First Rental Property | RHODE ISLAND

[Halbin Minaya]

Hello everyone,

Right now I'm going through my first possible deal. I say possible because It is not done yet and I am hesitating for the following reasons. The deal is off-market and it's a one family that has an attic, halfway done, with its own entrance, 3 bedrooms, one bath, and downstairs it has the same but alot bigger. The home is about 1600 sqft, sitting on a 0.25-acre lot. It will cost me about 70k to remodel, including the basement with possible income of about $4,400 when done. As you can guess, i don't want to flip it. I want to keep it. I was told by a few realtors that if I can get the house to be a two-family home by the city, it would likely appraise for about 330-340k. And already have about 80-90k of equity on the backlot where I can build if I wanted to and if I were allowed by the city. The problem is, that If the city doesn't accept it as a two family, the property will only appraise for about 285k. I already have a hard money lender waiting for me to make a decision. But since it's my first deal, I don't know how easy or hard would it be to be able to turn it into a two-family "legally". Has anyone here been able to do so?

If I can get it to be turned to a two family, Should I invest more money into the property so each tenant pays their own electric and gas bill? how can i go about this?

I would appreciate any guidance.

Best Regards,

Halbin Minaya.