The Brave Group Blog

Still on the fence about investing or buying your first home? We want to share the story of our first home/investment to help you understand why we believe real estate is the best way to build wealth. 

In 2010 just before we got married we bought our first home. It was where we lived for the first 3 years of our marriage, but it was so much more than our home. It was a duplex. At first we lived in one side and rented out the other side. At 22 and 24 years old we were landlords. Honestly, it’s how we could afford to buy a home making under $40,000/year. We had no idea what we were doing at the time, but we learned as we went.

Our tenant was paying a good portion of our mortgage. This allowed us to pay off debt and save to buy our next home. When we moved out 3 years later we kept the property and begun renting out both sides. That’s when we started to see a significant cash flow.

Our duplex ignited our passion for investing in real estate and helping others do the same. Our duplex gave us financial freedom. Our duplex showed us how real estate truly can build wealth.

The Numbers:

We purchased our duplex for $255,000 in 2010. We were able to purchase the property with a 3.5% down owner occupied loan, because we moved into one side. Our cash investment to get into the property was just under $9,000. 

To keep this as simple as possible I am going to round and share our averages. Over the almost 12 years we owned the property we cash flowed an average of $1000/month. That’s $144,000 over 12 years. Cash flow is the difference between your costs(monthly mortgage, repairs, maintenance, etc.) and monthly rental income. 

Now we didn’t make $1000 a month at first. Remember we lived in one side for 3 years, so the tenants on the other side were basically paying part of our mortgage and we made up the difference. During that time we technically negatively cash flowed, but the portion we contributed to our mortgage was low(much less than we would have paid to rent something) and gave us a great opportunity to pay off debt and save money. As the rental market increased and we could afford to move out of the property, our cash flow increased and we were flowing well over $1000/month for many years. 

Fast forward and we sold the property in 2022 for $650,000. That’s $395,000 in equity plus the amount we had paid down on our mortgage over the 12 years.

That’s total profits of roughly $550,000 over 12 years from a $9000 investment. Yep, that’s a 6,100% return! What else can you invest in and see that kind of return?

We understand we are in a different market than we were in back in 2010. Yes, it will more than likely take more than $9,000 to get into the market but there are options. Multi-family may be just the strategy to get you into the market.

We’d love to chat and help you strategize a plan to invest in real estate. Reach out anytime!