Buffalo, NY - Multi-family Homes

[Andrew Danzer]

Hey All! Just starting out on this wonderful journey to becoming financially free. I am from the Buffalo area and was looking for some insight/opinions of where you think are the best places to invest throughout the city of good neighbors. I would realistically love a place near Elmwood village but they are crazy expensive, so I have been looking in areas like South Buffalo (near caz park), Lower West Side, Niagara Street and North Buffalo. I am looking for safe neighborhoods as I will be living in it. Niagara street piques my interest as I know there are a lot of new businesses popping up there along with rental housing.  Any opinions or insight would be extremely helpful!

[Puneet S. Braich]

@Andrew Danzer - 

There appears to be some fluidity to what you are looking for. Getting clear on blend you are optimizing for is key. 
For example 

Cash flow, Buy and Hold - or 

Rapid value add +/- flip. Then the area matters less since you are doing it short term. Especially if you are looking for rapid fire capital.

House hacking is a great way to only obligate yourself with a 3-5% downpayment & get the property. 

I like data informed decisions. https://www.city-data.com/

Type in your town or suburb and you will see the metrics that matter to investors. It can even divide downtown Buffalo by zipcodes. 

Lets you know things like median income, median home value, % of home owners vs renters, college students, major employers, crime index etc. Just to name a few. 

Like @Thomas Latuga mentioned - plug into the community. You might learn more in an evening than a month or 2 on on your own. Make connections with others in the tribe. This region's meet up has delightful people. Every 2nd Wednesday 6 to 9 pm EST.