I'm looking to invest 30K and my own home to make my first deal.

[Christopher C.]

Hello, BiggerPockets. I live in Berks County, Pa. I'm a pretty private person, but after reading these forums I see they are filled with really helpful and decent people so I'm hoping to get some great ideas for investing. I'll dive right in and tell you everything. I'm in my late 40's and am looking to invest 30K in cash and my fully paid off condo (worth 55K). My goal is to use this money to eventually end up with a 3K a month cash flow. I have an excellent credit score which hovers around the 800 mark. One major issue I believe I have is my monthly salary. I only make around 40K at my job. And it took me 20 years at the same company to even reach that amount. I see some of the people on these forums are making what I would consider a fortune. From BiggerPockets I've come up with one idea. I'm wondering if anyone can tell me if it sounds feasible or if someone has a better idea.

I have my eye on a condo in the area. I know the building and I know the rents. Using a conventional mortgage, I can purchase the property for approximately 50K. With a loan, the property will cash flow at approximately $175.00 per month (this includes all of the expenses I've learned about on BiggerPockets. The total cost of the loan would be approximately 15K. That would leave me another 15K leftover. The following year it is my plan to save another 5K or so and purchase a duplex or triplex using an FHA loan. I would move into that in order to satisfy the FHA requirement. With closing costs, I imagine I would need around 20K to make the purchase of a $140K or 150K building. Because I would then be living in the building I doubt highly I could get it to cash flow, but the tenants would be paying most of my expenses. I would rent out the condo I currently live in for some extra money. Now this leaves me with 3 properties. But I still have relatively low income from my job. I also know my condo would appraise at around 60K so I believe I can pull out around 40K by doing a cash-out refinance or HELOC. I would then look to use that money to conventionally purchase (20% down) another 2 duplexes for around 100K each. . . I'm hoping some of the expert real estate investors out there can tell me if my plan is even doable as I've described my situation? Heck, for that matter, is it even a plan at all? Would I even be allowed to take out this many loans with my fairly low salary and several other mortgages? Is there a smarter, quicker way to reach my $3K a month cash flow goal? Any and all ideas and advice you guys could give me would be greatly appreciated... And thank you to BiggerPockets for all of your great information and forums. This site has really opened my eyes to what I had been missing financially my whole life.