All Forum Posts by: Roberto Santana

@Bart H. You good sir, have just helped me make me decision concrete. I'm going to attack my debt then by march 2019 have enough saved up to get my first property. I'll iron out the details here later tonight. Thank you for sharing your experience!!

@David Garrison Yea, after buying our house, I'm going to wait on buying another rental until the big (mistake) loan is taken care of. I'm not losing any sleep over the payments now but when I start investing I'd rather not have that loan (only one specific one) pulling money out of my pocket.

@Rick Roberson Oh no, not the first one. Still got some research to do before I jump into something that needs to be completely renovated. Hopefully I can find someone that will let me jump in and help out on a complete renovation so I can see the investor side of operations.

@David Garrison @Christopher Phillips And this is why I ask the questions, Thanks fellas!!

@David Garrison The plan would be to pay bi-weekly on my first property which I will be living in for the first 3 years or so. By the time I transfer and begin renting it out, the cashflow would be greater than if I were to stick with paying monthly payments. I would be losing out on 3 mortgage payments over the 3 year period but in the long run it will pay off. Or am I thinking this in the wrong mindset?

@Rick Roberson I was just speaking with a few people I work with about this. Yea, I'll have to find something solid that could just use upgrades vice renovations. The VA loan is going towards the house we will live in for a few years so the upgrades will be done by my wife and I and will be selected very carefully. I don't want to dump more money than necessary in it to rent it out. Plan is to move back to the area in about 8 years but continue buying properties in the area throughout that timeframe.

I've read that just by switching your mortgage payments from monthly or bi-monthly to bi-weekly you can save a ton on your interest over a 30 year period. This led me to researching the difference between bi-monthly and mi-weekly payments as well. It makes sense now but is anyone using this to pay their mortgage off?

@Michael Facchini Yea that's going to be my plan going forward. I was going to buy a second property before completely paying off my high interest rate debt. I'm going to throw as much as I can at this debt and pay it off in the next (hopefully less than) 16 months and get our home and future rental with the VA loan. Year 2 of the plan will consist of buying more investment properties.

@Thomas S. Thank you, I'm going to keep my options open with that. I understand where you're going and my family being first is the reason I'm doing this. After doing 20 years in the Military I want to be able to enjoy the time I have with them. But giving up 2 years in a duplex to help our future may be the way to go.

@Akeem Wheatley So we consolidated all the loans and it came with a 12% interest rate, with that we are 15 months ahead of the due date so our minimum is around $300 I'm keeping the payments at $600 to keep the payoff ahead of the interest if I go the savings to invest route. Setting a budget was my first goal, I set that and we've been strict to stick to it. I'm going to check out that board game, I just finished Rich Dad Poor Dad a few months ago. I'm waiting to get back home from deployment to buy it.