New member living in Virginia

[Marlin Roth]

Hey everyone! My name is Marlin Roth and I am 23 years old. I have been living in Lynchburg, Virginia for the past 5-6 years although I am originally from south-eastern Pennsylvania. 

My background is nearly as limited as it can get. I never had any interest in real estate until I read "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" last week and it has helped me be more interested in investing my money in assets rather than liabilities. Whether or not my interest in investing will show itself in the form of real estate investments has yet to be seen. At this time, I am working full-time as a third-shift (10:30pm-7:00am) janitor at a nearby university. 

My goal right now is to gain as much knowledge and information about real estate and financing as possible. I am trying to collect books that I can read on those topics and other relevant topics. I just finished reading "The Richest Man in Babylon." My current plan is to save money for the next 2-3 years with the hope that I can make an investment into a single-family home that I can house-hack and have my renters pay for my mortgage and provide me with cashflow. This is a huge college town with a lot of college students that need places to live. During summer graduation for the local colleges, there is always an abundance of families who want to come to town to see their relatives graduate--and a shortage of hotel space. With that in mind, I think that an Airbnb could be a plausible option as well.

I listen to the BiggerPockets podcast as well as other podcasts that interest me during my night job as a janitor and I am excited to learn and so far I see this website/forum as a valuable resource to learn how I can best prepare myself to make wise investments and to be a good landowner, property manager, etc.

[Nam Tran]

Hey Marlin and everyone who has replied! I just wanted to chime in and introduce myself as well. My name is Nam and I moved to Arlington back in May of 2016. I'm a long time reader, but this is my first time posting. Like Marlin, I'm really excited to start my journey in real estate investing. I am currently a resident physician saving up as much money as possible to start taking action and investing. I would love to attend the REIA, but I believe that lynchburg is quite a distance from Arlington. Anybody know any good real estate meetups in my area? I look forward to chatting with everyone, and even possibly linking up for joint ventures!