When is it time to Diversify?

[Scott Trench]

Howdy, wanted to ask the advice of the community here in discovering when the correct time to diversify is as far as real estate investing goes. I'm financially prepared to purchase properties 3 + 4 as things stand (I live in Denver, and will house hack one of them, and buy a regular rental property for the other), and I plan to do this over the next 6 months, my first offers to begin in November. At that point I will have a significant amount of wealth and assets under management in real estate, though of course much of that will be leveraged. As virtually all of my wealth and assets will be tied up in real estate, it seems like if the time to begin diversifying hasn't already come, it will after this next round of purchases. 

The problem is that it seems like building wealth in other areas is painfully slow compared to real estate. I'll literally have to save up tremendous amounts of cash and begin plowing them into stocks, for example, and I'm no entrepreneur that's going to build a business while working my day job here at BP. What do other investors do once they've applied their real estate plans for a few years, and have a bit of wealth and a stable cash flowing portfolio. 

What's next? 

[Matt M.]

Max out your IRA and invest in LOW FEE index funds. You don't need a huge amount as the time value of money will do that for you.

Properties 3-4 already? Is BP hiring???