Say what you will about manifesting, but we started talking about our next house about two weeks ago, and we are already under contract. In this post, I will talk about how we got from point A to point B. My mind is still spinning about how quickly we got here but I do feel like we are reaching the goals we set for ourselves when we started our REI journey.

We closed on our first investment property in March 2024. At that time, I thought September was a realistic time for us to buy our second. A few things made September seem like a good time to buy. The biggest reason was that my student loans would have officially been forgiven through PSLF (and they have been). While ideally this would have happened before now, they did not go away until early August, putting us right on track to buy in September. 

Ken did raise a concern about buying a house and trying to get a tenant in the middle of winter. I agreed that we want to get a tenant in there as soon as possible which is why we have entered into a contract before the house is even fully ready (more on this shortly).

Two financial considerations worth noting. First, once we started discussing the possibility of buying another house this year, we asked our tax strategist if that was a good idea. He emphatically stated that we should buy a house this year, with no hesitation. I suspect that he wants us to buy as many houses as possible each year, I will have to get back to you on that later though. 

Second, Ken and I decided that, for this house, I would buy it in my name alone. Each person is limited to 10 conventional loans, which includes your loan for your primary home, if you have one. Ken and I already own two homes (our primary and one investment) together meaning we can only buy eight more. Our goal is ten investment properties, meaning we need a total of 11 loans. If we each qualify for one house on our own, we will be able to reach our goal using conventional financing for all the houses. 

When I went to Ohio in February, I really liked the area of Massillon. I noticed that a lot of chain restaurants had recently opened which suggested to me that big companies were putting money into that area. I knew that when we tried to buy another house, I wanted it to be in Massillon. Once we decided we were interested in another house, we reached out to Adam at Rent to Retirement and asked if they had anything available in Massillon. Apparently, the company has not been having as many properties there but he checked, and there was one in the pipeline. They worked up some numbers for us and we said we wanted to buy it.

And just like that, we’re under contract for our next property. I signed the purchase agreement and sent over the earnest money deposit on Friday. I have been pre-approved to buy the house on my own. The house is not quite done yet, it is still waiting for a roof and new floors. I expect it to be finished next week, and then I will start working on the inspection and appraisal. If all goes well, we should close by the middle of September. I have already signed another contract with the property management company, so one of my next steps will be to have them start trying to find tenants before the weather turns. I am sure there will be a lot to talk about with this purchase, but for now, I am just trying to wrap my head around the fact that we will own three houses.