Newbie from Midwest Illinois. Currently in Northern Virginia.

[Tim Davis]

Hello everyone.  I am just now starting to get into real estate. My job is mobile, which forces me to move around every few years.  There is good and bad to this.  Good:  I can buy a house as a personal home at a lower interest rate that I will live in for a few years before moving on and renting the house out.  Bad: I will have homes in different markets, with different property managers, that I have no opportunities to check in on.

I fell into my first real estate property.  The plan was to buy the house, live in it for 3 years and then sell it.  Three months after purchasing the house, I got orders to go to another location.  Eight months after purchasing the home, I was in D.C. and decided to rent the property out. 

I have since done research and a ton of reading and now see this is an opportunity to build my real estate properties through my moves.

Does anyone have any similar experiences or does anyone have any thoughts on if it is smart to buy/possess several single properties in several different locations.

My other option is to start investing in multi-family rentals back in my home town where I hope to retire in less than a decade.  However, I will not receive the loan rates as a personal home.

I'm very excited about this website and I look forward to the amount of knowledge and experience that is available for me to learn from.  I have about 20 months until my next move.