New Investor in the Springs!

[Mark Lucas]

Hey everyone! My name is Mark Lucas and I moved to Colorado Springs about 6 weeks ago. I am active-duty military and I am interested in investing on the side for the long term. My main interest is buy-and-hold and I would like to house hack for a couple years while learning the other areas of real estate investing. 

I would ideally like to use my VA loan to buy multifamily properties, however with the limited supply in the area I am open to single-family properties. So my question is, what do you guys think would be the best strategy and what areas of town do you think are good places to currently invest?

Also, feel free to send me colleague requests, I'd love to learn what other people in the area are doing and if I can help at all!

[Colin Smith]

@Mark Lucas,

Hey Mark, it was great meeting you the other day.

I don't think anyone on here can answer your question for you. I truly believe you have to look at your situation and decide what is the best route for you. Some people on here will say that single families are the only way to go. Others will say that mult-ifamily is only way to go. In my opinion, you really need to decide how you want to invest and think long term. There are advantages to both single family and multi-family which makes it a tough decision. 

With the limited multi-family properties on the market right now, it could be tough to find a "great deal" whereas you can surely find those with single family homes. 

Your a single guy right now, but again you want to think long term. Are you thinking if you find the right person will you want to marry in the 1-2 years or do you want to hold off for 5-10 years? If you're thinking sooner rather than later, multi-family maybe a better route as your future wife is not going to want to live with roommates - I know mine didn't. :) If you think that is not in your future, then you may not only be able to use your VA benefit to find a great deal on a single family home, but you could find a 5-6 bedroom single family home and make great rent by doing a rent-by-the-room setup.

If you're also thinking this purchase will be something you'll keep for 10+ years but you won't be living in the property for the duration of that time, something to keep in mind is who is going to be doing the exterior maintenance or paying the utilities on multifamily properties. That is not always clear. On single family homes it's usually always the tenants responsibilities for both, no questions asked.

There is certainly quite a few variable at play, some of which only you can answer for yourself. 

If you would like to get together again and discuss your options, just shoot me a private message and we can schedule a time.