All Forum Posts by: Jason Schmidt

My wife wants to move, and we have 2 houses. Thanks to a large acquisition I made for resale purposes, we are not really liquid enough to put a good down payment on a house, though the plan would be to sell the 2 houses we have. What options do we have, aside from selling a house first?  Any help would be greatly appreciated!

About 10 years ago, I was white hot about real estate, but then ... life, ya know?  Here is my situation: 

Next year, I'll turn 40, and I want to have my family of four set up well down the road.  Currently, we own two houses outright in the Houston area.  Our primary residence (zillow valued at about 190k) and our rental (zillow valued at about 155k).  The rental was really just for family, and "produces" $700/mo.  We have 40k in the bank and about 70k or so tied up in investments/collectibles.  

We are looking at possibly purchasing another house to actually move to, with a garage apartment or similar for my mom to move into, from the rental.  I had long considered just selling the other two houses and getting into a house that is 300-350k, and be done with it, but I am starting to think about having both properties as rentals.  The total approximate rent coming in from the two houses (according to zillow) would be about 3k a month.  

I would love to hear the input from everyone here - what would you all do?  What are your suggestions based upon my situation?  I'm happy to answer any other questions that need to be answered, if I have missed anything.  Thank you!

@Jassem A. that is amazing....no ... I mean AMAZING.  I simply don't see how my money can be working any harder than paying off a 105k house outright and renting.  The bank gives me nothing on my money ($70/mo) so I'm kind of at a loss.  I'm like on this little cash reserve here and you guys are making your money sing.  Mine doesn't even have a voice.  

Thanks guys - I guess I'm having a problem with the whole numbers thing here.  If we charge rent that will cover expenses, the house will be paid off in 30 years and maybe we will squeeze 50-100 bucks out of it a month.  However, if we pay cash, we can get perhaps $700 or $800 each month.  It frankly scares me to think about having 10-20 properties.  I couldn't imagine dealing with all those tenants, but I could see us possibly having 3-5 at some point.  

To give you all a more complete picture, I'm 34 and for all intents & purposes am a part time worker.  I do several part time projects.  Nothing too terribly strenuous, but we don't live on much either.  I'd say 40k is what we need each year to live.  

In light of this information, any other help ... GREATLY appreciated!

We are looking into purchasing an investment home for rental income. We have already paid off our home, have 215k in the bank and are looking to get the investment home for 105k. Eventually, we may get 1 or 2 other homes to rent out, but right now, we are just looking at this one. 

What would you do...and why? 

Pay all cash for it, or put 55k down and finance the rest?

If financing, we will probably be hit with about $1,500 more in closing costs apparently, and it will be at a 4% interest rate which equals out to be $16,000+ in interest that we would pay over the life of the 15 year loan.

Several real estate folks have said to only put half down, but we hate debt, and can't stand that a few hundred dollars a month would be going to the bank just for the privilege of borrowing their money. Any people weighing in would be greatly appreciated!

As another side note - this will be for my parents (for now).  They will be paying rent, but not as much as we would normally be getting.  

Thanks Hattie!  I really appreciate the advice.  Someone else was telling me to stick with multi-family properties, and not the single family properties.  I would like for my folks to have their own place to not worry about neighbors, but maybe the multi is the best route to go from an investment standpoint? 

I've had an interest in real estate for years now, but because of "life" I just haven't pulled the trigger on ... anything.  Finding a house for my folks has given me the bug again, and I'm using this as a jump off point to really seriously consider getting into real estate investing.  

In the past 2 years, I've gone from being busy running a fairly successful computer related business (and burned/stressed out about it) to taking that part time and doing other odds and ends like buying/selling/trading things.  It seems like I'm on autopilot.  While our net worth is growing, it is slow.  

I currently find myself debt free, with our primary residence (worth about 125k)  paid off, 215k in the bank and 20k in mutual funds.  My initial thought was going to be to purchase a 100k or so house for my folks with cash, (and have them pay me a reduced rate for rent) but now I'm not so sure that is the best way to go about it.  

If you were in my shoes, and you wanted real estate to be the bulk of the income producer for you, what would you do?  I am in the Houston area, by the way - apparently the housing market is hot right now.  Thanks so much in advance!

i'd love to actually find a wholesaler - how do i go about looking for one of these folks?  

email sent, thanks!

figured i'd bump this to see if anyone had any leads on anything in the NW houston area.  i'm considering upping my investment to 90-95.  just want it to be good for my folks, and a good investment.