First time investor wanting to make the jump

[Justin Schrey]

Hi, my name is Justin. I live in the San Diego Area and my family and I are looking to finally jump into some investment real estate. I am trying to ingest as much info and education that I can and figured I would ask this question here…

Goals: To have a supplemental income when I retire in 8 years and enough knowledge and capital to try to pursue real estate investing full time in retirement.

We have about $400,000 available to us in equity in our home if we did a heloc but with interest rates going up, it seems way more risky to go that route. We have about $20k that we feel comfortable putting down on a down payment which means we will be investing out of state. We have family in the Wichita, KS area which helps because we travel there every few years and our family has good area familiarity that we dont have. I have found a few duplexes for right around $100k which would be great for our down payment and we could absorb the entirety of the payment if we had issues renting it for a period of time. The problem is, at that price point, the properties are in areas that have higher crime and are labeled as “bad areas” to live. Single family homes are available in better areas of the city but would bring in less cash flow. I would like to do this model every few years and hopefully have 3-4 properties within the 8 year time-frame goal of retirement and then move onto bigger and better properties. 

Any thoughts? Thanks in advance!