How far away for first rental property

[Garrett Davis]

I am currently looking to purchase my first of hopefully many rental properties. The market in the town I live in is not good for buy and hold at this time so I am looking at surrounding areas. 

I am finding property that would meet the 1.5-2.0 rule 45-60 minutes away. I am also only 2-2.5 hours away from Milwaukee and it looks more appealing to me for cost of entry vs cashflow. I am just unsure about managing the property from that kind of distance. Realistically how far away is to far for first time landlords?

[Alexander Felice]

I just moved away from all my units, about ~3,000 miles. What I've found is being close creates an unnecessary crutch in your business.

If you want to grow, you need to be able to run your business without being there. Starting long distance makes this easy, if you start with units that are close you create a dynamic of comfort to being close, which is not ideal.

being close to a house doesn't give you any real benefit unless you intend to personally go there and shake down a tenant. otherwise long distance will offer better options and teach you valuable lessons that are widely unspoken and undervalued on BP.

The important part of real estate is people, not geography. Create a GREAT team and you can succeed anywhere, lousy team and you will fail everywhere.