All Forum Posts by: Mark H.

Impressive indeed. Please give us a clue as to how you worked out the financing part of it. 

Congrats, I believe you will accomplish even more REI success in your future.

My biggest mistake was relying strictly on conventional mortgages around 2010-2012 at the bottom of the market. I was buying SFRs for buy and hold in nice suburbs and my goal was to RAPIDLY GROW my portfolio. Commercial loans offer a higher LTV (85-90) than conventional loans (65-80) and are easier to close on, so they could have helped me accumulate more properties with my limited cash on hand.

@Michelle Conley : Thank you.

@Ami Sapir : I forgot to mention that my definition of being rich is very narrow and simplistic : A rich person is one who can afford the lifestyle he enjoys without having to work for it. When a former co worker was bragging constantly how rich he was, I told him sorry you're not rich in my eyes, because you have to be at work right now to afford your current living standard. In essence I believe being rich = FIRE (Financially Independence Retire Early). By the way, the internet offers fantastic websites on the subject of early retirement.

I was unhappy growing up in a lower middle class family, and realized in my 20's that being a regular employee will only keep me working till I die. I concluded at age 30 that I must think outside the box to build real wealth. I was inspired by two RE investors I knew who had accumulated visible wealth, so I started reading a bunch of REI books for 2 years, and then looking out of state and later locally for deals. Being frugal, saving up cash, and maintaining a high credit score has positioned me nicely to get into this field. It took a good dose of courage and motivation to dive into it during a severe economic recession and raising babies at the same time. Talk about risk taking and stress. But what kept me going full speed and "obsessed" was my vision of having my little money-making RE empire. My conclusion is that self determination is the most critical piece to success, it's how you make things happen, but no book can teach you that, you either have it or you don't. Feel free to read my earlier posts in my profile to learn more about my journey into REI.

 Right after the last big market crash, I was buying a property every three months or so for bargain prices. A co worker thought I was nuts and asked me "why are you so obsessed with these investments ?? Why can't you just be like normal people, automatically contribute to SS and funds in your 401k and forget about it until you retire at 65?!". Obviously the guy was brainwashed to live in the six figure income trap. I told him I plan to retire much earlier than 65, financially very comfortably, and I don't trust others to invest my money, whether it's public (SS) or private sector.

I now own 8 cashflowing properties but I choose to live in a small apartment, and have modest and fully paid-off cars. My co workers have huge houses, fancy cars and large credit card debt. They wonder why I'm frugal when I make good money, I tell them I prefer to put that money to work for me rather than spend it and enslave myself at work for many more years.

I have an LLC with a commercial loan for one SFR rental. The next time I need a bigger commercial loan for my LLC, is there any advantage to having this commercial credit history at all? Is there a credit bureau that tracks credit history for LLC's similar to how it's done at the personal credit bureaus?

Had I followed advice from friends and family in the past, I would have found myself today financially as poor as they are now, with no option for early retirement. Nowadays they all wish they were in my shoes financially.

I got into REI at the same time I started having babies, on top of a very busy career in IT. Talk about a stressful combination ... That was in 2010. But I stuck to my goal and reminded myself that I don't choose when great opportunities come up - but I do choose whether to pursue them. Looking back I'm extremely happy I did, now I'm in a better position than I had ever imagined.

As mentioned previously, it takes two RE cycles to become a multi-millionaire. I got the first cycle done, now preparing patiently for the second cycle.

Finding, buying and fixing houses is the toughest part. The rental stage is much easier.

To lower our stress, we limited our search region, hired a property manager, focused on nice areas with good tenants, did high quality fixes to last longer and lessen repairs, and established a relationship with a lender to simplify the mortgage process. We consistently stay away from deals we are not comfortable with, even if they are very profitable.

A few years ago my wife quit her full time job to be with the kids. She gradually learned about REI and has been helping with the admin side of it. When she goes back to work, we will pay off the loans asap.

I keep working as a self employed consultant so I can select jobs that allow a balance with family life. Most of my clients allow some work from home.

Living well below our means allows us to afford buying 2 houses a year (the challenge is to find the deals worth investing).

We don't currently live on the rental income, but we count on it for our early retirement around age 50, when we will take over its management as a part time job.

We involve our son in this process, explain to him why we have rentals, how it all works, and encourage him to think about personal economics. We DO NOT perceive college and corporate career as tickets to success, instead we teach him that true wealth and independence can be achieved through investments and starting young. Fulltime jobs help create an initial investment principal and provide for basic needs, but beyond that they can become a miserable golden cage. We teach him that investing from age 16 can help him reach FI by age 40. So we put REI for him in this context and instill it in his daily life.

Self employed computer programmer here. Career start was very tough, required tremendous learning and motivation. Overall quite happy with work and the excellent income, but feeling partial burnout and believing there should be more to life than a demanding career. So I decided to build a passive income stream to retire around age 50. Began reading REI books and started investing 7 years ago at the bottom of the market, accumulated 7 SFR rentals so far. Waiting for market to cool off in a few years, plan to have 10-15 rentals total. Hired a PM from the start and very happy about it (don't want more work, need more family time). What keeps me going nowadays is seeing the progress I've made in getting closer to early retirement. So REI is my means to an end.

My lawyer said I'm exposed to a much higher risk of liability in driving my car daily than in owning rentals. He said when the liability becomes real, his service to defend me will cost me significantly more than an umbrella policy, so I better get all the umbrella coverage I can possibly afford, it's the cheaper option and it will settle much faster than a full length lawsuit.

Umbrella policies are NOT all the same, take the time to find out what exactly they do and do not cover. Here's a link to an article that explains this aspect:

https://www.irmi.com/articles/expert-commentary/ch...