4 States With the Strongest Economies and Investing Potential

Dave:
With all this news coming from the Fed and the presidential election going on, we’re talking a lot recently about the national economy, but every seasoned investor knows that the national economy and the national housing market doesn’t really impact housing prices or investment performance as much as local economies. And although we do talk about specific cities and neighborhoods on this show, we’ve sort of skipped what I think is a really interesting level previously, which is talking about states and which states across the nation have the strongest economies right now. Today we’re going to answer that. Hey everyone, it’s Dave. Welcome to On the Market. We got the whole crew here today, Henry Washington. How’s it going?

Henry:
Fantastic man. Great to be here. As always,

Dave:
Kathy Fettke, thanks for joining us.

Kathy:
So happy to be here with you guys.

Dave:
And we also have James Dainard and although this show is supposed to be sort of a debate and we’re going to crown a winner, I think James has given away his bias a little bit. Most people are probably listening to this as a podcast, but if you are watching this on YouTube, you would see that James is wearing a Washington Dard political campaign style T-shirt for 2028. James, does this mean you and Henry already have an alliance?

James:
Oh yes, we have more than an alliance. We are ready to change things in 2028. Get the word out.

Dave:
Why do we have to wait four years, man?

James:
Well, we don’t want to rush into it. We’re making a plan and we figure we might need it in 2028.

Dave:
Alright, well Kathy, I guess we’re going to be hearing about this for four years on the podcast. Seriously, they’ve got

Kathy:
My vote, they’ve got my vote.

Dave:
I was already feeling like presidential campaigns were too long, but I guess James is starting his campaign even earlier. Obviously we’re joking. I’m referring back to a previous episode of the show where we were coming up with our own economic policies. If you haven’t checked that out, it came out a couple weeks ago in the middle of September. But today’s episode we are talking about a showdown between states. You’ve probably seen this format where we’ve duked it out over cities before, but today each of us have chosen a state that we think has the strongest economy for investing. We’ll each go around and break down the strongest parts of the state we chose as economy, what cities in that state we’d investment and which investment strategies we’d use and why. Obviously this whole show will be immediately more fun if it’s a competition, so we’re going to make it a competition and we’ll be voting on a winner at the end. But the real hope for this episode is that you’ll learn how each of the four of us assess state level economic information to make micro level decisions about our investments and our portfolio. Let’s get into it. Henry, I guess since you are at the top of the Washington Dard ticket, we’ll allow you to go first. What state did you pick?

Henry:
Well, before I tell you the state, I want to tell you a little bit about how my brain works when I’m thinking about markets or states in this matter. I grew up in a town called Bakersfield, which is about an hour and a half north of Los Angeles. And what I learned living in that smaller town was that there are lots of people who live in more affordable areas who commute to more expensive areas. So I was kind of looking through that lens. Where is a place that also has strong market dynamics but maybe is more affordable in some of the states with some of the more noticeable larger cities within them? And so the state that I chose is Delaware, and the reason is there is proximity to a lot of other major cities. Delaware is not too far from Philadelphia. It’s Borders, New Jersey, so it takes a few hours to get to New York.
You can go south and hit Baltimore and dc. It’s a place where you can commute to other cities if you so choose that maybe aren’t as affordable, but it also has great real estate dynamics. If you look at the median home price, Delaware is approximately at 370,000, so it’s about 9% lower than the national average. To buy a home median rent is $1,500 a month. That’s below the national average. So from an affordability standpoint, it’s there, but if you look at the economy, Delaware in general is a business friendly state. That’s why there are so many LLCs that get formed in Delaware because of the business friendliness of the state. And as far as the economy goes, they’re very strong in the financial services and banking industry. Some of the largest employers in Delaware are the Christian care healthcare system. DuPont is the second largest employer there, which is a big manufacturing company.
The University of Delaware is there, which is a large university, and then JP Morgan Chase, bank of America, AstraZeneca. So you have people that are moving there because population has also been growing in Delaware over the last five years to work for these companies. And you have some amenities that keep people there. People forget that Delaware is a state where you can actually go to the beach and so there’s beach towns and there is tourist attractions as well as proximity to some of these other larger cities, Philadelphia, New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, dc. So you can really get out, see a lot of the country, live in an affordable area, have a high paying job, and be able to actually afford housing and or rent because of the types of industry that are there. And it’s a pretty landlord friendly state in comparison to some other states. So there’s a lot of different options for you in terms of what you could do from an investment standpoint. It’s pretty diverse for a small state.

