Looking to invest out of state, need help

[John Pearson]

Hello everyone, I was hoping to get some general advice about how to pick a handful of cities to analyze for my first investment acquisition.

I have put together a small pool of investors and we have ~150k in seed capital.  However, due to the fact we all live in southern CA, that honestly wont get a whole lot even if we leverage it and the returns are so low most deals honestly dont make a lot of sense.

So we have decided to look out of state, but want to at least put some research and analysis into the decision.  I was hoping to get some ideas from some members here on what type of criteria would be most important.  My thoughts so far:

Population growth

Rent growth

Income growth

Employment growth

Any idea about other metrics and which would be the most useful for choosing a target metro region? Many thanks.

Ps. I already asset manage a small portfolio of about $3M in assets remotely so I do have a solid operational understanding of multifamily real estate, but this would be my first acquisition and first asset out of state so any advice or thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

[Steve Kontos]

@John Pearson

Great question.  For us we only go to landlord friendly states.  This already narrows the playing field down to just 8 states.  Then I pick 3 states that interest me most (this could be based on the economies, resources I have tied over there, etc.).

Hopefully that helps.