80k to Invest and Overwhelmed by Choices. Help!

[Steven Henao]

We have 80k to invest but feel paralyzed by the many directions to take! Please help!

Some background:

We bought our first property last year (2023) for $675k. A SFR 3/2 in Long Beach, CA that needed some work. It appraised for 725k at the time of purchase and has been holding steady since. Our plan was to do an ADU garage conversion (I know, super original), rent it out Short term / Med term, and then spruce up the main house after a couple of years of the ADU income.

So, we started the ADU permitting process right away…

The main house was livable but very old. It needed some TLC, and over the months of living there, we slowly started feeling claustrophobic. We couldn't hold it and decided to start on the renovations early while we waited for the ADU permit. Some of the work we did ourselves, but most of it we contracted out.

Fast forward to today, 

We spent about 70k on all new bathrooms, flooring, minor upgrades, and a badass kitchen. Our plan basically reversed, and we now have a beautiful main house but no ADU and no cashflow yet. We haven't received a new appraisal with the updated renovations, but we're estimating a solid chunk of equity has been added.

We'd like to invest the 80k in the ADU since that's a guaranteed >2k rent per month, but are feeling a bit doubtful in this moment. Do we really want to have all our eggs in one basket? It feels like a huge chunk has already been put into this property. Would it be better to invest it elsewhere? Should we consider different financing options? Did we chose the right location to have an ADU?

So BP, what do we do? 

Any tips, advice, thoughts appreciated!