New to forum and potential first time renter

[Destin Hinton]

Greetings all.  I ended up here after watching several BP YouTube Videos.  My name is Destin Hinton, 41 years old, and we live about 30 minutes North of Salt Lake City.  Full time I am an Aviation Safety Inspector with the Federal Aviation Administration and also a supervisor in the Air Force Reserves.

We have zero experience with investment properties and are considering renting our primary residence. We are also in the middle of a VA IRRL refi down to 2.75%. Not sure if renting is best or selling and investing the equity.

After the refi we will have a balance of $183k on a 26 year note.  We had considered moving out of state last year and had an appraisal that came in at $359k.  The market in Northern Utah has been pretty hot.  My real estate agent has been keeping contact with me and would obviously like us to sell.   I feel pretty confident we could rent our house for $2,000 - $2,100 per month.  I just learned about he four square analysis and completed the first 3 squares.  All expenses with a renter comes out to $1369.92.  If we stay local this would be self managed otherwise I would absolutely pay for a property management company.

Traditionally I have been pretty bad with money. Being a federal employee last year during the furlough was a little bit of wake up call. I took $50k out of our TSP and am currently paying that back with a balance of $36k as of today. We have also stared a short term emergency savings and currently have a balance of right at $13k.

Glad to be here and excited to learn.

-Destin