i need to renovate with no money. any suggestions?

[Jessie Victorio]

I live in a home that i would like to make my first rental property, which needs a ton of work. my credit score wont allow me to finance a pack of gum, so im unable to get a heloc. and my job doesnt pay me enough to have a savings. i have been doing a few diy projects here and there but at this rate i will have my property ready for rent in 2040. any suggestions on what i can do to speed up my renovation project to get this house rented out sooner? thanks

[Jody Sperling]

I'm going to go the unpopular route: you appear to be a pro member. That's $300-some dollars you could have spent renovating. I mention this because anytime I see someone say their job doesn't allow them to save, I immediately want to dig into their budget and find the fat. It's always there. I have fat in my budget.

When you set a goal to do something, you have to bring every resource, no matter how big or small to bear. Do you eat out? Replace meals with savvy grocery shopping. Do you have memberships: Netflix, BP, DIsney+. Cancel them.

The next piece is finding a part-time income stream to accelerate your savings. If you have a new enough car, you can deliver for Uber Eats or Grubhub or do rideshare. If you have skill writing you could sign up for The Content Authority or Textbroker and write SEO articles for money. There are so many side hustles that can bring in money.

All of these choices are difficult, but they all represent a goal that must be driven by a future vision.

Before I married, I had twenty thousand dollars in school debt, twelve thousand in credit card debt and less than ten thousand dollars of income annually. My credit score was cratered with late payments, high leverage, and open accounts. This was in 2010, so not long ago. We went through some marriage counseling before the wedding day and one of the things our counselor told us was that marriages broke up more often because of money arguments than any other cause.

That planted the seed, and since the time we had our first child, a son, in 2012, I have strived not only to repay my debts, but to build the kind of wealth people scoff at. As of June this year, when we purchased our first rental property, my credit score was 820, we had thirty-thousand dollars in savings and my annual income was ten times higher than what it was in 2010. My student debt is gone (I regret paying it off since I could have used some of that money to purchase more real estate, but we live and learn) and I have zero credit card debt. We traded a great deal of in-the-moment comforts to achieve these things, but it hasn't been all dull.

Along the way, my wife and I have taken multiple one-week vacations: NYC; drove the 101 from Portland, OR to San Diego, CA; drove from Portland, ME back home to Omaha, NE; and hit Chicago for food and Cubs games several times.

If you want to escape your financial burden and achieve financial freedom, you can, but it requires difficult choices and hard commitments. Best of luck to you!