Hi, I’m hungry, what’s your name?
34 year old that’s been lots of places and done lots of things. I’ve lived in Korea twice for a total of almost six years, taught English as a Second Language, served in the Marines as a Supply Administration Clerk, and had a whole mess of odd/dirty jobs in the States and Canada. For now I substitute teach and moonlight as a prep cook.
Unfortunately, there’s a lack of financial stability that goes with moving around a lot and doing a lot of different things. At the same time It’s hard for me to settle down. The idea of a boring 9-5 scares me just as much as the idea of being without money.
Well, as I get older, more and more I catch myself checking my closet at night for signs of the broke-y man. I won’t always be healthy enough to earn my way out of a situation. At the same time, I won’t stop being me, plain and simple. I NEED a source of income that lets me keep living the way I’m going to live.
Recently I’ve been given a great opportunity in the form of a down payment. I want this to be a springboard into the future, not a crutch, or worse, a hobble. The last thing I want to do is park it in some house I’ll feel obligated to live in.
So! The idea is to own enough rental property to support me when I need the extra help, fund my retirement, keep my parents healthy, and take care of my possible future family.
I plan to house-hack my way through my first four residential multi-family properties, then trade up to a commercial apartment. Maybe rinse/repeat the process until I’m where I need to be, establishing and scaling systems as needed.
Right now I’m in a weird place. I’m hiding in my cocoon, transforming into a beautiful RE Investor, learning all I can. But I’m also scared of blowing it all. I only have one shot at this. No do overs. This is the stage where I face the greatest risk of being stillborn. I want to begin but I know I’m not ready. Too long without action and I’ll lose interest. At the same time I don’t know when I’ll be ready. Also too long in this cocoon and I might get comfy arm chair investing.
I’m taking real estate classes and have attended one REI meetup. I’m practicing pricing things here and there. I have rough ideas for my goals and will write them down this week. I know my ‘why’. I don’t know the how or where. All the things I want to know seem to be things based on experience i.e. recognizing good contractors and being able to look at a property and size it up. I’m also reluctant to invest here in CA. TX, OH, PA, MD, WY and MN all look good, but nothing yet makes one better than the other.
What I need to do next is write out my goals, plan and exit strategy. I also need to get through my 10kth number crunch so I can work faster and start to recognize trends. I also need to learn about how to spot house problems and figure out how much fixing it would cost. I will put together a list of 20 cities (two in CA, three for each of the other listed states) and try and try to rank them in a wish list, and work the top three. That should focus my number crunching practice.