<prompt> Human: Hi All,My wife and I have a large combined income, but also have large student loans that we pay a lot extra to every month. Our combined salaries are about 180kyear and we put about 90kyear to student loans. To paraphrase someone here, we have large cash flow, but are not wealthy.We just got married, we are young, we enjoy the flexibility of an apartment, and we live in a fun area. We do not want to settle down or live in a house yet. In 3 years, yes; right now, no.However, we live in north DFW. This housing market is red-hot, and will likely continue to be so for the next few years as more and more companies move their headquarters here. Home prices increased 11 last year. Locals are saying it will keep growing until something like 2019. The year-over-year home price increases are staggering.I know that, when estimated over the long term, real estate investment approximately tracks or barely matches inflation. I know that we could do a lot better even on just the SP. All those numbers are not lost on me. But, Im looking at the reality of our situation, and not theoretical long-termlarge sample size averages. And the reality is that when we buy a home 3 years from now, the price will be 30 higher than it is now. Any money we lost on the rental investment would more than be made up in the home value.Weve looked around. There are some really nice houses in the 200k range that we could buy and have rented by the end of the month. We have the cash flow to cushion a few months of empty rental property if something happens, and could get the cash for a 5 or so down payment. Weve really been thinking of buying something now just to get our foot in the door while we can, and renting it until we are ready to settle down.Is this a good idea, a bad idea, or a terrible idea? What factors am we not considering?  <response>: Ive rented out two apts and a single family house over 15yrs.Its wonderful when its going well, but disasters in the form of broken heat where you might cover hotel bills while is its being fixed to bad tenants can make the bad times really bad. Honestly, even good tenants are typically really confused about what they can and can not do.What state do you live in? Mine is super tenant friendly and not knowing the law can cost me triple damages.Last, dont assume you know what the market is going to do. I never planned on owning more than one house, but in 2008 my house was unsellable due to three foreclosures on my street. From what I understand from the older landlords in my area, the same thing happened in the early 90s. We now have another political climate like we had before those two crashes. I dunno...the policies sound good on paper, but statistical trends are tough to ignore.Good luck with your decision. 