Dave:
Alright, quiz time. James, can you name a single city in Delaware?

James:
I can’t but I can name Wayne’s World. That’s what I always think of.

Dave:
Am

James:
In Delaware.

Dave:
Kathy, can you name a single city in Delaware?

Kathy:
I just thought Delaware was a city.

Dave:
I love how these episodes are basically just lessons in how bad we all are at geography. It’s pretty bad. I think, and I swear I didn’t look this up. Is Dover in Delaware?

Henry:
Dover is in Delaware, that’s

Dave:
Correct. Okay, okay. That’s the only one I know. Henry, can you name another one?

Henry:
Of course I can name another one.

Dave:
Name me some interesting places to invest in Delaware.

Henry:
Dover is one of the cities and it is one of the cities that I would consider investing in. Dover is spending a large amount of money investing in revitalizing their downtown area, and so there’s a lot of expansion. Dover is also where Delaware State University is, and so there’s also a lot of money being spent by Delaware and Delaware State University to enhance the facilities because of the growth that they’re seeing. So Dover is one of the cities I would invest in. Wilmington, Delaware is another city. Think of the Riverwalk in San Antonio. So they’ve spent some money on developing their riverfront as that has continued to grow what we would consider. Smaller cities are major cities for Delaware and they’re investing in their growth because of the growth that Delaware has seen. The other city we would consider investing in is Newark. The University of Delaware is investing in other major research facilities and student housing around that area. And then in terms of tourism, you’ve got, oh gosh, I dunno how to pronounce this,

Dave:
Spell it for us.

Henry:
R-E-H-O-B-O-T-H.

Dave:
Oh my god. Okay. You guys all can’t hear this on the show, but our producer just popped in and took Henry to school and corrected that it’s not Newark, it’s new Delaware. So everyone who is about to write mean YouTube comments about this and how we don’t know how to pronounce things. First of all, you’re right, we clearly don’t know how to pronounce anything, but thankfully our producer corrected us and then Henry, you were about to tell us about a beach town.

Henry:
Rehoboth Beach is the, see, we can’t pronounce anything. I probably murdered that even after she told me. Yes, but in terms of tourism infrastructure, they’re making major upgrades to the boardwalks, to the beaches and adding public amenities because this is one of their beach towns and public attractions. And so that market would be great for short-term rentals. You’ve got student housing in New Ark and as far as Dover and Wilmington, those are the more city type areas where you could get your traditional long-term rentals and midterm rentals for people that are coming in because healthcare is the number one employer there. Got

James:
It. I do like Henry, and this is why he’s my running mate. Abby Delaware is one of the most tax friendly states. That’s why there’s so many corporations that get established there. I think that’s a massive benefit, especially as what we’re going into over the next three to five years. Things are more expensive. Quality of life’s going down, Delaware’s got runway. I think any of these tax friendly states have runway over the next three to five years, and so that’s why I think it’s a pretty good pick by Henry

Henry:
Delaware is home to over 1 million business entities because of that and 66% of Fortune 500 companies are there.

Kathy:
Yeah, I probably got five or 10 LLCs in Delaware. And then there’s the DST, the Delaware statutory trust. That’s a big thing where you can actually 10 31 into one of those.

Dave:
Oh yeah, I’ve done a DST.

Kathy:
Yeah,

Dave:
Yeah, absolutely. It’s a very beneficial thing. And I’ll just note, I looked up some of the stats here that Delaware’s got a pretty hot housing market right now. I think that means you’ll probably face a lot of competition, but prices are going up there. Days of market are low, and so if you’re looking to perhaps do a flip or some sort of value add project in Delaware, it seems like a good place to do it. Alright, well thank you Henry. Is there anything else we should know about Delaware before we move on?

