I am a pharmacist in my late 30's, I have a wife, a 3 year old daughter, and a 2 month old son. I purchased a vacant lot in 2023 for $155,000 for the purpose of building a primary residence on it. Fast forward to today, we have decided to scrap the idea and now want to sell the land. I will wait until we've held the lot for at least 1 year to avoid additional taxes owed per my CPA's advice. The value of the lot is somewhere around $350,000 and for the sake of simplicity let's say I profit $200,000 from the sale. What should I do with this money?

My initial thought was to put enough in savings for a 1 year emergency fund (am I pharmacist so I am risk averse!) and dump the rest into a brokerage account which holds ETF's invested in essentially total stock market indexes (VTI, VOO etc.). But now the investor side of my brain is saying WAIT a second, why don't you do a 1031 exchange!? As you know this will defer the taxes owed on the profit of the sale, which in my case, would be pretty substantial given my salary as a pharmacist.

Other pertinent info, I own a duplex that we currently house hack but will be moving into a new home in Babcock Ranch later this year. So we will convert our side into a long term rental. In addition, our new home will have an attached in law suite in which I intend to rent out as well. By 2030, I plan on moving my family to Poland (my wife's native country) and so I am unsure what I will do for income then. Perhaps a mixture of rental income/brokerage account gains profits/dividends or finding a remote job I can work in Poland. Also, we have no consumer debt, car loans, or student debt. The current mortgage rate on my duplex is 3.5%.

So I just don't really know what to do. Invest the profit into the stock market and get 6-10% return on my money without lifting a finger but taking on the additional tax burden of the profits? Or rolling that profit into another property(s) to obtain more rental properties to increase monthly income? What would you do if you were me? Thanks for reading my long winded post, I realize with situations like these there are no "correct" decisions only different decisions that yield different outcomes. But I am interested in your thoughts. Thanks again!

Frank

Cape Coral, Florida

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