New Invester Starting Around Military Bases

[David Wood]

Hello,

My name is David, and I am currently an Active Duty in the U.S. Army serving overseas. I do not have any prior real estate experience, but my goal is to learn how to retire from my 9-to-5 job within the next 5-8 years via long distance BRRR strategy. I am listening to BP videos and Morris Invest via YouTube, and looking through various posts here at BP. "Long Distance Real Estate Investing" by David Greene has a lot of good sutff, and I had to replay so many times to regurgitate!

My current short-term goal for the next 6 months is to reduce my liabilities from unnecessary credit card debts, while focusing on learning how to really commit to financial discipline. My goal is to start looking for deals 6-8 months as I will have more flexible funds month-to-month by then.

I want to know how you guys started out doing market research, and the resources that you are using. These are the list of resources that I am using when I'm looking through the markets for the areas listed below. I want to hear if you guys have a set process and/or better resources that I can use. At glance, it seems like College Station and Fort Gordon areas are is too expensive to get in, and Fort Gordon area (especially Grovetown) shows high crime rate. I am not sure if I am looking at the data correctly, but I think the first two areas are not too expensive for my criterion. What are your thoughts?

House Search Criterion:

- Purchase approx. <$60k, not exceeding $100k per unit

- Looking for rental property with cash flow of $400-500/mo.

- SFH/duplex/four-plex

Platforms:

- rentometer.com (for rent rate est.)

- smartasset.com (for property tax est.)

- county tax records via web

- bestplaces.net (for economy, job growth)

- Trulia/Realtor.com (for crime rate, users feedback about the area)

Markets Considering:

1. College Station/Bryan, TX

2. Fort Gordon/Martinez/Grovetown/Hephtizbah, GA

3. Fort Hood/Killeen, TX

4. Suburban areas in Dalls/Fort Worth, TX

[Sandra PIrtle]

Stay as far away from Clayton Morris as possible. Everything he says is a lie. Rates of return are nowhere as high as he said the would be. Of the 15 properties he sold me only two have showed a slight profit the rest are bleeding me dry. He likes to say that the people who rent C class properties are hard working and far less trouble than folks that rent A class properties. I have lost count of the number of evictions I have had. Even when they leave without going to court, they trash the place. He sold me 15 class D properties that he assured me were class C. Investing with him was the worst thing I have ever done in my life. I have been working for almost two years to dig myself out of the mess he got me into. Being a long distance landlord is a pain. I can't wait until the day that I am able to sell the last dog he sold me. Invest your money in a IRA or a 401K. I had $730,000 invested in the stock market before I got talked into taking it out and becoming a slum lord. I will be lucky when all is said and done to have $100,000 left.