Henry:
Yes. There’s one thing I would like everybody to know. Fun fact about Delaware. It is home of the pumpkin chunkin contest. This is where they have a contest to see who can chuck a pumpkin the furthest using homemade manufactured items.

Kathy:
Oh, I want to do that.

Henry:
I’m in on this

Dave:
Dude, we used to do this in college. Wow. Yeah, I went to an engineering school. They used to build trebuchet and catapults and just launch these things. Pumpkin chunking. Do you know the record? I don’t know the record. I’m going to look it up right now. How do you spell this pumpkin Chunkin? No. Okay. In 2013, the record was set by the American Chunker Air candidate. That’s such a good name. It lodged it. 4,698 feet is the record for chucking a pumpkin. It’s almost a mile.

Kathy:
This could be the first assignment for Washington to prove your skills.

Dave:
That’s right.

Henry:
That’s right.

Dave:
We’re probably not in time for Halloween this year, but next year we’re chucking some pumpkins. All right, well thank you Henry. This is very interesting. Honestly, didn’t know a lot about Delaware, but it sounds very compelling. Okay, so looks like we’re all learning some geography today and hopefully you’re learning some smart economic factors to look for in a state. We are about to take a short break, but when we come back, which market is James feeling bold about? And is barbecue actually an overlooked KPI for market performance? Stick with us. Hey investors, welcome back to On the Market. We’re talking about the strongest state economies. Let’s move on to Kathy. Now I got to separate you and your homey James over here. So Kathy, what state did you pick?

Kathy:
I dunno, you guys have a guess

Dave:
If you’re not watching Kathy, just put on a very, it looks like movie quality prop of Thank you. An American flag. What would you call that? Cowboy

Kathy:
Hat, I guess.

Henry:
Yeah, I would say it’s a cowboy hat.

Dave:
Okay,

Kathy:
That’s a cowboy hat. A lot of people don’t realize this is what defines America. When you think of France, you think of a beret, you think of sombrero. Mexico. This is it. This is America right here.

Dave:
Yes, an American flag cowboy hat. It actually looks very nice. That’s not an Amazon hat that looks like artisanal.

Kathy:
It could be just a CVS. Anyway,

Dave:
Okay,

Kathy:
So my state, I stole the gorilla here. I took taxes because of a few things. One, we are definitely heavily invested there. It was the first place I invested 20 ish years ago. Here’s just a few things. This is amazing to me. It’s the eighth largest economy among all the nations in the world.

Henry:
Wow.

Kathy:
So that’s impressive. The population growth has led the nation over the last 18 years and doesn’t seem to be slowing down and continues to be the top state for job creation.

Dave:
But is that job creation per capita? Just total jobs? There are a lot of people living in Texas.

Kathy:
Well, according to my data resources, I have no idea. It’s just a lot of jobs,

Dave:
Dan. Well, at least you’re being honest. You should have those stats.

Henry:
This is why you can’t vote Meyer fe gee, because they just blurt out random facts that they can’t.

Dave:
Well, I don’t know if I can go on a ticket with Kathy right now because Texas has got negative home price growth right now. I’m not sure I can pick it.

James:
Well you know what though? That just means there’s opportunity there. Negative growth is when you want to go towards the market.

Dave:
Are all three of you ganging up against me now? Are you recruiting Kathy, secretary of State?

Kathy:
You got to look at the micro level. Yes, there are some parts like Austin and downtown Dallas where we’ve seen prices come down. But you have to look in the special little corners where the jobs are moving, but it’s not slowing down in Texas. And I think now that rates are coming down, we’re going to see another boom just like we’ll see in a lot of areas. This is interesting. For the 12th year in a row, Texas won the governor’s cup and that is for the business climate there. There’s no personal corporate or personal income tax, so that’s a friendly business climate and lots of businesses are moving there for that reason. It is continually ranking as the best state for doing business by the nation’s top CEOs. Lots and lots of job growth in Texas and it’s very diversified. We know that the refining there is 31% of US capacity and as far as I know, we haven’t stopped using oil and gas. There’s high tech defense, biomed, these are all businesses that don’t just pick up and move easily. And then this was funny you guys. What do you think was the biggest job sector?

