All Forum Posts by: Eva Arnold

Hello, I'm a CPA by trade and a wholesaler in Northern Colorado - primarily Fort Collins / Loveland / Greeley. If you would like to be added to my cash buyers list, please message me with your name, number and email. I'd love to let you know about my next great deal. Thank you! - Eva

@Taylor Shapiro, I hope your single family flip deal worked out! Thank you for the encouragement! 

@Joseph 

Thanks so much for your encouragement! Yes, I saw that same stat about the JD degrees outnumbering attorney jobs 2 to 1! It's unbelievable. 

I'm hoping to also reach kids who would normally go to prestigious colleges -- if they simply did a 3-year hitch in the military first, they could attend Columbia University in New York city for free and get paid a $3,759-per-month housing allowance during the academic year. This is through the Post-9/11 GI Bill's Yellow Ribbon program.

@Jered Sturm

Hi Jered, I wanted to pay you the courtesy of listening to your podcast before I replied.

Wow! Your story is amazing and inspiring! Probably my favorite part was the jaw-dropping maturity of your insight, at such a young age, that "there will be times in my life when I'll want free time more than I do now," which drives you to work extra-hard right now. What kind of 20-year-old thinks like that?? Probably the type who's a retired millionaire at 40!

Thank you so much for recommending your podcast interview. It also gave me the insight that a younger, less conventional investor might want to look into portfolio loans rather than go through all the red tape of getting a VA loan. The advantage of a VA loan is no money down, but a young person with capital wouldn't need that advantage so much.

Yes, I will be referring to you in the book I'm working on, and I do hope your story will inspire others! 

Very Respectfully,

Eva

@Account Closed

Thank you for your positive words!

We have four young daughters and I hope I can mold them into the type of savvy little tycoons you used to teach! :)

@Timothy Colman

Timothy's question: Thanks for asking this question! I am active duty myself and some ponder my possibilities. Not to steal your thunder here, but I have a tax question for you :) Here is the scenario: active duty, owns townhouse in NC that is being rented. Stationed in Japan. This past year I paid state tax on my rental 'income' as well as federal tax on the 'income'. However I still have to turn around and pay the mortgage with the 'income'!!! Is this right?

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Hi Timothy, maybe you could turn around your thinking. Think of it this way: regular employees have to commute to work, buy work clothes, and usually incur miscellaneous expenses in order to earn income. The money they spend on commuting or business clothes to wear to work or virtually all sundry expenses has to come out their pocket after it's been taxed. Furthermore, from the income they earn that they didn't spend on commuting/clothes/misc., after that's been taxed by the government, they have to provide for their housing and basic sustenance. 

Let's contrast that with you: in order to earn income on your rental property, you must pay expenses on it, including state taxes and mortgage payments -- but the money you spend on those expenses you incur does not get taxed. Of course, any rental income you have left after that does get hit with Federal income tax, but not with the FICA / Medicare taxes the ordinary wages of our poor hardworking employee are subject to.

Furthermore, as a member of the military you get BAH and BAS (housing and food allowances) and you do not get taxed on that money, and you still get to claim the standard deduction on your taxes.

I hope those facts help you get into a more positive mindset about your rental. You are very smart for investing in yourself while in the military. I wish you all success as being an absentee landlord sounds a little scary to me, but then again I know several military "lifers" who own rental property and they seem to do very well with it.

Please let me know how else I can help.

Very Respectfully,

Eva

@Ryan Jackson

Hi Ryan, staying away from alcohol is definitely crucial to saving money in the military!

I think once a young person adopted a wealth-building, options-conferring mindset, saving $50K in five years would not be difficult. It is certainly not as difficult as what this poor guy did, paying off over $100K in student loans over 6 years on a journalist's income while living in very expensive major U.S. cities.

What happens, unfortunately, is that kids away from home for the first time suddenly have all this spending money they never had and do really stupid things with it. I used to teach at an Army training course and I'd see recruits spend $10-20 on snacks at the 'gut truck' each day, for instance. And of course, many servicemembers return from deployment and immediately put all their savings into the snazziest new car possible. And it's true that some servicemembers engage in 'drinking' as an activity in and of itself and waste a lot of money this way. 

As I mentioned to Joel above, I had a very shrewd friend who saved over $100,000 during her 5 years in the service. She had two deployments during that time. She told me her now-husband saved $200,000 during his 6 years. I'm even pretty skeptical about that and hope to learn more from her husband about how he saved that much. She was very private about such matters when we were in the service, in fact she never even retorted when my husband and I would poke gentle fun at her for driving a ridiculous hoopty and shopping at thrift stores, but she's definitely getting the last laugh now.

$50,000 in five years assumes a private entering at the lowest rank possible and not enjoying any special pays for things such as deployments or Airborne status. I've run the numbers and am convinced it really can be done while still enjoying life in the military.

Yes, there are many opportunities for free or reduced-cost recreation when you are an active-duty lower enlisted servicemember.

@Joel W

Joel, thank you for sharing your story -- serving on a heavy icebreaker sounds like no joke, yikes! Very sweet how love for your new wife propelled you into a Navy career, and it's wonderful to see how you've made the most of it.

Regarding saving, I have a dear friend who saved up $100,000 during a 5-year enlistment that included a tour in Iraq and a tour in Afghanistan. We used to poke fun at her for her extreme frugality, but she's definitely getting the last laugh now.

@John Thedford

That is simply amazing and I hope more young people will follow Steven David's example and take charge of their financial well-being, rather than sleepwalk into college and rack up debt on some vague supposition that this is the smartest thing to do.

@Mark Gallagher

Mark's question: Are you saying this person would come out of the military with $50K, and not work? Or go another route say working full time, and invest the $50K on the side?

Hi Mark,

Thanks so much for the response. It really is up to the ambitious young person.

-He could work only part-time but attend school full-time and support himself with the Post-9/11 GI Bill housing allowance.

-He could work full-time + attend school on either a full-time or part-time basis.

-He could simply work and not attend school. 

Any full- or part-time employment could possible be something related to real estate - real estate sales, construction, handyman work, property management, anything like that.

-As Joel W. mentioned above, the military will often actually pay you to attend college -- it sounds like Joel did so while on active duty -- so half- or full-time college attendance would be a good idea.

Really, such a person could go travel the world and not invest in real estate, or go live in NYC for two years and audition for acting jobs full-time, or any number of things.

Very Respectfully,

Eva