Buying a duplex and then personally living in an apartment?

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Just starting to learn about REI. I was originally wanting to buy a 3 - 4 unit multi family and live in one unit, while renting out the other 2 - 3. My market is Bradenton/Sarasota FL, and a 3 - 4 unit home runs $500 - $750k, not something I can afford. If I went up to Clearwater it's more doable, but I dont really want to move there.

So, I decided maybe I could just get a duplex. I'm finding that in order to be in a neighborhood which is actually safe, I'm going to be looking at homes in the $200k+ price range. The average around here for a $250k duplex is $1,200 per month in rent per unit. At 4% down on a $250k property, I'd be paying about $1000/mo on the mortgage. According the to 50% rule, $600 of the rent revenue would go to expenses, and $600 would be actual income (right?). This means I'd be losing money.

So I'm considering, maybe I could just rent both units out, and stick to living in my current $650/mo roachy apartment. At least then I would have some kind of positive cashflow. Is there some part of this that I am missing, or is the market here just pretty bad for what I'm looking to do? (Or maybe I'm currently just too broke). Just from quick browsing on loopnet and redfin, it looks like this would be so much more doable in the clearwater/st. pete area, but I would hate to live there. I've always disliked the area, so I want to stick to bradenton/sarasota.