New to Real Estate Investing, but ready to learn! & buy a out of state rental!

[Dennis Lin]

Hello all,

Ive been creeping on this forum for about 4 months now and decided to finally make an account today. I'm 36, I've own a primary for about 8 years now in California (Los Angeles county) and i recently (2021) completed an ADU build in my back yard that generates a nice monthly income. (ADU was paid in cash)

Before doing some reading - i knew REI was more than what i thought it would be. To me, i thought, buy a place, make sure your payments are lower than your rent to the point you can pay a manager, and pocket some money for repairs, and BOOM, you're in.

Ive discovered its a lot more than that, and to be honest, its scared me out of investing. However, life is a risk! I have a decent chunk saved for a 25-30% down payment (depending on cost of house), and ive been looking into Arizona (Buckeye) or Nevada (Henderson)

Nevada - I have a friend/acquaintance who is a real estate agent out there. I figure i can get some good information from him in regards to the area I'm looking to buy in Henderson, have him refer me to a good property manager and go from there.

Arizona Buckeye - A co worker of mine bought a house out there about 10 years ago, and has since paid it off, and has been generating a decent cash flow. He currently has been using the same property manager for 6 years with no issues. My plan was to buy something around his area, using his real estate agent, and piggy backing off his property management as well.

I am open and would love some advice of which direction i should go, what pitfalls await me and what i should expect and avoid. Ive never listened to a podcast in my life, but i would love some suggestions for podcasts, and literature that can expand my knowledge in this area. 

Thank you all in advance for any comments, and im glad that i made an account!

[Taz Zettergren]

@Dennis Lin welcome to the forums and congrats on the first post! Congratulations on the ADU as well, no better way to start the journey than getting your hands dirty from the get go. I work with hundreds of clients that live in the same area and they like the middle/southern part of the country because home prices are far more affordable and they're landlord friendly states.

There's always going to be unexpected's that come up unless you're buying a property turnkey. I would advise having a healthy reserve fund, for my unrenoavated rentals I keep about 7k liquid per door.

Feel free to reach out if I can be of any assistance and best of luck investing!