Am I selling myself short?

[Leon Chappell]

I want to present my financial information and in the end get some advice. I don't want to make another mistake like I did on my first duplex.

I make about $66,000 gross a year. Including rental income from one side of my duplex. I stay in the other side. I have about $1650.00 in total debt a month. That leaves me with about 30% debt to income. With about $6000.00 cash in the bank.

I am only looking at properties that are in the below $60,000 range including repair cost. Should I go higher? Am I even able to. Should I focus on flips to build cash. What's the best financing avenue? Hard money? Should I just save my money for a down payment? What would your route be if you were in my situation? lol Sorry for all the questions Im starting to feel stagnant. The same way I was feeling before I made a mistake on my first duplex.  

[Ned Carey]

What was the mistake on the first duplex? More importantly what was the lesson. 

If you only have $6,000 in the bank, I would consider that pretty slim reserves. It is considered wise to have 3-6 months in reserve for anybody. If you have  rentals you should have some reserves for the properties in addition to that. 

If you use that money as a down payment you have no reserves, a very risky position. If one little thing  goes wrong you have no money to address the problem.

One thing you didn't say is how quickly you saved up that $6,000.

How good are you at finding deals? A killer deal of a lifetime is perhaps worth taking a little more risk to get. There is no point in taking financial risk for an ordinary deal you can pick up any day.