First Time Buyer & Investor -- Save or Spend

[Kelechi Ukonu Nwankwoala]

Hello everyone

I’m 23 years old, currently working full-time. I’ve been educating myself on real estate through books, YouTube, and podcasts for the past few weeks. As I haven’t been saving for long, I’m wondering if it’s worth it to save more money before I start pursuing deals. I’m afraid that if I start pursuing deals now, I will have trouble finding funding.

Here are the details of my situation:

• * Because I plan to invest out of state and need to stay in my current area for work, a FHA loan won't be an option for me. I'll be looking at 20% down payments.
• * I have enough saved up for a 7k down payment right now, but by the end of the year I’ll have enough for a 20k down payment.

Given this information, does it make sense to start now or wait until I have more saved up? If I was to start now, what’s the next concrete action I should take, besides just reading books and listening to podcasts? How do the benefits compare to the opportunity cost?

Really appreciate the advice. Thanks in advance!