Need niche/strategy advice

[Daniel Fague]

Hi everyone,

I just joined BP recently and have already picked up some great knowledge.  I'm looking for advice on how best to get started in real estate investing based on startup capital and long term goals. Any advice you have would be appreciated.

My wife and I are in the Cincinnati market.  We have around $30k to start with and based on our current incomes and living expenses we are able to grow that number quickly.  Our long term goal is early retirement, and we'd like to build a portfolio that can cash flow $70-80k per year in 15 years. We both work full time 8-5 jobs so we need to start with some properties that are relatively low maintenance.

Based on the above I was envisioning our niche being SFH's and our method to be buy & hold. What do you guys think? I've heard multi-family cash flow's better but I'm not sure if that would be the best way to start out given more maintenance/tenant issues.

Thanks guys.  We're excited to get started, but a little overwhelmed with the options!

[Craig H.]

Daniel welcome to BP and Cincinnati. Sounds like you're off to a great start! I was researching, reading, listening to podcasts, and running numbers this past year and purchased my first 5 unit on the east side of Cincinnati this year. Something that worked for me is emailing/calling people that have for rent listings on Craigslist and seeing if they want to sell. Pick a few neighborhoods and start researching on Craigslist for rent ads in those areas. Call property owners/managers to see what they actually get for rent. There are some areas of town that are getting a ton of money dumped into them in the near future: Pleasant Ridge, College Hill, Madisonville, Eat Walnut Hills, Incline District of Price Hill to name a few. Let me know if you need anything I'd be happy to help you out!