Looking to buy my first multifamily property withing 9-12 months

[Farouk El Khatib]

Hello everybody,

I joined this wonderful community a month ago after I started reading about real estate investing couple months ago. I’m 25 (turning 26 next month) and looking to buy my first rental property within the next 9-12 months. I recently relocated to Massachusetts from Indiana for my job as a civil engineer. I wanted to introduce myself to the BP community and hopefully meet other investors from the area.

My plan/goal:

My first rental property will be an OO multifamily (hopefully fourplex) so that I can benefit from the low down payment and the good rates. I plan to do that for my first 3 properties, which I plan to buy within 6 years (buy one property every couple of years). Once I've done that, I want to focus on making more payments on one of the properties to decrease my risk and then move on and buy some more. I plan to hold on these properties for a long time, because my goal from REI is to have an early and comfortable retirement.

Advice from BP members:

Right now I’m reading books, listening to podcasts, and educating myself before I start with this journey. I don’t want the “analysis paralysis” syndrome so I want to start taking some steps to ensure that doesn’t happen. From what I’ve been reading, the first steps are:

• 1.Real Estate Agent: When should I start looking for one? As I mentioned I’m looking to buy my first property within 9-12 months, mainly because my wife and I have around $15K saved up right now and will probably have around $25K (or more) by next year. I feel like that number will offer a lot more property options especially in MA where the properties are more on the expensive side. I’m not looking to invest in Boston, rather in the southern part of the state (I live in Milford right now). Also, how do I start interviewing/meeting real estate agents?
• 2.Getting preapproved: I feel like this as important as finding a real estate agent because it’ll give me an idea of the loan I can get. I’ll probably be getting a 203K loan if the property needs repairs or a conventional loan (5% down), so I don’t know if the getting preapproved is an important step for the time being.

I want to thank everybody who took the time to read this and looking forward to the great advice I will be getting.

Happy investing!

Farouk