Success! My first single family home has been rented.

[Justin Messenger]

After months of hard work making property improvements in my spare time we have rented the house. I was shocked how fast it went and if I had more homes I could have filled them too. We had one day of showings and with a contract signed the following day. I listed on Facebook Marketplace and used Tenant Cloud for screening. Purchased the 1953 house for 80k. 1 acre, 1,700 SF, 3 bed, 1.5 bath with 2 car garage and built in work shop. It also has a paved 20ft. long boat or RV parking lot. Spent 12k on all new plumbing and central heat & air. Mortgage/insurance/property tax total is $540 month. Rent collected is $1,200 month plus 10 bucks for a pet fee. Now we can focus on renovating the new investment home we moved into. My wife can’t wait to rent it out too.

[Justin Messenger]

@Marc Ferguson To tell to truth I didn’t initially purchase the house as a rental investment, I was tired of blowing my money on a rental house and I needed a house with lots of parking for my vehicles. So that was my first goal. After living the house I looked at our finances and decided we could pull the trigger to start a real estate business. We spent 8 months trying to close on a particular rental house but it fell through at the very last second when they asked me to sight a waiver on title insurance and a title check. I walked away from the closing.

We found a larger house, closed on it and changed our strategy by moving there and renting out the first house. I refinanced the first house and also got a HELOC based on the new appraisal which I then used to replace the central air system. The first house rented for $400 more than I initially expected it too, thanks to our improvements that made it presentable.

The new house is two stories and after renovations we plan to house hack by renting out the upper level. At that time I will not be spending any of my W2 income on mortgages which is my 2nd goal.