New Investor from San Antonio, Texas

[Michelle Felux]

Hello everyone! I'm new to the REI world, but have always been interested in real estate in some form or fashion while working on my formal education and looking to jump into the Rat Race (ha!). I am originally from Tyler, Texas, but as a military child I moved around quite a bit - an experience that I believe has really added value to my life. I was able to meet a variety of people and learn that change is good, not something to be feared all of the time.

I entered the job world as an office manager for a local real estate office, while I simultaneously started my own wedding invitation business. It wasn't a wild success, but it was profitable enough to bring in around $14,000 per year, which was extremely helpful at that point in my life. Fast forward four more years and I find I have bought into the idea that working for someone else was going to be more beneficial to me than working on my own business. I have been working as the Clinic Operations Analyst at a small hospital here in South Texas for several years, and while the money is good, the lifestyle is not. As many of you probably have come to realize, being stuck in someone else's rat race is not the way you want to live your life. So, last November, my husband and I started investing in real estate. 

We started with a turn-key rental that brought us around $450 per month in cash flow and it was an energizing experience. However, we knew that in order to bring enough cash flow so that one of us could do this full time, we would need at least 6 rental properties. We didn't have the equity for that, so we wanted to begin pursuing value plays. Our first equity capture strategy property is a 1940's house in a neighborhood that is turning around. HOWEVER, we were naive. The original bid came from the seller and was off by half.... we have struggled with contractor issues and inspection failures and it has been the biggest learning experience ever! We are hoping the education we have gained by doing this in real life will help mitigate the disaster it has been in the future. While that is going on, we acquired a small rehab property in an area where cash flow from rent is again around that $450-500/month range. We are still working (more slowly than we'd like) on turning that place around, but it is going to be much smoother than the first! 

We are looking to acquire a fourth once we catch our breaths and then re-evaluate our strategy for trading up our properties into Multi-Family investing. We will need all the help we can get! I am currently looking for CPA and Real Estate Attorney assistance to look into setting up an LLC and investigating different ways to acquire and sell REI properties other than MLS listings.