Wannabe investor from Wisconsin

[Eric M.]

I have been lurking for a while and listening to the podcasts and figured that it's time to get more involved with the community.

I was an accidental landlord in the past, but now am ready to do it right. My long term goal is to increase my passive income by investing as a buy and hold investor in SFR and Multifamily properties in central and western Wisconsin.

Thanks in advance for your kind words!

[Eric M.]

Originally posted by @Joe Fairless:

@Eric M.welcome to BP and looking forward to hearing how things go. Any lessons learned you want to share when you were an accidental landlord? 

 The first issue I ran into was that I arbitrarily picked a rental amount that seemed fair to me without actually doing market research. I probably should have rented it for $100 per month more.

Second, I didn't realize that insurance rates would change with with owner occupied vs. rental. My rates increased a lot. I ended up being cash flow negative.

Third, I did not enjoy being a long distance landlord. My tenant hit the garage and it killed me to not be able to drive over and look at the damage. I am only interested in investing locally at this point.