Dave:
I would hope barbecue.

Kathy:
That could be, but retail, because with all that money from their low expenses, they like to shop and there’s a shopping center is pretty much on every block.

Dave:
I mean Texas obviously has an incredibly strong economy. I think several of the fastest growing cities in the entire country are in Texas. Like Brownsville, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio are all growing a lot. So I think you got something going there, Kathy.

Kathy:
Yeah. And then just people talk Dallas and San Antonio, but it’s really the suburbs. You got to follow where the jobs are going, where people are going. So we’re investing in sort of northwest of San Antonio and Dallas. You guys have heard North Dallas as things get expensive within the cities and that’s fairly new for Texas. They didn’t have high home prices until just the last 10 years. They’ve been going up consistently. So as prices increase and as all these people move in, especially Californians with the high tech jobs, they are used to paying more. So as you move out into the suburbs, you can still find those opportunities in the path of progress.

Henry:
Well everything is bigger in Texas and that not only includes home value decreases, but it includes personal property taxes as well. So

Dave:
Yes it does. It does include

Henry:
Taxes. You don’t have income taxes, but then personal property taxes will murder a deal for you.

Kathy:
And in our fund, because we bought a lot of houses in north Texas, those properties have doubled in value. So just again, it depends. Maybe a lot of those stats are misleading and that’s fine. That is fine. Y’all stay out.

Henry:
Spoken like a true Texan.

Dave:
Well, just for reference, the average property tax in the United States is 1% of the home value. In Texas it’s 2%.

James:
So it’s

Dave:
Double.

James:
It’s brutal

Dave:
But it’s not actually the highest in the country but it is among the highest for sure.

James:
Yep. There’s a lot of job growth that offsets the tax.

Dave:
The government’s going to find a way to tax you.

Kathy:
Yeah,

Dave:
They might not have income tax but they make it up in property tax.

Kathy:
Yeah, the issue is the high property taxes and it is hot. It’s too hot for me there. It’s too hot. Sorry I’m a weenie. I can’t handle that.

Dave:
Alright, well Kathy, tell us a little bit about what strategies might work in Texas in different areas. I know you invest in Dallas but elsewhere in Texas. What would you recommend to people listening?

Kathy:
Pay attention to the suburbs. There’s still opportunity. It may look like a cornfield sometimes. Some of these areas that are just bordering areas that have gotten too expensive for 20 years I’ve been buying properties in cornfields, understanding where that growth is going and it’s a little bit scary because there’s nothing there yet. And then I go back and there’s a whole town. So just with the growth that’s happening there, if you buy within the city, it’s going to be more expensive. Although from what I hear, multifamily values have come down too. So if you’re a multifamily investor, you might start to see some opportunity. New homes can be a great opportunity but again, just you got to make sure the numbers work. That’s the bottom line. If you can negotiate the rate down, that’s helpful. If you have a team, there are still areas where you can buy older homes and fix them up and do the burn method, but that’s going to be for us, that’s like an hour out and prices have already gone up so much.

Dave:
Alright, well interesting stuff. I think Texas in my opinion, has sort of the extremes. There’s great opportunities. There’s also areas like Austin, which is probably the most overbuilt city in the United States right now in terms of excess supply as the highest rent declines. That’s obviously Texas giant state. So I think as long as you’re careful about which places within the state that you’re looking at, it can be a great place. And that’s not to say Austin’s not a good long-term market. There’s a lot of good fundamentals in Austin. It’s there’s some short-term disruption in a lot of Texas right now.

Kathy:
And if you are looking to move to Austin and there’s a lot of inventory that’s actually an opportunity for you. I think values are down and with all the growth there, it seems it would come back once the population growth can catch up with all the new supply. But I got my fun fact.

