All Forum Posts by: Andrew Ashby

@Theresa Kennedy, yes the VA loan is still active on the Jacksonville SFR. However, as the house was purchased for $155k, I still have partial loan guarantee remaining to use VA again on my next primary residence purchase.

@Jamie Jones, yes I'm absolutely going to continue investing in Chattanooga remotely. I have a good team set up there, including an investor friendly agent to whom I can refer you. Chattanooga is one of the highly attractive tertiary markets that I target. However, house hacking right there in Murfreesboro is probably your best shot at getting started. Can't beat those primary residence financing terms!

@Stephen Watt, I'm not one of those people who are only interested in real estate to the extent that it makes them money. In other words, my interest in real estate is not fleeting or temporary. I didn't buy properties and immediately seek to distance myself by hiring property managers. I LOVE REAL ESTATE. I love the subject matter. When I discovered this, it made my day job miserable because I really wanted to be spending my time on real estate. My confidence in quitting my job comes from 1) Knowing my passion and knowledge will make me successful as a real estate agent, 2) I have monthly income from my 4 rental units if needed, and 3) I have substantial savings and a large lump sum payout from my 401k from my former employer. To @Mark Scuderi's point, leaving the "safety" of traditional employment is indeed scary but it was much scarier and daunting to me to continue plodding away at a job that made me miserable. I gave up a six figure salary, excellent healthcare benefits, a company car, and many more perks to pursue my passion in real estate which is an all-cash business for agents. As an agent, you eat nothing but what you kill for yourself. My healthcare insurance, vision, dental, retirement, etc, is all coming out of my own pocket in cash now. It's a bit scary, but oddly freeing at the same time. I will be successful in this business. I will not allow any other outcome. I have too many people depending on me. 

Thanks everyone for the encouragement. Meanwhile, if you know anyone who wants to buy or sell real estate in Central Florida, hit me up!

Former U.S. Navy officer and former pharmaceutical sales rep. I'm now a licensed real estate agent with Masters Realty in Orlando. If you need to buy or sell real estate in Central Florida, hit me up! As an investor myself, I'm investor friendly: 443-454-4460 and [email protected] 

@Joey Hamaoui, we chose Orlando because we have lived in the area previously (Winter Haven and Kissimmee), we have friends here, and because it seems to be a boom town right now for real estate. The Orlando Sentinel recently featured an article pointing out that a third of Orlando homes go under contract within a week of being listed, and anything move-in ready in the $100k-$300k range will be in a multiple offer scenario. For an ex-military man who considers doomsday scenarios, Orlando has the added appeal of sitting high and dry well above sea level for the sake of flooding and hurricanes. I'll continue to invest in Jacksonville and Chattanooga though. I know Jacksonville is seeing massive growth as well. 

@Paul Paschall, the Jacksonville SFR was no money down VA financing (initially a primary residence). The Chattanooga SFR was a conventional 30 yr fixed rate with 5% down (again, initially a primary residence). The Chattanooga duplex is a fixed 30 yr conventional loan with 25% down. A lot of this down payment money was made possible by my frugal lifestyle and low-tax bracket during my Navy years.

As for real estate school, I went with a well recognized online platform. It was difficult, but the books that accompany the course were excellent. I completed the whole course in 5 weeks, but I easily could have done it in 1-2 weeks if I didn't have a full time job holding me back at the time. 

I did it. I took the leap. With only 4 rental units (2 SFRs and 1 duplex), I quit my six-figure job in pharmaceutical sales, got my real estate license, and moved my family back to Florida. How did I get here? I'd say after buying my duplex in December 2016, rehabbing it with my family, and watching it be successful, I had become far more acclimated to risk taking. It was my taste of honey and I absolutely loved it. I couldn't go back to the vinegar of my day job. I needed to take my part time gig to full time to be happy. How did I get here?

I served 5.5 years as a U.S. Navy officer. I bought my first house with 100% VA financing in Jacksonville FL in June 2008 just a month after graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy. I knew the market was in decline and I thought it was a perfect time to buy. Little did I know that the Jacksonville market was nowhere near bottom and the 3/2 I paid $155,000 for had been bought by a flipper 6 months previously for $95,000. So when it came time for me to relocate to Rhode Island for military orders in October 2012, I became an accidental landlord because I still owed far more on the house than it was worth at the time and I understood that short sales were treated the same for FICO as foreclosures. I still own that SFR to this day and it will soon finally be profitable after subtracting reserves.

I left the Navy in the fall of 2013 and entered pharmaceutical sales in Central Florida. 

My real estate awakening began in the summer of 2016 when I was preparing to buy another SFR as a primary residence in Chattanooga (another work move). It started with audiobooks--first Rich Dad Poor Dad, closely followed by Brandon Turner's Rental Property Investing and then several more Rich Dad adviser series books. I bought and moved into that SFR in August 2016 and immediately set a goal of making my first intentional investment-only purchase by year's end. I set my sights on a Section 8 duplex in Chattanooga and closed that deal in December of 2016. That experience made real to me what I already knew...that I was destined to be in real estate full time and it was only a matter of time.

As the months wore on after getting my taste of honey so to speak, I became more and more disenfranchised with my day job as I listened to over 200 hours of BP podcasts and more than 10 real estate books. I actively began looking for other lines of work to get me relocated to Florida, but I knew that whatever I found would only be another means to an end to my full time real estate dream. After several phone interviews and many dozens of inquiries, I finally concluded that the answer to misery was staring me in the mirror. It was me. It was time to take the leap and go into real estate full time in the only way I saw immediately possible--get licensed and move back to Florida. And that's exactly what happened. I started real estate school online, gave notice to my employer, leased out my own primary residence as my 4th unit, and moved my family back to Florida. 

I'm now a full time real estate agent (Masters Realty) and investor in Orlando and I couldn't be happier.

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefor all progress depends on the unreasonable man."--George Bernard Shaw

I just finished real estate agent school (Bob Hogue) and I quit my pharmaceutical sales job. I'll be taking the sales associate exam soon. Relocating to Apopka/Winter Garden/Clermont in 2 weeks. I'm looking for a great brokerage office to work for that's investor angled but also has a strong retail side. Any recommendations?