New to Real Estate 路 Melbourne, FL 路 Member since 2021 路 7 posts 路 3 votes
Hello All. First BiggerPockets post!
I've recently moved to Brevard County from Chicago to pursue an engineering career. I've come to really like the area and see great opportunities in real estate. My plan to get my feet wet in real estate investing is by using the house hacking strategy; expanding my portfolio by one multifamily property per year. From the books I've read, this seems like a great way to get started and I'm very excited to begin.
I'm making this post post to network with other investors in the area and learn about their experiences with multifamily investing and house hacking. I'm looking forward to getting in touch with you all!
Rental Property Investor 路 Orlando, FL 路 Member since 2015 路 353 posts 路 269 votes
5y
@Michael DiMeo welcome to Brevard. I don鈥檛 live in Brevard but I鈥檓 close by in East Orlando. I invest in Brevard and Jacksonville and have done both multifamily and some single family. I think you鈥檒l find the multifamily market over there is highly competitive and not much inventory, so if you have trouble finding a deal, don鈥檛 be afraid to consider househacking a single family by the bedroom to your engineer buddies...just another option. You can keep it when you move on to the next one and you won鈥檛 have to overpay to live in a neighborhood where you don鈥檛 want to be. Good luck! Let me know if you have any questions!
I live in Merritt Island and I like it here. It is very competitive here. I have been making an offer a week or more for some time now and haven鈥檛 gotten one yet. It鈥檚 definitely persistence. I have my current home that I will turn into a rental. Trying to buy both an owner occupied property to move in to as well as another investment. Goal is 2-3 this year then 1-2 more a year for the foreseeable future but like I said it鈥檚 very competitive.
New York City / Space Coast FL 路 Member since 2021 路 16 posts 路 15 votes
5y
My 2 cents - with the caveat I am a fairly new investor in the area. 2-4 units are hard to come by here and the ones that do go for a price that hardly makes it more worthwhile than a single-family. You find in other areas of the country - such as NYC, where I'm from - duplexes/triplexes/quadplexes were a fundamental component of the residential development plans of the area. Not so here, here is open land and aside from the HOA communities, well-sized lots.
Now, as others have mentioned, renting by the room is still certainly viable and if you price it competitively enough I believe you will have very low vacancy with that strategy. Reason is, the rental market is inundated with pricier rentals that exclude a very large part of the population that do not make a high W2 salary. Everyone wants to price a rental at $1500 or above, but there are so many people who can't really go above something like $800 or $900.
Don't get me started on multifamily. I'd be surprised if you can make something happen there for less than $2M.
Realtor 路 Vero Beach, FL 路 Member since 2016 路 72 posts 路 18 votes
5y
Welcome to Brevard County! If there's anything we can do for you, feel free to reach out. I serve Brevard, Indian River & Port Saint Lucie, pretty much the Treasure Coast Area however, my team is global. It doesn't matter the location we can help!!
Hi Michael! Our stories are very similar, I also moved to Brevard county to pursue an engineering career. What discipline did you study specifically? I studied mechanical engineering. I would love to network and keep in touch.