Dave:
Oh yeah, what is your fun fact?

Kathy:
Do you know that Dr. Pepper comes from Texas, from Waco?

Dave:
Was there an actual Dr. Pepper?

Kathy:
Yeah, he was a pharmacist. Charles Alderton in Waco, Texas started serving it around 1885. That’s when he created it. A year later, Coca-Cola was born and it became the number one drink in Texas because you guys back then there were nine milligrams of cocaine in Coca-Cola. So hard to compete with that. Hard to compete. Dr. Pepper tried it stayed alive, but

Dave:
Just a little less addictive.

Kathy:
Yeah, they decided that there was, I don’t even, I’m not even going to say,

Dave:
Yeah, we’ll just skip the rest of this conversation.

James:
All I know is I would’ve been hooked on Coca-Cola back then. I mean rockstar has got me enough.

Dave:
Alright, well we’ve heard Kathy’s pitch of Texas and her very strange, fun fact. So James, let’s move on to you. What state did you pick and why?

James:
You know what? I went with Florida, which I know seems like it’s tapped out. That’s so

Dave:
Boring.

James:
You know what? It is not boring.

Dave:
Well, it’s just everyone talks about Florida. I just thought you’d maybe be a little more creative,

James:
But this is why I picked it. It’s because everyone’s going to stop talking about Florida pretty soon because people are so seasonal. It’s the market’s hot, the market’s hot, and then all of a sudden, I mean what do people say now? They’re like, oh, Florida’s market’s starting to transition. It’s going down. There’s inventory. You’re starting to hear the buzz. And one thing I’ve learned is when the buzz goes away, there’s always an overcorrection and an over dip. And I think this is the year to buy in Florida because I think pricing’s going to be a lot better.

Henry:
I really thought you were going to go with when the buzz goes away, that’s when James Dard comes to play.

Dave:
That’s why Henry’s on the top of this ticket. He’s got all the campaign slogans.

James:
But that is what I liked about actually, and that’s kind of what I like about Texas too. When these markets transition out. Florida was never on my buy list, but now I’m like, okay, well it’s getting hard. Insurance costs are going up, inventory is starting to stack up a little bit. Builders are having to dump off some newer product or they’re cutting price. There’s opportunities to buy when the market slows down. And I feel like Florida’s going through its cooling moment and that’s the best time to buy. So I know it’s boring, but I’m actually doubling down on Florida when people are going to be on the way out. I think it is one of the best ways you can buy.

Kathy:
I am with you there. We have a lot of properties in Florida and at Real Wealth. We have so many investors who bought there and we have not heard of a single issue with this last storm because don’t buy in a flood zone in Florida, but if you could buy inland a little bit or just not in a flood zone and newer product, newer product, I know it’s not as great for flipping what was newer product. The insurance is way, way better and we have a property in St. Pete where it was right there, but it didn’t flood so it’s not in a flood zone

James:
And right now in 2024, 30.7% of Florida sellers cut price. So

Dave:
Yeah, you’re basically just counting on a big comeback, but I guess my concern would be Florida boomed, which is great if you invested in Florida four years ago, you’re doing great and now it’s having a correction. But are you expecting it to have outsized growth better than the national average going forward?

James:
Well, yes, because the big businesses are just starting to anchor there and move their money there. The tidal wave outside of the natural disasters is coming in the economic force too. You have companies like Amazon is currently shopping for 50,000 square feet and these companies aren’t moving their headquarters. I do want to say that, but they’re expanding their growth. The tech you have Twitter, Tesla, fun kite. There’s companies that are expanding their presence in this market and again, doesn’t mean they’re anchoring there, but when they expand the presence, things grow and jobs grow. And the one thing I have seen and I live in it, I have to go off personal experience. When you have tech growth and you have no income tax and affordability sections, good thing happens. And that’s what happens in Seattle and I think it has better overall investing potential than the Pacific Northwest because as a landlord you can control your assets a lot better.
It’s not as restrictive as Washington state as far as I know. I don’t have to wait nine to 12 months to remove a tenant from one of my properties because they haven’t paid me rent. And so the reason I think there’s upside is the businesses are just really starting to expand. Apple is starting to expand out through there and when that tech money comes with the no income tax, it hits that rocket fuel and it can have some major growth. Do I think it’s going to happen in the next 12 months? No, I don’t. 24, maybe not, but in three to five years it’s going to be ribbon and the best time to buy is on the overcorrection because when people get freaked out, they dump price and then you get a buy.

