Marine Scientist Hoping to Start Multifamily Investing

[Brenden Mitchum]

Howdy fello BPrrrrs!

First off, please forgive me for doing this a little backwards. I have already posted a couple of times, but am finally getting around to telling y'all a little about myself.

I am a marine scientist currently working as a fisheries observer in the Hawaii longline fishery. A typical trip out at sea is 3-4 weeks if fishing for tuna and 4+ weeks when fishing for swordfish. The work is incredibly boring and monotonous once the novelty wears off (which it does quicker than you might expect). However, it is a fantastic way to save money since spending is close to zero when out at sea. Soon into starting this work I realized that it was not a career for me and that I would use it to save up, pay off student loans, and network for other positions in marine science. At this same time, I began listening to personal finance podcasts. This quickly led me to listening to Paula Pant's Afford Anything podcast, which was my first introduction into the idea of real estate investing. 

Now, after a year of educating myself through podcasts and many real estate investing books, I am incredibly excited about the prospect of beginning my own portfolio of longterm buy and hold multifamily investments. My plan is to continue building my savings with this job for another year before purchasing my first investment as a house hack for my partner and myself to also have our first primary residence. The location for this is still very up in the air, but right now my top prospect is the San Diego area. I definitely need to do more research into different markets but so far this has been a very daunting task and I am still figuring out how exactly to go about it. I am also planing to find a mentor in my current area (Honolulu) to get a little hands on experience. There does not appear to be a ton of real estate meet-ups happening here, but I could be looking in the wrong places. 

My longterm goal is to build a large enough portfolio of positively cash-flowing multifamily properties to support a career in low-income and volunteer marine science positions, while also being able to travel the world. I would love to help rehabilitate and conserve our marine world, but am unable to support myself and eventually a family on the work I would like to do. I plan to accomplish this is by purchasing at least one property each year for the first two years, then increasing my purchases by one property per year each year. I am hoping to manage the properties for at least the first two purchases before switching to a manager. During the first few years I will likely (unfortunately) have to continue working as a fisheries observer. However, I hope to go full-time into investing by 2023. And I plan to be completely financially free by 2030; able to fully pursue my dreams of non/low profit marine conservation and travel.

Well that's a little about me and my plan (hopefully not too lengthy an explanation). Please feel free to drop some comments and let me know what you think/give any advise you think could help. As I am still in the early stages of planning, I am very open to criticism and changing said plan. 

Hope everyone's having a good weekend! Who Dat!

Brenden