24 year old starting out

[Jonathan Chin]

Greetings BP Community!

I am freshly new to BP, and the Real Estate World of Investing. I always had an interest in real estate going into my young adult life. This past year, my interest peeked after reading the book Rich Dad Poor Dad, and listening to the BP podcasts. My Uncle in-law is quite the investor in Real Estate investments, especially in New York City as far as I know. I haven't discussed my ambitions yet with him, but one of my objectives is to speak with and learn from his experiences. I'm not too sure how to go about asking him though. Anyway, as I'm still building my foundation before I jump into my first deal, I'm still unsure of how to begin.

My main focus is to acquire income generating properties. By the time I'm 26 I plan to at least make my first deal, sooner the better, but I have a few priorities to take care of. First I am in school for Nursing. I'm trying to obtain my degree as something to fall back on and also I see it as a unique skillset to have even though it has nothing to do with Real Estate. I've been working at a hospital since I was 19 years old, and that's what introduced me to the field of Nursing. Also I feel like people would take me more seriously if I had a professional degree under my name.

Now I thought of starting my Real Estate career, or at least my first few deals, through house flipping. My parents own two lots of land in Pennsylvania (1.5 and 1.0 acres) in a residential community called Tink Wig. They planned on building homes on it when they first bought them way back in the 70s/80s, but because they had to raise a family they never got around to it. They've asked my two older siblings and I to do something with it so it does not go to waste. However as far as I know, they don't have any ideas on what to do nor flirted with any, so ultimately it falls on me. Ideally I would like to turn one of them into a summer retreat for our own personal use (once I'm well off in life and I can afford to build something on one of them), and use the other lot as an investment vehicle. How would I go about this? Well I would invest the other lot by selling the land raw, and using the proceeds from that to invest into another deal... or build something on it and sell/rent.. but I don't think there would be much money to made from that. I would have to consult with contractors in that area. Maybe some of you BP members can provide some insight on what would be the better choice?

There's a great deal to learn about this business, and the most efficient learning will come from actually doing. I'm working my way up towards that. Are there any books you have read that has made an impact on your Real Estate careers you would suggest for me to read? Thanks in advance to everyone contributing. This is such a great community, and I'm grateful to be apart of it.