Anyone else in Midwest Michigan?

[Joe Kilchermann]

Hi, I'm Joe Kilchermann and I'm from Big Rapids, Michigan. I've been in the learning stage of my investing journey for about a month at the time of this post. I plan on becoming a police officer when I graduate from Ferris State in May of 2021 with a BA in Criminal Justice. My plan is to use my job to fund my rental investments until I am financially free and able to turn my investments into my career. I heard about BP from an officer I worked with during my internship phase. Lastly, I am 21, married, and have an almost 2 year old daughter currently. 

I want to meet with some of you and see how you do a deal start to finish. This includes: the decision making in how/what to rehab, how you analyze a deal and estimate expenses, and what you look for during an initial walkthrough. And I wouldn't mind paying if we stopped for coffee.

If you're not interested, please leave a comment as advice to help point me in the right direction.

Thanks for your time!

[Janani Kalpathi]

Hi Joe - welcome to BP and real estate investing (REI)! I'd recommend starting out with getting yourself more educated first. Maybe you're already doing all or some of this, just do more of it. This involves:

• Reading books (the ones I've read so far - Long Distance Real Estate Investing by David Greene, The Book on Rental Property Investing by Brandon Turner, few more authors like J. Scott and Ryan Pineda on flipping). 
• Listen to BP podcasts - ton of info there and will help you learn to speak the same language and make you more confident.
• Setup keyword alerts on BP on cities/markets you're interested in. For instance, I have 'Columbus, OH', 'Michigan' set up to also keep an eye out on the current discussions and who would be the right fit to partner and network. 
• Get active with REI Instagram and Facebook - to network, get referrals, check out off-market deals in Facebook groups, to get added to multiple buyers list from wholesalers on FB etc. I've started connecting with people who are rookie/experienced investors, agents who have been super generous with their time and knowledge.
• Define what your goals are in a business plan - for instance a SFH/MFH, buy-and-hold/flipping/BRRRR, howdo you plan to source deals, what markets, why? etc. It will change multiple times but without one you can get easily lost.
• These are a few I could think of right off the bat. Do all the above on a daily basis, then engage with someone to have a focused conversation to give the impression that you've done your homework, you know what you want and you value their time most importantly. Hope this helps, good luck with everything and feel free to reach out if you have any further questions!