Noob++ from Fort Collins, Colorado

[Bradley Chapple]

Hello, everyone. I have been on BP for a little while now and even upgraded my account to Pro in order to use the analysis tools. But, then I realized I never posted an intro here. So, here we go...

I grew up on a farm in Southeast Georgia, about an hour north of Jacksonville, Florida. After high school, I moved around a lot to satisfy my wanderlust, spent a lot of time in Oklahoma (in and around Tulsa) and eventually made it far enough west to settle in Northern Colorado.

Like many people here, my REI journey began when I listened to the audiobook "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" while on a road trip in the early 2000s. That's when Robert Kiyosaki planted that powerful seed. At the time, however, I broke. I don't even know if broke is the right word for it. The kids were still young and we could barely keep them in diapers and still pay the bills. We owned our home, but it was almost repossessed countless times. Having money to invest in real estate was a pipe dream because we were only a couple of paychecks away from being homeless ourselves. So, that seed went dormant for a while.

Fast forward 15 years to 2019. Our careers have progressed, our kids are grown and (kind of) on their own, our revolving debt is down to zero, and the seed that Kiyosaki planted so long ago has started to grow. We have one SFR (our previous home) and we do our own version of house hacking by renting our downstairs MIL suite to two of our adult children. Currently, we manage our one SFR and the tenant is great, but that's probably the only one we'll manage ourselves. Our next buy-and-hold properties will, more than likely, be out of state.

Our plan is to acquire around 10 to 20 properties over the next 5 years and then using the next 5 years to pay them off, swap out the bad apples, etc. This should allow us to retire about 5 years earlier than we otherwise could. The goal is to get to eventually work our way up to $10K per month in cashflow. We may not need that much to retire once we get there, but that's our "safe" number that should provide a buffer for medical insurance/emergencies, travel, and provide care for our aging parents.

So, there you have it... The real estate version of me, in a nutshell. If you want to know anything else, ask away. I'm mostly an open book and hope to use this forum to meet others with similar goals and maybe even develop some friendships that extend beyond real estate.

I wish all of you a happy and healthy holiday season and the best of luck in 2021. Stay safe, everyone!