Total newbie from Buffalo, NY

[Scott S.]

Hi everyone,

I posted something similar to this yesterday, but I figured I should do it the proper way in the new member section. First, I'd like to say how incredible this site is. I can't believe how much I've learned in the past few weeks just cruising through the forums. Thank you Josh and everyone who contributes!

I'm 33 and my wife and I just had our first child. Working in sales with no pension, the thought of paying for my daughter's education seems overwhelming. I feel like I will never retire. I had this thought of buying an investment property for mostly a buy/hold strategy (a little cash flow would be great obviously).

I started looking into condos due to the fact that the hoa takes care of exterior maintenance. I know most of you don't agree with condo rentals, but let me know what you think of this.

The condo I would purchase is a 2br, 1 ba, 1100 sq ft, roughly $70k in a nice suburban neighborhood. The condo will cash flow about $2500 per year including PITI, vacancy, and maintenance. I plan to self manage as it shouldn't be too much work.

Are condos a trap? I notice a lot of newbies like myself seem to be interested in condo rentals (maybe because they're cheap and you don't need a lot of cash to put down the 20%). Let me know what you guys think.

Thanks!