I Just Started Out My Real Estate Journey, Here's My Story.

[Danny M.]

Hi, my name's Danny, I'm 25, and I live in Royal Oak Michigan. I finished reading Set For Life last week and it opened my eyes to the world of real estate, and I think I'm hooked now. I want to use this post to introduce myself to the community here on Bigger Pockets and tell my story. 

I make about ~$60-75K/year (bonus dependent) as a market research analyst focused primarily on the regulated US online gambling industry. I have been implementing a lot of money-saving strategies (from part I of Set For Life) for a few years, even before I read the book. This has left me with about ~$80K real net worth mostly in weighted index funds and money market funds. A little over half of that money is in a Roth IRA. I am working towards the personal finance goal of having $100K in real net worth within the next 8 months.

As I see it I am currently in a learning phase of my real estate journey. I am currently listening to the How To Invest In Real Estate audiobook, and taking notes. After that, I have created a pseudo-real estate course for myself which will consist of reading the following books: Rich Dad Poor Dad, The 4 Hour Work Week, The Richest Man In Babylon, The House Hacking Strategy, The Multifamily Millionaire vol. 1 & 2, and Buy Rehab Rent Refinance Repeat. With the goal of getting all these books read asap. Spending at least 30 minutes a day reading. part of my course plan is to do research on financing to determine how I will buy, and research in different markets to determine where I will buy (I work remotely and could live anywhere in the US, not planning on doing long-distance real estate for my first property). While I complete my course I will start building my real estate team and evaluating properties. My goal is to acquire my first property by July 2025. With the stretch goal being to acquire a property by the end of 2024. 

I plan to spend a total of 8 months doing research. While I am doing this research I will be working (remote) full-time and traveling. I am going to be vacating my apartment and selling my car in the next 2 months, and then I will spend 2 months living with friends and family, 1 month staying at an Airbnb in Hawaii, and the rest of the time traveling around South America. I am attempting to do all of this and save more money than I can living in Royal Oak Michigan. Running the numbers looks promising. 

The real estate strategies that have been resonating with me so far are house hacking, multi-family buildings, and the BRRR method. My current ideas are to buy either a triplex or quadplex and live in one unit while renovating it and rent out the others for a couple of years before flipping the property. I am also considering a live-in flip on a large single-family home, and possibly renting out some rooms during the renovation if I can find friends or tenants willing to put up with the renovation (I don't like the uncertainty of the cash flow in that scenario if I can't find tenants). I figure the single-family strategy will have more advantageous tax benefits to flipping, and I can flip it more quickly, possibly in just a year and a half. This would allow me to get into a bigger, more valuable property faster. However, I am keeping an open mind to all kinds of real estate investing as I learn more about it. If anyone has any thoughts on either of these strategies for a first-time real estate buyer please share them with me.

Lastly, if there is anyone in Royal Oak Michigan, or the surrounding area, who is interested in getting a real estate club going (I just need one more person, two's a club!), or anyone interested in just chatting about all things real estate and beyond, please reach out to me! I would love to hear from you. Thanks, everyone. Have a wonderful day. 

-Danny