Joining the military and want to know more about my finance.

[Banis Boortian]

joining the military and want to invest in real estate. Going in as an E3 my pay will be around 1800 before taxes, after taxes around 1500. Im planning on saving most of my income to invest in rental properties. Will it be easy to get finance while living in the barracks? Oh and after my first year my pay will go up to 2000 after taxes 1700. Keep in mind that i dont pay for my housing or food. I already have some money saved up, but after my first year i will have about 27k to invest, any suggestions on what i can finance or do?

[Elizabeth Colegrove]

My husband is also active duty. We started off investing by buying primary houses. Than when my income picked up we started complimenting pure investments to personal properties.

At this point I would advise you to save save save! Make sure you don't get any debts (car loans, credit card, etc). While you have pure income right it is very low. The first time you can live off base and the numbers make sense. I would buy a house 3-4 bedrooms. You want the house to be able to rent once you leave to one family for at least a $300 profit. While you are living there you want to rent out all the rooms to your buddies.

Keep an eye on the market in various towns you live in. You will see some areas that make a lot more sense than others. We truly want to buy our investment in virginia beach but other than a primary it just didn't make sense for our business plan!

Slightly off topic, while you are young single and poor because you are saving money for your real estate. Get your degree, start working towards the officer program! Set yourself up to bring in more money!

One thing that really helped my husband and I is we worked hard to get ourself as set up as possible to be in the place to be high wage eRners. I have my masters degree, my husband got his undergraduate degree and than spent 3 years getting specialized training. We did both while slowly investing.

Getting an education won't hurt you while your trying to save if you do it right. They pay for 4 free classes a year! More free ones on the shop and there are always programs they offer.

Good luck!