Buying as Corporation, with back to back loan

[Darryl Allen]

Hello,

Long time lurker, first time poster.

Short background on me - I've been buying & renting properties for nearly 12 years. I've brought my wife into the mix, and we now have a total of 9 units across 7 properties. My wife is stay-at-home, and I work a decent job as a self-employed IT contractor. I'm in the Hamilton, Ontario Canada area, with majority of my properties in Niagara Region.

Between a large portfolio & being self employed, I'm at the point where lenders are harder to find.

To continuing growing, I'm turning to partnering with others who have some land lording experience, good income & a drive for success. This will help me get financing with the banks & more competitive rates. We'll be doing up agreements to discuss how to handle all the scenarios we can think of around the property, ranging from putting more money into it, picking tenants, to sale/divorce.

This brings me to 2 questions

1) Is it worth incorporating? We plan on buying multiple properties, and even bringing in more investors.

2) We'll each be putting in 10% of our first property purchase to get the 20% down. In terms of pulling money out of the corporation, is there any benefit in lending the money at a higher rate than I'm borrowing it for & amortizing it over a significantly longer period? What's the best way to get my money back out of the initial investment, or is it even worth it?

Thank you