New to REI in Georgia

[Chris Cannady]

Hello BP fam!

I’m in Georgia and brand new to real estate investing. My initial goal is to house hack, purchasing a small multi-family property within the next year, ideally the next 6 months.

I am between Atlanta and Athens and have relatively little savings so unless I find a partner I will likely be using an FHA or USDA loan for my first property. Unfortunately I have only been at my current w2 job for 1 year and I'm hoping this won't prevent me from securing a loan in the next several months.

I know one of my first steps should be to seek pre-approval for a loan, so I am wondering if any other Georgia investors have recommendations for lenders in the area that I should prioritize reaching out to.

Lastly, I want to make networking and hopefully even finding a potential mentor a high priority. So if any of you are investing or otherwise involved in real estate in Georgia I would greatly appreciate the opportunity to get to know you or any investors, lenders, agents, brokers, contractors, inspectors, etc. you may be able to recommend. I am also hoping for recommendations for local REIA meetups that aren't just trying to sell bootcamps with "guru's".

Thanks in advance for your time and any insight you may have, I wish you all the best of luck and success!

[Chris Cannady]

Quote from @Deborah Pyburn:

Welcome to your investment journey @Chris Cannady! I tell everyone - friend, family, clients…ask yourself your real estate goals. Once you identify what you want to achieve in RE, finding the right deal will be so much easier because you can analyze and weed out the properties that won’t meet your needs. This will also help you use a little creative imagination to realize your goals in a different way. 

While researching how you will fund the deal, ask yourself: am I investing for equity or cash flow? are jobs coming to of leaving the area I'm looking at? How accessible is the area to amenities my end user would actually want? Do I have multiple exit strategies or avenues to generate income? Does this community have an HOA or rental restrictions?

Thank you for your response, this is great advice. I was wanting to start with cash flow initially rather than equity, though the more I learn about current market conditions the more it seems cash flow is harder and harder to achieve. That said, I do intend to keep my “day” job and live in the first property, so generating cash flow above and beyond the mortgage and other fixed costs isn’t entirely necessary. You’ve definitely given me more to think about.