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Updated almost 4 years ago,

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Rick Kierner
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Where & When to get cash for first investment

Rick Kierner
Posted

Hello all,  I'm super new to the concept of real estate investment.  I just finished Rental Property Investing and am beginning to see things from a completely new perspective.  

My Question:  I don't have enough cash to make my first investment, where / when should I get that cash.  Details below:

Target: $150k SFH with positive cashflow on the deal. I have a bunch of reasons for this target but for the purposes of this question, let's just assume they are valid reasons and the right choice.

Cash on hand available for investment: $10k (I've spent 20 years saving in tax deferred retirement accounts and paying down my mortgage and don't have the liquidity to pull those funds out)

Equity in primary home: $160k

Credit Score: Excellent (>800)

Location: Central Ohio.  Property inventory is very low, investment opportunities are there but not abundant right now.

I have plenty of extra monthly income to get approved for a $150k mortgage on top of my debts

Option 1: Continue saving and use that cash.  So I just took a pivot from throwing my extra cash each month into IRAs and HSAs and extra against my mortgage and started saving for the first time which is why I have the 10k available.  Obviously, I could continue this effort and get to a point that I'll have the $30-35k needed for a property investment by the end of the year.  Maybe the market will have settled down by then.  Or maybe it will be crazier... who knows

Option 2: Go get a heloc.  Plenty of equity in the house but heloc rates seem to be around 6% which seems high.

Option 3: Cash out refinance.  My mortgage is a low rate (3.125) already so I won't improve there much but I would have to pay the closing costs on that refinance which I am estimating to be about $3-4k which is ~10% of the cash that I would need to make the investment

I'm sure there are other options.  That's why I'm asking the question here.  I know that some of these are specifics to me but I hope that the thought process and answers will help others in similar situations.