Originally posted by @Imran Ahmed:
Hello fellow FL investors and Floridans wonder if you could drop some of your two cents here. I am from the North East and currently living in NH but earlier this year had an interest having a good cash flowing multi in FL after lots of research from last several months and based on the market condition right now I get a gut feeling thats not gonna happen anytime soon for me. At this point, all I want a 2-4 unit which could even break even or may be couple hundred bucks shy from that me occupying one unit as I want a property in FL anyway but that even seems very hard to come by. I work from home and sometimes needs to travel, don't have kids so only requirement is anywhere max 1 hour traveling distance from any major airport. I am open to both east/west coast and northern part of FL as I really don't care just want a decent property in FL.
What are the towns/neighborhood would you recommend where I still might get lucky keep searching? So far I looked into Jax a lot and St Augustine, Daytona, Tallahassee, Panama city, totally ignored the South, some part of west coast (but most of them are sing fam, few duplexes but numbers don't even make around half way close to the asking price!), inland close to Orlando but no luck. I dont have requirement that I have to live by beach unless may be find a greater deal on 2 unit and do STR on the other and try to cover the expense that way even then which area would you recommend? Or should just waiting for market to possibly crash again would be best bet? Main problem I see is rent is quite low compared to the what we get here in North East even on 1800s house on the other hand price is too high. I never lived in FL and still don't have much idea of the pros and cons of different part
As a truck driver, I've been to many parts of the country and what I learned is that almost every place is pretty much the same. There are always going to be good neighborhoods and bad neighborhoods. Hopefully, which ever area you decide to look at, you will at least visit the area before making your purchase. I highly recommend visiting FL before making your choice. When I moved to TX, I went to Dallas for a week before deciding where I wanted to live. There are plenty of cheap hotels, just don't stay in the 'tourist' areas! There are plenty of good cities in Florida, but using Tampa as an example - North and South Tampa are pretty nice, but the closer you get to Ybor or even in some parts around USF and the Stadium, the worse things get. So for me to say, "Tampa is great!" could be true, depending on WHERE in Tampa we're talking about. That's why I say you really should just take a trip down here and see for yourself. Everyone's experience is different. The best thing you can do is take the time to see it yourself, THEN start looking for places to live!
