New(ish) Member - Tampa, FL Area

[Stefan K.]

Hello BiggerPockets! I've been lurking the boards for a while, trying to learn as much as I can as I've been creating a plan to eventually retire my wife. Thank you for sharing all of the useful information that you all put out there everyday.

By day I'm an accounting/finance guy (CPA/MBA) for a Fortune 100 company. By night, I'm scouring the net looking for my first buy and hold rental property (and my second and my third...).

I've finally widdled my list of houses to go look at this week to 7. Started with a lot more and then weeded out houses in flood zones (especially due to FEMAs announcement that flood insurance will be going from hundreds to thousands!), neighborhoods I didn't like (by driving them) and houses that dissappeared a day or two after they were listed.

My list is down to the following:

1 - private sale
1 - Bank owned REO
1 - Homepath (Fannie)
1 - HomeSteps (Freddie)
2 - Short sales no contracts yet
1 - Short sale possible back up contract

Very excited to get out there and check them out. My projections have them all in the neighborhood of $200-$300/mo cash flow and 17%-25% cash on cash return. Fingers crossed!