Financial Help for Real Estate Newbie

[Matthew Medlock]

Hello,

My name is Matt and I am new to the real estate game. I have taken my first step in my journey by renting my home and moving to another home that I plan to rent in a couple of years. This is my dilemma. I have only 5 years left on my rental property until it is paid off ($65,000). It has a loan with a good interest rate (2.95%) It was an eleven year note and the current monthly payment is around $1630 with everything included. I already have a renter that is renting the place for $1700 per month. I will have zero cash flow each month after the repair costs after accounting for the repair costs. The house is worth $217,000.

I was able to put zero down on my current home ($210,000) and it has an interest rate of 3.04%. I have enough in my bank to pay off the rental property and I was going to do so to give me immediate cash flow ($1100) monthly. Then I was going to apply that cash flow to my current home and pay down as fast as possible by putting $3,000 extra each month to principle. I will be able to have it paid for in around 3.5 years.....if all goes well. Then I would move to the next house and do the same. I would use the money coming in to pay the next mortgage and so on.

I have not gone through with the plan because once I drop that cash it is gone and my investment potential will be reduced. My fear is that I will end up losing all of the investments because of something stupid if I use leveraging like most people.  

I really don't know what to do: pay off the rental, pay off current home, or buy another home with the extra money.  I have thought about refinancing the rental for some cash flow but I am unsure about this because it will be paid off soon and the cash flow will be a lot. Should I use the equity in my rental plus the extra money to buy my 2nd rental free and clear?  I should be able to cash flow around $1000 per month with it being paid off. My current sketch that I put to paper has me owning 8 properties free and clear (1.8 million equity) and a conservative yearly passive income of $86,000 in 24 years. Like I said earlier I would be snowballing each payment to a new property every 2 years ish. 

I currently bring home about $72 k per year and my wife makes about $12 k. Once she starts working harder she can be making around $70 K. (physical therapist) My monthly expenditures are around $5 k ( I was only figuring one mortgage payment) and bring home is $7 k ish. In 5 years I will not have a baby sitter bill which is an extra $1,300. I don't have any other debt except the mortgages on both the homes.

Someone smarter than me that has been in my boat please help. I have been reading books and listing to videos a ton but I figured someone was super savvy here. Sorry for the novel.

Matt