One of my financial regrets was not buying a multifamily investment property in my late 20s. Instead of taking advantage of multifamily investment opportunities to generate more passive income, I decided to buy a four bedroom, three and a half bathroom single family home and live larger instead.

The house wasn’t huge at ~2,300 sqft. But it was too big for my girlfriend and I at the time. Two bedrooms and two bathrooms were hardly ever used. Not only was there so much wasted space, the house was a suboptimal use of $1.52 million. Taking on a $1,216,000 mortgage that cost $6,200 a month was a lot and sometimes stressful.

In retrospect, a better choice would have been to buy a two-unit building for a similar price. Each unit would consist of two-bedrooms and one and a half bathrooms around 1,350 sqft each. My girlfriend and I would live in one unit and rent out the other unit for at least $4,000 a month.

Not only would our living costs have been so much lower for more than a decade, our passive income today would be at least $2,000 a month higher. Investing in multifamily investment properties is a better bet when you are young and don’t have children.

With increasing anticipation of a strong recovery in 2021 thanks to a bevy of upcoming vaccines, it’s worth getting smart on the best multifamily investment opportunities post-pandemic. The value of cash flow has gone way up because interest rates have come way down.

I’ve invited CrowdStreet, my favorite real estate crowdfunding platform for accredited investors and Financial Samurai sponsor, to educate us on three types of multifamily properties they think are the most promising.

As a whole, American real estate is some of the cheapest developed country real estate in the world. When you add on how much money you can make in America thanks to the proliferation of world-class companies, American real estate becomes an even better bargain.

Below is The Economist’s real house price index. Notice how cheap the United States is versus New Zealand, Australia, Britain, France, Ireland, Canada, and Spain.

The realization of how cheap American real estate is on a global scale should make you want to buy as much real estate as possible if you are an American. After all, before the pandemic began, international investors were gobbling up American real estate for this reason.

The last thing you want is foreigners profiting off your land and pricing you out. Instead, you want to buy property first and then get rich as foreigners bid up property prices. The pandemic has helped keep foreigners at bay, for now.

Despite reported rents going down anywhere from 15% for 2-bedrooms to 30% for studios in San Francisco, San Francisco real estate prices keep going up in 2020. The question is, how come?

As a resident of San Francisco since 2001, a homeowner since 2003, a landlord since 2005, and a personal finance blogger since 2009, I’ll share with you my perspective on why San Francisco real estate prices keep going up during the pandemic.

Big media like Bloomberg, SF Chronicle, and more love to focus on the negatives. Perpetually negative local blogs like SocketSite and Wolf Street, who missed the big run up since 2011-2012 also like to focus on the negatives because they’re hoping they’ll finally be right. However, I’m here to tell you a more balanced point of view.

Yes, I’m long San Francisco real estate. But I also sold a single family home in The Marina district for $2.74 million back in 2017. Therefore, I feel I have a balanced perspective on the market. I’m also a landlord who recently spent a month interviewing a dozen prospective tenants.

San Francisco real estate prices keep going up, as you can see in the chart below. Let’s explore why.

I’m always searching for reasons why things are the way they are. It’s also fun to connect the dots and come up with an investment thesis to make a lot of money. What I’ve recently discovered is that because the minimum qualifying income required to purchase a house is so low, there is still a lot of upside to housing prices.

For years now, I’ve made the case that Americans earn more and are wealthier than we all like to think. And finally, after three years of waiting, the U.S. Census Bureau came out in 2020 with 2019 data saying the real median household income has reached $68,703.

$68,703 is a healthy middle-class income. The question now is: Is $68,703 a high enough household income to afford a median-priced home?

Let’s look at data from the California Association of Realtors (CAR) on the required minimum household income to afford a home.

The housing market is in a tricky situation given massive unemployment, continued shelter-in-place, the coronavirus, and tremendous uncertainty. However, after a massive 44% month-over-month rebound in U.S. pending home sales in May and another strong 9.6% rebound in September, the U.S. housing market is stronger than ever! Here are my housing predictions for 2021.

Overall, I believe the housing market will stay strong in 2020 as demand gets pulled from the first half of the year and into the second half of the year and into 2021. With at least two viable vaccines with a ~95% efficacy rate from Pfizer and Moderna, I think the housing market will continue to reach new highs in 2021.

The demand for housing is strong due to record-low mortgage interest rates, more time spent at home, the desire to invest in a more stable physical asset, and strong demographic trends from the millennial generation, who are in their prime home buying years.

Given my housing market prediction, if you’re looking to buy a home and can afford to do so using my 30/30/3 home buying rule, buying property before a viable vaccine will probably turn out fine. Just make sure you live/own your own for at least 5 years, if not 10+ years. The longer your holding period the better.

For big cities like New York City and San Francisco, I believe there will be a V-shaped recovery in demand in 2021 as hundreds of thousands flock back to big city living again. All of my wealthiest and smartest friends are buying San Francisco property before 2021 to position themselves for such a rebound.

Here are more detailed thoughts about my housing market predictions for 2021.

Owning rental properties only ranks fifth out of my eight best passive income sources. However, as interest rates decline, the value of rental properties and their cash flow has increased.

As a financially savvy individual, your goal should be to accumulate as many underpriced cash flow-generating assets as possible. I believe this permanently low-interest-rate environment is once more favoring owning rental properties.

As a tired father who yearns to earn 100% of his income 100% passively, it’s tough for me to accept that owning physical rental properties is once again the right thing to do. However, building up a rental property empire is one of the most promising ways to get richer today.

In my endeavor to stay on top of the commercial real estate market, I’ve interviewed Marious Sjulsen, EquityMultiple Co-Founder & Head of Real Estate.

EquityMultiple is a real estate investing platform for the self-directed accredited investor. They offer a diverse array of rigorously vetted, professionally managed commercial real estate investments.

Their per-investment minimums are as low as $5k, and they offer debt, preferred equity, equity, and fund offerings, enabling each investor to tailor their real estate portfolio to their investment objectives and risk tolerance.

EquityMultiple also offers robust in-house underwriting and asset management, as well as a dedicated Investor Relations Team. Their goal is to make real estate investing simple, accessible, and transparent for individual investors. EquityMultiple is also a sponsor of Financial Samurai.

As a landlord since 2005, I believe in developing a good relationship with my tenants. I treat my tenants as customers and want to provide the best living experience possible. This article provides tips for prospective tenants in a strong rental market.

If you are a landlord looking to find great tenants, this article should also help you make a better decision. Having great tenants really makes a difference in terms of peace of mind and your quest to build reliable passive income.

This article consists of two parts:

• An interaction I had between one prospective tenant and how it all unraveled. The interaction may help both renters and landlords better negotiate a lease. Since attending business school, I’ve found using real-life case studies to be the best way to teach and learn.

• Tips for getting the rental property you want in a highly competitive market. These tips are based off my experience as a landlord for over 15 years and new things I learned from my latest tenant search.