All Forum Posts by: Stephen K.

Thanks for the advice everyone! To be clear here, the 5k is set aside for a house - its not emergency funds. Its also a house we plan to live in for a year or 2. I’m hoping to have another 5-10 by the end of the year (without going into details money owed to me). I am also aware that Real Estate Investing is not a get rich quick scheme - that is actually what attracted me to it. I am also aware and understand it takes a-lot of hard work. Just out of curiosity, what gave the impression that I am poor, I want to get rich quick, and the funds I am using are emergency funds?

Hey Everyone!

Happy to be here.  I've been doing my due diligence the past month and a half and spending every bit of free time I can to learn more about the real estate investment business.  I'm on my 4th book now and have been listening to a lot of BiggerPockets podcast episodes and I am super pumped!  Currently taking a look at finding some meetups to see if I can find some part time work under a real estate investor and get some more "hands on" experience in this business.

I've been scouring the listings to see whats in the Greenville SC area. My wife and I have about 5k right now to get a SFH and may/may not have another 10k in the next year. I was kind of thinking to use this 5k to invest in our first house hack SFH that needs some work (get a max up to say 75k max which would give us about 5% down or 10% if we could get a 50k house) and borrow the rest through either FHA or an 80-10-10 loan depending on the price of the house. If we got another 5-10k later on down the road get another house or 2 and rent our first property. I've been keeping an eye out on Taylors, Greer, Greenville, Mauldin, Simpsonville, and Spartanburg. Seems there are a few houses in Greer, Spartanburg, and Greenville that would be in the price point we are looking at, but I am bit worried about the Competitive market here. I've been looking since August of last year and from what I understood Winter is generally the slowest time of the year for the real estate market. Houses here, however, seem to go fast! Prior to looking at Real Estate Investing I was looking at houses in the 150k range for the past 6 months and it was no different in this price range either. As someone looking to get into the real estate market that makes me a little nervous. It seems like finding a house with a "20% discount" as is so often talked about in the books I read is extremely hard to find in this area. I've been adding HUD houses in the search and those go even quicker! Maybe I am missing something, but this area does not seem to be very beginning investor friendly. Should we consider other areas?

@Andrew Kerr Thanks for your feedback!  This is where I was leaning as well, but so far I haven't seen anything on trulia or the like for a good priced duplex+.  The few that I have seen run between 175-200k for a duplex, and appear to only rent for ~800/month per unit.  Ideally we would like to get one for a great price that would allow us to live for free and have a positive cash flow (even if its just a 100-200), but maybe that is a bit too ambitious for a Duplex if we plan on househacking??  Maybe we should be aiming for a Triplex or Quadplex instead?  I've also been reading that a lot of times a mortgage company will not count existing tenant rent as part of your income and with our student loan debt I'm not sure how much we could get approved for, so there is also that.  

Hey All!  Extremely excited to be here and to begin my Real Estate Investment journey.  I have been thinking about this for the last 2 years and now that my wife and I are looking to buy our first home within the next year, I decided it was time to invest a lot of time into research, the local market, and the "how to" as Brandon puts it.  So without further adue, here is our situation:

My wife and I both have student loans combined pushing 130k. 4 months ago we had our first child, so right now with my wife working part time and my being full time, we bring in around 60k a year. At the pace we are at, it would take roughly 20 years to pay off our student loans, so I thought now was as good of time as any to begin what I've always been fascinated with: real estate investments, specifically with rentals. We are looking at purchasing a property that is 100k or less. The goal is to build an LLC with a good rental property portfolio and use the cash flow to pay off our student loans, and then once those are gone and any other outstanding debts are paid in full (car, etc) begin to focus completely on growing the business and building financial freedom. All in all we should have roughly 15k to put down for a down payment and closing cost for a house. We are currently tossing around 2 ideas:

1)  Get a duplex; rent one side and live on the other - We would use a management company to handle the other side so we could more or less remain anonymous owners so as to avoid any interference with our personal life while we are raising a baby.  In our area though, I have not been able to find any duplexes remotely close to what we'd want to spend on our first property (100k or less); they appear to be roughly 1.5 - 2x that amount.  My wife is not crazy about this idea either (the cheaper duplexs that fetch for roughly 170k are the typical ranches you picture when you see a duplex, and the areas are not so ideal for a family).

2)  Get a SFH and live in it for a few years then rent - There are plenty of houses in our area for less than 100k, so easily doable.  Sure, we will have a property to rent when we are ready to move out, but this would rely heavily upon our being able to get another loan for another house and then having to front the expenses until we would find renters.  

I was hoping to get some advice on our situation.  Any other options or advice here?  Anyone who has been in this same position who could share their experiences?  Thanks for any input you have!