Turn primary into house hack or BRRRR

[William Middleton]

Hey everyone! My name is Will, I'm 28 years old and married with a 5-year-old daughter. I just recently over the past few months started listening to the podcast and have started reading books about real estate investing. I've always been interested in investing and like to absorb as much information as possible related to finance since I grew up in a poor family and have been on my own since 17 years old. Just wanted to get some opinions on what the better option would probably be for someone in my situation. My wife and I recently moved and with the equity from selling our old home we were able to buy our new house 30k below market value with only having to finance less than half which was awesome and kept a portion to finish minor rehabs inside and to redo the roof and siding. My wife doesn't want to "jump" right into doing BRRRR/Flip investing and does not want to use the equity in our home to invest in other properties. We have a good size lot and she has agreed to building a garage with an apartment above it to rent. I have already spoken with the town and zoning and they said it would not be an issue to build about a 30x30 garage with about a 700 sq ft apartment above. It should be under 100k to build since we can do almost all of the work ourselves with help from friends and I estimate that we could rent it for around 800-1000 per month. Doing this we should be able to almost double how much we can save and she is fine with using that money to invest in the future.

My question is, has anyone here done something similar with their own property and what are some obstacles or pros and cons. Does that sound like a good investment starting out or should I run numbers on homes in our area and try to convince my wife to get into flipping or using the BRRRR method instead of putting our money in building a garage with an apartment above. It would take 1-2 years to complete the garage and in 5 years I would like to be financially free and own or be able to get into multi-family properties of 3 or more doors.

Also, what are some recommended books that you guys think every investor should read and any tips on getting started in today's market. Thanks for taking the time to read this and any responses are much appreciated!