How did some if you get started in this?

[Billy LaFerney]

I am just getting my feet wet in reading and learning about real estate investing.  I'm probably 6 months away from actually diving in to this.  I am primarily going to focus on buy and hold investments to generate a steady monthly cash flow.  

I would really like to know how many of you started out in obtaining your first property, the avenue you took to acquire it and what you did right and wrong in your first deal.

This would help me understand more how I want to move forward.

Thanks everyone!

[John Thedford]

I did invest at a young age but left investing behind. Started opening different businesses and ran them through the years. In 2012 I decided I was going to start doing HML. My very first loan was actually foolish but at the time I was new and also dealing with health issues that left me living on heavy duty meds. I would never do the same loan today. The reason it was foolish was because it was such a tiny loan there really was no profit. It was about 8% LTV. One day the owner of that property called and asked me if I wanted to buy the house. I went and looked and wrote a contract. I was VERY hesitant and questioned my judgement. What if I could not rent it? So, my exit strategy was if I had no success in renting it, I would simply put it on the market for sale. I made a horrible blunder trying to get the rehab done for cheap cheap, and lost maybe two months rent. Lesson learned: pay a good price, hire PROFESSIONALS, get it done, and put the unit into service. Before I closed on the property, I was offered about 15K to assign the contract! That WAS a shocker. I declined. We closed, got it rehabbed, and rented it. Still have the same tenant since day one. That big assignment fee was etched in my mind. I was hooked. I started running ads on CL saying "I Buy Houses". Along came deal #2. It was a giveaway. I turned down a 10K assignment fee which was unsolicited. I wrote a post about it on the unlicensed brokering forums titled something like "10K Assignment Fee". The bug had me. Playing monopoly with REAL money for REAL estate was fun, addicting, and what I believed to be my path to financial freedom. Buy and hold WILL make anyone wealthy over time. It is a SURE way to financial independence if you stick with it.

Here is the 1st house I purchased. Paid 60K. Turned down about 15K assignment fee. Spent about 15K on rehab, new appliances, etc. Today it is worth about double, brings in gross rents over 14K, and I have no debt on it. Same tenant since I owned it! 

Since I started in 2012 I have purchased over 1M in real estate and grown my HML business. It IS freedom and I encourage everyone to pursue RE if they want to change their life!