First time investor living in SF - Wanting to invest out of state

[Shivam Bhalla]

Hello BP members!

I am a first-time real estate investor and I live in an expensive area (bay area) and I am looking to invest in properties outside of CA. I have a good amount of cash saved up and looking to hear from experienced investors about where they invest if they invest out of state. I am also wondering if anyone can recommend any good research tools for investing in out of state properties, which I personally have had a tough time finding myself (side note: I'm a software engineer by trade so if something good does not exist, ill be happy to build something out for the community) 

[Brenden Mitchum]

Hey @Shivam Bhalla, welcome to the BP community!

It is very hard for anyone to point you in the right direction without knowing a bit more about your investment goals. Even with that, you will get a billion different answers because for every U.S. market you could think of there is likely a BPer investing there. 

My suggestion is to educate yourself on how to analyze markets. There are many BP podcasts on this subject and I'm sure searching this in the forums will give lots of great information. You'll find that most people look at 6-8 factors (although there are tons of criteria you can add). The big 6 I see are:

1. Population over 100k

2. .5% or more year-over-year (YOY) population growth

3. 1% or more YOY median household income 

4. 2% or more YOY job growth

5. 2.5% or more YOY median home value

6. Decreasing crime index

Like I said there are a bunch of other criteria you can and should look at depending on your strategy. But these should get you started and there are plenty of good sites to do your research, like data use, city-data, area vibes, neighborhood scout.

Please, feel free to shoot me a message if you have any questions or just want to chat!