A Millennial Bought Rental Properties, Retired Early, Moved to Japan

As Manny Reyna wrapped up his service in the Army in 2021, he had a lot of question marks about his future.

He’d suffered a major hip injury that would require surgery and didn’t have a clear career path.

“I was super concerned about a lot of things,” the 32-year-old told Business Insider. “I was hurt, I had a one-year-old son, I didn’t really have a job. On top of that, my wife didn’t have a job either at the time.”

What he did have was a decent amount of real estate knowledge that he’d accumulated throughout his time serving.

“I was a medic, so we wouldn’t really have too much to do unless somebody got hurt. With that downtime, I read so many books about business and real estate and finance,” said Reyna. “We didn’t have a way to get internet a lot of the time, so I just read anything I could get my hands on.”

When interest rates started to drop around the time Reyna was leaving the Army, he saw it as the perfect opportunity to buy property and start building equity: “They were between 2 and 3% and I was like, I know they’re going to raise it. I need to go buy a house.”

Draining his savings to buy his first home

Reyna said he had about $12,000 to his name when he started looking for properties, but he qualified for a VA loan, which allows eligible veterans and active-duty service members to purchase a home with no down payment.

There are a few stipulations — you have to buy a property that you intend to live in for a year, for example — and you don’t avoid closing costs. That came as a surprise to Reyna, who spent just about his entire savings to close on a $219,000 three-bed, two-bath single-family home in San Antonio.

He locked in a 3% interest rate and moved in with his family in the spring of 2021.

“It felt like a huge achievement. I had never thought I was going to be able to buy home because I came from nothing,” said Reyna. “I worked really hard for it, and once I was able to get it and get settled, I started to think, ‘Okay, I have this one now. What else can I do?'”

Expanding to four properties: 2 single-families homes and 2 tiny homes

The home purchase marked a shift in momentum for the Army vet. “I started to get back on my feet. I got my MBA, found a job, and my wife found one, too,” said Reyna, who started working for a project management consulting firm.

When a family friend called to let him know about an off-market deal, which would be an upgrade from his starter home, Reyna felt like he was in a stable enough position to jump on it.

In August 2022, a little over a year after purchasing his first single-family home, he bought another. Again, he financed the property with a 0% down VA loan and was able to secure an interest rate right under 5%.

He and his family moved into the bigger space, allowing Reyna to rent the first property to a long-term tenant and start generating relatively passive rental income.

“The mortgage on the first home was $1,000 — it was super cheap — and I was able to rent it out for $1,695,” he said, noting that he profited about $600 per month after accounting for other monthly expenses.

Shortly after buying the second single-family, Reyna’s real-estate mentor reached out about an opportunity to buy a tiny home.

Reyna loved the concept and the property — a fully furnished, 384-square-foot one-bed, one-bath home that a local plumber had built on his plot of land — but he didn’t have the cash to buy it outright, or anywhere to put the tiny home. He and the seller agreed on seller financing terms and Reyna leased the land from the seller before eventually buying his own 1.6-acre lot, where he would add a second tiny home.

Preparing the land to support tiny homes was a time-consuming and expensive process. The land came with a water meter and nothing else, meaning Reyna was responsible for installing a septic system, which cost about $18,000, and electricity, which ran him another $3,500. He also spent time and money building out a deck for the home, a privacy fence, and a stock tank pool. He used a credit card with a 0% interest rate for 21 months to fund most of the project.

As he racked up a balance, “I questioned my life choices a lot of the time and wondered, What am I doing? Is this going to be completely botched?” he admitted. “But I think that’s part of it, right? Maybe if you don’t question yourself or if you don’t feel that way, maybe you’re not doing things the right way or pushing the envelope enough.”

After three long months of development, he reopened his first tiny home for business. It took off on Airbnb immediately. The short-term rental income paid off the credit card he charged the major expenses to within a year, giving him the confidence to buy and add a second tiny home to the lot.

“I keep hearing a lot of people saying that tiny homes are just a trend,” said Reyna. In his opinion, “I think they’re probably here to stay. When people book, it’s not so much that they’re looking for a place to stay; they’re looking more so for an experience.”

He now lists his tiny homes on a variety of short- and mid-term platforms: “I put them out on everything, from Facebook Marketplace to Facebook groups to all these different OTAs, like Airbnb and VRBO, and Furnished Finder, as well. I try to do a shotgun approach to see who’s going to bite first, rather than just solely relying on Airbnb.”

Reyna plans to eventually add more properties to his lot.

“The cool thing with the tiny homes is that they’re so cheap to set up that the cash-on-cash return is pretty good once you can establish them at scale,” he said. “If you can get more than one going, it’s just pure profit, and it’s not too much maintenance, either.”

Quitting his job, moving to Tokyo, and managing his rentals from abroad

Between his project management career and real estate portfolio, Reyna regularly logged 80-hour weeks between 2021 and 2024.

“I was getting so burned out,” he said. “My wife and I were always working. We only saw our son like one hour a day. It was terrible. And I felt so bad and so guilty, and I told myself, I don’t want this kind of life.”

When a friend from the Army living in Japan suggested Reyna join him, he didn’t have a good reason to turn the idea down. The rental income from his properties wouldn’t fully replace his salary, but he calculated that it would be enough to sustain his family’s lifestyle abroad. He said that the four homes, which BI verified Reyna owns, are on track to bring in about $84,000 this year. Plus, his wife, who is a certified behavior analyst and works specifically with autistic children, would be able to work part-time to supplement the rental income.

“I don’t need to live a super luxurious lifestyle, having the nicest car, the nicest things,” said Reyna, who’s content earning less money for now if it means gaining back time with his family.

They moved into a fully furnished, two-bedroom apartment in Tokyo in January 2025. The rent is about $1,700, and he says the cost of living is incredibly affordable: “Everything is essentially 30% off, if you will, with the conversion rate.”

The quality of life feels different, too.

“It’s been really safe here. My son can pretty much walk the street by himself. He’s only five. He can take the train by himself. He knows all the train lines,” said Reyna, who drops his son off at school every morning, picks him up in the afternoons, and coaches his jiu-jitsu classes after school. “We never lived outside the US before, but it’s been really nice. I don’t know, to be honest, if we’re going to go back because of how much we like it here.”