This 32-year-old grosses $431,000 a year from his real estate investments—while traveling and living in a converted van

I always tell people that real estate has the potential to be a great investment. But getting started can be daunting.

As a real estate investor of eight years, I've found that the key is to take small steps. When I first began investing at age 23, I set a modest goal to make a bit of extra money on top of my engineering salary with one or two rental properties.

Today, I own 61 rental units that last year grossed $431,000 in rental income. I'm also a real estate coach at Roofstock Academy. I mostly work from a converted van that my wife and I live in. When we're not traveling across the U.S. in our van, we stay in our California duplex home.

Thanks to his flexible streams of income, Michael Albaum and his wife spend part of the year living and traveling across the U.S. in their converted van.

After paying my mortgages, property taxes, property management and maintenance fees, I earn about $6,000 per month in passive income from my real estate portfolio.

Since 2019, I've been...