Should You Become a Landlord in Denver? What I Learned After 6 Years

How I Got Here

My wife and I bought our rental properties without traditional income — we funded everything through side hustles, which felt like a win at the time. The plan was straightforward: build up a portfolio of rental properties, collect monthly income, and eventually step back from the grind. That's the version of landlording that gets talked about online. What doesn't get talked about as much is the version where a single property starts stacking up costs you didn't see coming, and suddenly the math that made sense on a spreadsheet starts looking a lot different in real life.

The Costs Nobody Warns You About

The current four-year stretch we've been in is rough. Not the worst run a landlord could have, but worse than most. And what it's shown me is that even one rental property can generate a serious amount of unexpected expenses. Repairs, vacancies, maintenance cycles, problem tenants — any single one of those can wipe out months of cash flow. String a few together and you're not just breaking even, you're losing money. I made this video specifically because I want people who are seriously thinking about buying a rental property in Denver to see a real example, not a highlight reel.

A lot of the landlord content out there focuses on the upside. The passive income angle. The appreciation angle. And those things are real — I'm not saying real estate is a bad investment across the board. But there's a version of this that doesn't get enough airtime, and that's the version where you're six years in, you've dealt with multiple costly situations, and you're recalculating whether this is actually the life you want to be running.

What the Denver Market Adds to the Picture

Denver has its own dynamics worth factoring in. If you're looking at buying a rental property here, you're entering a market that's seen significant appreciation over the past decade, which means purchase prices are high relative to the rents you can realistically charge. That spread matters. A property that cash flows well in a lower-cost market might barely break even in Denver once you account for your mortgage, insurance, property management if you use it, and the inevitable maintenance that comes with any older home.

The landlord-tenant landscape in Colorado has also shifted. There are more tenant protections in place than there used to be, which isn't inherently bad, but it does mean you need to understand the rules before you're in a situation where you need to know them quickly. I've had to learn some of this the hard way.

My Honest Take After Six Years

I'm not telling you not to become a landlord. I'm still in it. But if your vision of owning rental property is mostly passive income with minimal involvement, I'd push back on that framing pretty hard. It's closer to running a small business than it is to collecting checks. You're responsible for the property, the tenant relationship, the legal compliance, and every repair that comes up — or you're paying someone else to handle those things, which cuts into your return.

If you're in Denver and seriously considering this, do the math on a specific property with realistic vacancy rates, realistic repair budgets, and realistic rent figures for the neighborhood. Then stress test that math with a bad year. If it still works, you might be in good shape. If it only works when everything goes right, that's worth sitting with before you commit. Six years in, that's the clearest thing I can tell you.