Dave:
All right, well every time I make one of these lists of best cities, best markets, Florida is at the top, but it’s also on the bottom.

Henry:
That’s the most Florida stat you could say.

Dave:
Exactly. There’s so much. You’re totally right about the economy in Florida. It’s extremely strong, but I just personally don’t get it and understand where I would invest in Florida, so it’s hard for me to wrap my head around

James:
And that’s the beautiful thing about Florida. You got all sorts of different types of landscape. If you want to flip, you go to Miami, there’s big margins there. You can rack big returns and if you want cashflow, you can get some amazing, and I know beach cities come with some problems, you get some weather issues, you got some insurance costs, but quality of living, some of these beach cities, there’s good metrics there for renting. There’s a ton of tourism there. There are coming because they want to go to the beach. You can do short-term rentals, you can do long-term rentals, the affordability factor all over the coast. You can go into any type of market into Florida and buy. So you can do the long-term, you can do the short-term, you can do whatever you want,

Dave:
Maybe like lose money. You can do

James:
That. I think we’re going to need to make a wager. I’m going to go buy a house in Florida in 2025 and we’ll see if we can make some money on it.

Dave:
I mean I agree Texas and Florida both have a lot of economic growth and population growth, but if it were me, I’d pick Texas over Florida. I just think there’s less insurance risk, less weather risk than I see in Florida for some reason that just worries me.

James:
Well, and Dave, if you’re worried about making income there, making money, there is one random fact about Florida that has some extra kicker. Andor benefit, Florida has over $2 trillion in lost treasure off the coast. Okay, so if you can’t find the cashflow, actually that works on me. I’m interested in that. You want to work a little harder, get a bow, go find some treasure. Double your cashflow. Wait a

Dave:
Minute, how do they know there’s lost treasure there? Who comes up with this stat?

Henry:
Wouldn’t that make it not lost treasure?

Dave:
Yeah, exactly. They’re like, we know it’s there. We know exactly what it’s worth. Then go get it. As

James:
Far as I’m concerned, it’s lost unless it’s in my bank account.

Dave:
You almost tricked me and convinced me there James, but I’ll go on vacation to Florida. That sounds great. I just got scuba certified. Kathy Scuba certified. Kathy, you want to go hunt for treasure with me? Absolutely. Excellent.

James:
You want to go to Ari’s Treasure on Honeymoon Island? Not only do you get a romantic spot, you get nice beaches, you can go get rich.

Dave:
Okay. Alright, time for one last short break, but stick around. Based on my research, there’s actually treasure to be made in real estate in one other state. And as always, if you’re considering investing in a new market, there’s a tool on BiggerPockets called the BiggerPockets Market Finder, and it’s here for you to help you find a market. You can check it out at biggerpockets.com/find a market. We’ll be right back. Welcome back to the show. Let’s jump back in. Well, I obviously do think there’s a lot to invest in Florida. I’m just talking sh*t because I want you to pick my market, which brings us to our last market. I selected another one in the southeast, but I didn’t want to pick the obvious ones like Florida and Texas. So I picked maybe the third most obvious one. It’s not really much of a secret, but it is North Carolina. I don’t know if you guys have invested there, but I know James actually you were thinking about moving there, right? For a little bit.

James:
I still kind of fantasize about moving there.

Dave:
Really?

James:
I like the Carolinas. It’s beautiful.

Kathy:
Oh, the heat in Arizona is getting to him.

Dave:
Yeah, he just moved to Arizona like two weeks ago.

