Newbie moving to Oak Harbor, WA

[William Sumner]

Hi everyone!  My wife and I are both Naval Officers moving to Oak Harbor.  Being from Portland, I am excited to be stationed on the west coast.  In addition to the house we bought to live in in Oak Harbor, we own a rental from a previous duty station.  Our goals s not to just build wealth in real estate but to do it while enjoying ourselves and meeting great people along the way.

[Elizabeth Colegrove]

Welcome to Biggerpockets!

We are buy and hold investors. My husband is active duty Navy also an officer. It's actually a small world because we know a bunch of people at Widbey :)  We buy houses at every duty station (personals are the cheapest entry requirement). We have bought pure rental properties and created a system that allows us to self-manage even from a distance. We live off one income and invest the other Our goal is to be able to retire at 42 and 44 when my husband has the opportunity to retire from the navy.

There are lots of great options. The one thing that everyone agrees on at this forum is investing in personal properties. Beyond that, everyone has their own "style". We have learned to turn lemonades into lemonade. We figured out our goal and from there have simple to turned everything into an opportunity to achieve that goal. If you had told us 3 years ago where we would be today. I would have laughed. The key has been to adapt. Our challenges have actually made us better investors.

Another great place is to look around the blogs, forums and listen to the podcasts. If you see a post you enjoy check out the persons signature. Many of us including myself talk about our strategies, styles, niches and business model on our website. So definitely check that out as it is an amazing additional resource. For example, my blog is about while working full time, buy and hold investing, 0% Down Rentals, Personal Properties turned rentals, Long distancing investing, self-managing 3,000+ miles away. Definitely list your blog or website in your signature, if you have one. Its a great additional networking source.

Look forward to seeing you around! Let me know if I can help!