Student + two jobs = bad idea?

[MikeJ]

That's a great idea, a brilliant one. I agree with you...

[phlemboy]

Another alternative would be to buy a duplex or three plex in an area with extremely high rent vs price ratios.  In many cases these are areas that you may not want to live in, however it doesn't matter.

Take the money that you get from renting out the unit that you would normally want to live in and move to a nicer area and pay rent with that money.

Stealing from one pocket putting it in the other.  I did that when I first got started in rentals.

Instead of buying 1 duplex in a nice area, I bought two in rough areas but rented high.  Then I took the overage from the two and put it towards my house payment in a nicer area.

Always pay attention to your opportunity cost....

Good luck either way!

How can you charge a high rent in an undesirable area? I can see buying at a huge discount in a rough area and possibly renting to Section 8 for market rents. But I don't see people with good paying jobs and credit renting in rough areas. If it works for you that's great. But that wouldn't go over too well in my area. The properties in nicer areas cost too much to cashflow. I have to look for areas that in between the good and the bad.

[penwrite05]

well, as for me, i think that's a brilliant idea. go ahead and get that investment while you can. props up for you. for being young and hardworking!


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Luxury Cars

[phlemboy]

I'll make just one last point here. The idea that if you don't start now you'll somehow miss out on something. That's simply not true. There will always be deals to be made in any economic environment if you're willing to adapt to the conditions. Jumping in without the knowledge, money or credit required is like telling someone who can't swim to jump in the deep end and learn how to swim as they go. I was in your postion about 10 yrs. ago in regard to rental properties. What I didn't know would've buried me within 1 - 2 yrs. You can learn the lessons the major lessons the easy and free way or the hard and expensive way. Good luck.

[trickpaint]

please elaborate more on the free easy way of learning this. i'm new at this also

[justin0419]

Trickpaint,
Start here on this website with the forums that interest you.  Read every post in the forums.  I started from the oldest threads and worked my way up to the newest ones.  You will learn a ton.  I strongly recommend you take notes along the way.  I took notes and put them in a MS Word document I keep in a MISC folder on my computer for reference on different Landlording, financing, and repair issues.  So you can learn from the experiences of others here (others who are actually doing it) - the good experiences and the bad.  Learn from the mistakes of others so you don't do it yourself.
Watching too much late night tv and thinking it's easy to make millions in RE is a fallacy.  Our Realtor told us a couple days ago he had a lady come in saying she wanted to purchase a "luxurious foreclosure" for $30K.  I'm not saying things like this *never* happen, but it's not as easy as the infomercials make it out to be.

There is NO reason to pay someone a bunch of money to "teach" you how to do REI.

[phlemboy]

Perhaps I misspoke when I said "free and easy". While the info on this site is free, the cost of the internet and computer are not. It also takes quite a bit of time and effort to comb through all the info here. There are some good books you can buy for under $25. I've probably spent about $300 on books over the years. Some are better than others, but I've learned a few money saving/making ideas even from the bad ones. These costs are nothing compared to the fleecing people go through going to expensive seminars and/or buying the wrong property at the wrong price. So I'll rephrase my earlier quote and say "cheaper and easier".