James:
If I was at the point where, and I considered it just selling off the businesses, getting in cash and becoming a loan shark, hard money lender on the east coast, north Carolina’s off the top of my list.

Dave:
Okay, see I’m already getting a vote. I haven’t even said a single thing about North Carolina and I’m recruiting James to my team. Alright. North Carolina has great economy. It’s been voted for three years in a row. The second best state to do business, thanks to a really highly educated workforce. We’ll talk about that in just a minute, but there are a lot of really good universities in North Carolina. There’s generally just a booming economy and there’s very business friendly climate. I’ve actually never been to Charlotte, but I know Charlotte’s one of the biggest banking and insurance hubs in the entire country. So not only are there good jobs in North Carolina, but they’re very high paying jobs. If you haven’t heard, there’s this area of North Carolina called the research triangle where there’s a lot of universities, duke University, university of North Carolina, chapel Hill, North Carolina State Wake Forest, some of the finest universities in the entire country are there.
And because of that you have a lot of investment into more high paying jobs, a lot of life sciences, a lot of technical jobs are in the area. And so North Carolina has built an incredible economy. Businesses are taking notice. There have been 111 major corporate relocations into North Carolina in just the last year, including a major investment by Toyota and a 1 billion investment in Apple in the research triangle area to attract and retain a lot of that talent that’s coming out of their universities. And in addition to all of these awesome business stats, it is a very landlord friendly place. There is no rent control. There is no notice required for raising rent or entering property. Of course, there are laws that require landlords to maintain a safe and habitable place to live as there should be, but it does allow you to run your business as you see fit in North Carolina.
And it also has a very strong housing market today, unlike Texas and Florida, which are seeing these corrections right now. North Carolina continues to see steady growth. There’s nothing like, it’s not booming, it’s not a bubble. But North Carolina is continuing to grow at 3% a year, which is exactly what I want to see. That’s about the long-term average and to me, that creates a predictable investing climate for real estate investors. Now, a lot of the big cities are a little expensive for finding cashflow. You’re not going to find cashflow in Charlotte very easily, not in Raleigh. That’s a very expensive market. But if you go into some of the other areas, one of my favorite places that I read about is a town called Winston Salem. You might recognize them from the cigarette company, but there is a university there and it has great cashflow and great economy. There are also a couple other towns that I thought you can find good cashflow, which are Goldsboro and Rocky Mount. And I also put Wilmington on there just for James because I know James loves it, so I just included it anyway, but that’s my feeling and it has, I guess I would say the second best barbecue sauce in the country is North Carolina. My heart really goes to Kansas City barbecue sauce to be perfectly honest, but very good barbecue in North Carolina as well.

James:
Dave, I got to say I’m in on North Carolina too.

Dave:
Give it to me

James:
Honestly, if you didn’t take it, I was going to take it so you just got it first.

Dave:
Yes,

James:
But Riceville Beach is one of the coolest spots. That’s why I was thinking of move there. But if you ever want good tacos, there’s this little taco stand there that is the best tacos I’ve ever eaten in my life.

Dave:
Do you know how many people you’re going to piss off saying that the best tacos in the country are in North Carolina?

James:
Yeah, you know what? I don’t care. They were so good. It made me want to move. I was like, I will move here and I’m going to walk down, eat tacos every day for lunch and then go to the beach. It’s a great place. And also Charlotte is a really cool city. I mean North Carolina has so many fundamentals for growth. It’s got high quality living, it’s got some affordability in there. There’s business growth. It’s a great state. I do disagree that a steady growth, I think it’s a little bubbly still. It grew at 3%, but that’s down quite a bit from what it was growing. It’s slowed down and it could go a little bit the other way, but that doesn’t mean you can’t buy and there’s not opportunity there.

Kathy:
I have a little issue with the barbecue sauce because I think maybe Dave, you haven’t been to Terry Black’s in Austin.

