Real estate investing comes in many different flavors, including:
I’m even experimenting with Fundrise (affiliate link), a crowdsourced commercial real estate investing platform.
Which one is best depends on your goals, available time and money to invest, and risk tolerance.
For example, while I LOVE the idea of building a mini real estate empire and having tenants pay off my mortgages, the direct cash returns and the risks involved don’t get me that excited.
Check out these real estate-themed posts and podcast episodes and choose which strategy makes the most sense for you.
Buy a house.
Rent it out.
Tenants pay it off for you.
It’s possibly one of the oldest side hustles in the books, right?
Done right, owning rental properties can be an attractive long-term income and wealth-building strategy. But done wrong, it can be a recipe for headaches and a mountain of debt.
Roberto Chavez started his raw land flipping side hustle a little over a year ago, and with persistence, has already built it into 5-figures of monthly revenue.
This is a business model that was first introduced to me by Mark Podolsky, from TheLandGeek.com, in episode 108 of The Side Hustle Show.
He called it “the best passive income model” because it avoids “the 3 T’s” of traditional real estate investing: tenants, toilets, and termites.
Austin Miller built a $1.2 million real estate portfolio at 31 years old — for free.
He’s a side hustling real estate investor specializing in “creative” financing deals — houses he can buy without using his own money.
Corey Jeffreys turned an $800 investment into $3k in the first year and has been growing his business and adding more automated processes each year.
His entrepreneurial adventure began by exploring the world of real estate investing, when he happened upon a slightly different rental business model: inflatable bounce houses.
It’s like owning a parking lot, Jefferson Lilly explained. And you can earn 20% cash on cash returns too.
That got my attention, though those returns are coming from a surprising real estate niche: mobile home parks.
Zeona McIntyre is earning $12-18k a month through her portfolio of vacation rental properties and her “co-hosting” service for other property owners.
All this has afforded Zeona financial independence at a very young age, as she built her operation largely by piggybacking on the growing popularity of Airbnb.
Chad Carson is a 30-something semi-retired real estate mogul, who together with his business partner, oversees a portfolio of 90+ rental units.
In fact, he and his wife are in the middle of an exciting adventure — a year abroad in Ecuador with their two daughters.
But of course he didn’t start there. Fresh off the football field at Clemson, Chad’s real estate career started more modestly by “bird dogging” and house hacking — two of the tactics he shares in this week’s show.
This is the second in what will (at least) be a 2-part series on side hustlers earning income from their land investment endeavors.
In this special Friday edition of the show, I’m joined by Chris Pritchard. Chris is a software developer by day, but has built his land investing business up to $1500/mo in recurring revenue.
In addition, Chris does the occasional cash flip and also has more than $70,000 worth of land payments under contract. Not bad for a year of dedicated focus and effort!
In episode 108 of The Side Hustle Show last year, we met Mark Podolsky, a real estate investor specializing in raw land. He called it “The Best Passive Income Model,” because there are no products to build, no tenants or toilets, and you can start without a huge upfront investment.
This year, I wanted to feature a couple listeners who took action based on that episode. The first is my friend Josh Brooks, an Army Battalion Commander and founder of The Enduring Charity Foundation.
Elizabeth Colegrove and her husband are budding real estate moguls. So far they’ve acquired 7 houses, and neither of them are 30 years old yet.
Between their 7 properties, they’re earning around $1800 in cash flow every month, and their tenants are paying off $1650 in loan principal.
But real estate investment is not without risks and Elizabeth joked that I just have easily could have called the episode 27 and $1.1 million in debt.