Buy home with great equity or invest the $ in cash flow? Regrets?

[Jarrin Benson]

I'm a bit torn about a primary home purchase and looking for some sage advice. I'm a newer investor and RE broker. The long term goal is to get cash flowing like a madman and then live the life I want, which is really pretty simple - travel, yada yada.  I've been ready to invest some capital into real estate, but also have outside investor capital ready and waiting for a deal too - and starting to feel like there is a lot more where that came from. I am now considering taking my capital and buying a home that I'm really attached to. It's not a castle but its just that perfect mix of everything - location, style. The experience of living there would be phenomenal, especially compared to my current home. It fits my goal criteria for my next home purchase: separate living area to short-term rent as we desire, as well as almost 100K equity built in the day we walk in the door, not counting down money. This house fits within my goals, I just thought that I'd be cash-flowing at least 5K/month before I would consider a move like this. So, it's just a little flip-flopped from what I originally laid out the sequence of my goals to be. 

Key factors: 

1. This would increase my net worth by about 100K, but decrease my personal monthly cash-flow by 1K/mo (possibly neutralized with short-term rental)

2. For my other investing- I am starting to see options in OPM (other peoples money) more and more so I'm starting to be less hung up on having my own bank-roll to make deals happen.

My real questions for you are: 

Have any of you bought your personal residence as an emotional decision and later regretted it - like maybe you wish you'd have been more cash-flow minded than net-worth minded? 

How many of you sacrificed for so long to make cash flow plays, that you looked back and wished you'd have lived a little more?

[JD Martin]

Well, for me personally, I wish I had invested for profit *before* I bought my personal residence. If I had done so I'd be light years ahead of where I am now, and I'm in a pretty good position now. 

Don't fool yourself into thinking buying your dream personal residence is an investment play. That's just a way of you talking yourself into making the comfortable/personal choice rather than the financial choice. There's nothing wrong with buying something because you like it/want it/need it - just be honest with yourself about the financial implications. Unless you plan on selling it the next day, you don't have any guarantee of that instant "$100k equity". It's also admittedly, at best, a cash wash, but really looks like it's cash-flow negative. 

Never think of your personal home as an investment. It *can* be an investment, and maybe turns out to be an investment, but it's primarily a place to avoid sleeping under the overpass. 

PS: Sometimes investment opportunities have to be tempered by the wants/needs of others if you are married or in an otherwise committed partnership. The only way to do 100% of what you want is to be alone.