Loan in one or two people's names?

[Gwen St. Pierre]

Hi - I'm looking ahead to where my husband and I will have multiple properties. Is it better to try and keep loans in one of our names or in both of our names? I know about DTI and that if in one person's name we'll need to qualify on our own. Is the best strategy to try and qualify with just one of us on each loan if possible? What will give the most flexibility as far as getting the most number of loans?

We started out with loan #1 - a USDA in his name. Got loan #2 - FHA in my name and turned #1 into a rental. Sold loan #2 and got loan #3 - a Conventional in both our names. We moved >50 miles from home for work so were able to put him on the new loan even though he was on the USDA which is otherwise a no-go. I'm thinking we should have kept the current primary loan in my name only (my DTI) was fine) to give us more flexibility. Since the current it is an ARM loan we are going to refinance anyway and wondering if it's better to refi in my name only.

Thoughts?