2400 sq ft home sell vs rent to begin investing

[Robin Roundtree]

Hi everyone, my husband and I have six children and we live in a 2400 square-foot five bedroom three bath house. It's on 2 acres. We have about 250 in equity, potentially more if we put about 30,000 in to renovate, it could be more like 300,000 we currently own no rentals and would like to get to a point of having several rentals in order to transition from W-2 to financially independent. But we're torn, do we sell for the equity so we have our capital to invest, do we rent out with a $690 cash flow w/ ROI 5.3% as a single-family residence, or do we convert to a duplex, and rent out a 3/2 up top and a 3/1 below. The downstairs would be a walkout basement and I'm thinking probably Airbnb. It's a strange property because it's on a long driveway that would need to be plowed in the winter, it's on property, so duplex seems awkward, and there's a shared road agreement with the neighbor. However, we bought it two years ago and have this much equity because of appreciation and we locked in a 2.75% interest rate. Hard to let something like that go. I'd love feedback and can give more info if I missing something.

[Danny Jimenez]

It really depends on your end goal and how quickly you want to get there.

Personally, I always say wholesaling/flipping to get a lot of capital quicker and then park that money into rentals.

You could utilize a HELOC if the rate makes sense to do fix and flips funded with your own capital.