Flipping or Buy & Hold in San Luis Obispo

[Stephen Wyer]

Hi, so I'm a brand new real estate investor and I'm trying to invest in San Luis Obispo single-family properties, preferably houses close to Cal Poly/downtown area. 
My question is fairly straightforward: do you guys recommend pursuing house flipping in SLO as a viable strategy for profit or is it more of a buy and hold market? Has anyone been successful house flipping in SLO? If so I'd love to hear your story; like how you did it-or if it didn't work out I'd love to hear why. 
Thanks! 

[Patrick McCandless]

I agree with @Ben Tilbury on everything. This area sucks for cash flow comparatively speaking. No way you'll get even close to the 1% rule. More like half percent rule. And to find something at a discount is like a needle in a haystack. What I'm in the process of doing in Paso Robles is a live-in flip which I will turn into a rental once completed and move onto the next. Purchased a couple years ago as a trust sale for $405k with only 5% down. I now owe $364k and it's worth about $525k. Have put MAYBE $15k into the place as I've done almost all work myself. Dropped the PMI off a while ago and will be refinancing probably in the next month which will bring PITI down to <$2,000/month and I will be able to rent it out for about $2500-$2600. By the time I'm ready to move onto the next hopefully more like $2750. Contemplating what to do with $55k HELOC I'm now eligible for (even more if I want to pay higher interest). Next one I hope to find off market and for a deeper discount and possibly with an ADU. Good luck and let me know if I can help!