Career pivot pre-investing

[Melissa Geissinger]

Hey BP community! I'm new here and so far I'm loving what I'm seeing from this group. 

I wanted to introduce myself as well as ask what you might recommend for a career pivot. 

My name is Melissa and I am an aspiring real estate investor/rehabber located in Santa Rosa, Sonoma County, CA. I bought my first house 8 years ago, used the equity to move up a couple of years later, and unfortunately lost my home in the Tubbs fire in 2017. My husband and I rebuilt but later separated mere weeks before the home was completed. Multiple personal tragedies in quick succession left me unable to work for a couple of years. When I was able to go back to work, I decided to make a career 180 from website development into real estate and decided to become a mortgage advisor/loan officer. The downside to this is I didn't predict the separation nor the pandemic, so I'm left in a position where I need to have a more reliable source of income (ie not commission only) and I'm quickly running out of financial runway. 

I have been doing a lot of soul searching and figuring out what I want to do for the rest of my life and the answer has been a resounding REAL ESTATE INVESTMENT. I would prefer to ditch the client-facing and paperwork-heavy tasks of a loan officer and instead do more hands-on, project/property management-related work. I'm hungry to learn as much as I can about investing and am open to anyone's ideas or suggestions of where I might look for a great opportunity to grow my career in the investment direction while hopefully having an income that makes numbers work in the loan department. 

Creative solutions appreciated! Thanks! 

[Jesse Thompson]

Welcome to BP. Sorry for the past but the future looks bright for you!  I’m new to the game as well but keep learning and pushing yourself and soon opportunities will come. This website has plenty of helpful tools and people who are connected as well as very knowledgeable. I wish you well along your journey!