Why I love real estate investing

I got lucky and fell into real estate. Whether you have luck on your side or not, I want to help you do the same.

It took a perfect storm to allow me to buy my first home: A global recession in 2009 + just enough savings for a down payment + learning to negotiate on the fly + a government incentive of cash. 

Buying in a great area, Berkley, Michigan was half strategy (good schools) and half luck (Royal Oak & Ferndale didn’t work out for me). My home more than doubled in 10 years of owning it. After renting it my last couple years, I sold it in May of 2021, at the height of the housing market. This is the magic of real estate, and why I fell in love with it. It’s not always this easy, in fact, it rarely is. BUT, if you apply these basic principals:

“Buy lowish, hold, sell highish: the real estate model can work for you too!”

I moved to Ann Arbor in 2018 to work for a tech company called Jottful . I quickly discovered what many people already knew: it is hard to find any kind of good, affordable housing in Ann Arbor. I also ran into many landlords who didn’t seem to want to be landlords. I had to find creative ways to keep things affordable (I moved 7 times in 3 years to do this)! I saw an incredible need for great landlords + affordable, quality housing options in this area.

Fast forward to 2021. My tenants were moving out of my Berkley home and I needed to make a decision about moving back, selling, or renting. I decided to sell.

It is a major undertaking to sell. My house was nearly 100 years old. I had to solve the water problem in the basement:

I had to finish that basement after years of water damage (see below). I updated windows and paint, put in central air, tended to the garden and let’s just say I kept my handyman busy.

Preparing my house for sale was a MAJOR investment of time and money. 

I know not everyone is in the position to prepare a house for sale.

Whether it’s due to financial challenges, or to an issue of too little time or energy, there are countless reasons that keep everyday people from selling.

So, how do we work together?