck. I want to be out of the corp world and focused only on REI within the next 7 years. I think I'm more interested in BRRRR as I'm not ready for the risk / cost of flipping yet. (Although, I think I'd be good at it.) I'm ok with net zero cash for a few years while building equity but need a strategy to get me to an investor only life that is close to or more than my current W2. I'd love to invest in my own community of San Diego, but it's so expensive that I'm starting to think I need to do long distance investing to build a portfolio faster.

I'm planning to attend BPCon to start building my network and absorb all the info I possibly can. If anyone has suggestions, wants to connect or lives in San Diego and wants to meet up, I'm open to it all.

Thanks for reading and excited to join this community!

-Julia

[Julia Harmon]

Quote from @Jules Aton:

Hi Julia welcome. It sounds like you have a solid plan and are capable of making things happen. Here are a couple of items that stood out to me. CA is a different animal from what I understand but the thought of adding AUD anywhere near or onto my home would be a hard no from a lifestyle standpoint. And I'm not sure how many are actually able to live off rental income particularly when they have been high earners with W2. I kept my high paying job and continued doing RE as a side gig which has worked out well for me.

Hi @Jules Aton, Thanks for the response! CA is certainly a different beast. I'm actually from the MD/DC area originally. Note the AUDs are very common in the coastal community I live in. You often put them on top of the garage on the alley side with a separate entrance, so not as intrusive.

Glad your side gig has been successful!