Dave:
Oh, are you kidding me? I’ve been to Terry Black’s last time I was in Austin. I made the big mistake of going to Terry Blacks like three hours before a 12 hour flight back to Amsterdam. And I bought, I’m not even exaggerating, I bought one beef rib and it was $68 and it was like the best experience of my life. So I have definitely been to Terry Blacks and I’m not saying I actually like Texas barbecue in general better. It’s more brisket focused, but the barbecue sauce, I don’t love how thin Texas barbecue sauce is. I like the thicker sauce from either from Kansas City, but North Carolina’s a little thin too.

Kathy:
I’ll let Terry know.

Dave:
Yeah, please do.

James:
I think we need to do a next show on barbecue sauce and density.

Dave:
Don’t get me started. I could talk for another 45 minutes about barbecue and barbecue sauce.

Henry:
I grew up in a barbecue restaurant. My dad owned one for 10 years.

Dave:
What is your style of sauce, Henry?

Henry:
Yeah, I like a thicker sauce, molasses base sweet sauce. Ooh, no, sweet.

Dave:
You like the vinegar sauce?

Henry:
Yeah, it’s

James:
Going to have some kicking. I don’t like the sweet.

Dave:
Can we all just agree Alabama white barbecue sauce? There’s something wrong with that. I just like, no, I’m not saying,

Kathy:
Can we just have Henry do a barbecue for us?

Dave:
All right, next meet up.

Henry:
I’m sighing so much because man, I like North Carolina too. I do. I’ve always loved

Dave:
It winning everyone over.

Henry:
I’ve always loved it. It’s just I spent some time in Raleigh back when I was in school and it’s just such a cool place. Job infrastructure is amazing. Charlotte is growing and if Charlotte’s a bubble that’s going to pop, I don’t think it’s going to pop anytime soon. It’s now becoming not only everything else that you mentioned in terms of banking and finance, but it’s also becoming a transportation and infrastructure hub because of its proximity to all of these other cities around it. So lots of companies are establishing a presence within Charlotte just to get their products over to all of the other cities that are around it. So it’s becoming like a transportation hub as well.

Dave:
Home to NASCAR also. There’s all sorts of good stuff going on there.

Henry:
Home to the left turn.

Dave:
Yeah. Fun fact. The largest private house in the entire world is in North Carolina. It’s in Asheville. It’s 250 rooms. There is actually a house big enough for James to live in, thankfully. So he

Henry:
Can

Kathy:
Actually move there. It’s interesting because Florida gets the flack for having the most issues with climate change and I think North Carolina’s really experiencing that right now. It’s really tragic what happened this past week. And also it’s affecting a lot of homes and insurance prices will probably go up there as well and people might be rethinking where they’re living, but I do hope the recovery goes well. It looks like North Carolina got hit really bad.

Dave:
Yeah. Want to extend our thoughts to anyone impacted by Hurricane Helene in North Carolina and Florida, anywhere else in the United States? Thanks for bringing that up Kathy. Alright, well I think we’re all done. I think it’s time to vote. Henry, let’s just say you can’t vote for your own. Henry, what’s your vote? North Carolina. It’s not even close. James.

James:
You know I want to live in North Carolina. I’m signing up with you, Dave.

Dave:
Yes, Kathy, I’m going

Kathy:
With Florida.

Dave:
Yes. Okay. I am going to vote for Texas. I think there’s a lot of good growth there, honestly, I’m intrigued by Delaware. Henry, you’ve piqued my interest, but I just don’t know enough about it yet. But fair enough. There’s a lot going on in Texas that I’d like, but taking the victory right now, and I’m actually in the BiggerPockets office right now. I’m in our conference room and there’s all sorts of trophies right here next to me. So I’m just going to grab one and take this sandwich. Trophy. Alright, well thank you all so much for joining us, James. Kathy Henry. We’ll see you soon for another episode of On The Market. In just a couple Days On the Market was created by me, Dave Meyer and Kaylin Bennett. The show is produced by Kaylin Bennett, with editing by Exodus Media. Copywriting is by Calico content and we want to extend a big thank you to everyone at BiggerPockets for making this show possible.