Building your first investment vs. Buying your first investment

[Felipe Gonzalez]

Good morning,

A little bit about me.

I am planning on starting to invest in real estate in the next 6 months.

I am 23, I live in NYC because of work but plan to invest in my hometown in Texas. It’s a town that is growing but not as big as San Antonio or Houston.

There are a lot of old houses for sale. Modern houses seem to be in demand. Not a lot of apartments in demand but people do rent.

My problem is that I don’t know what my first investment should be.

I can either buy land and save a bit more money and then build either a house or a duplex. ( I fear that the cost will be too high or that I will be stuck paying the mortgage without any income coming in. I also fear that construction will take too long and that the houses will make me make a lot of payments before even seeing profit)

I can also buy an apartment or a house and start renting it right away. (The problem is that most modern houses are too expensive for my price range and there are a lot of old houses for sale and that leads me to think that the demand is low for those houses.)

Flipping seems like an alternative but because I don’t live in my hometown, it could be a burden to do everything through the phone.

Any recommendations?

Thanks!