House hacking and finding tenants?

[Tony Marcelle]

If I buy a multi-family property to house hack, how fast do I need to have a tenant in place to start paying their house payments and mine. I am just saying since I would kinda be at the mercy of the tenants paying their rent to cover my mortgage payments. While we're at it, can I add in utility costs for my unit too to be paid by the tenants? Should I or should I not do that? Paying my own utilities would be a problem for me since my biweekly income is unpredictable. I may stretching it a bit too far. Can I use the rental income from all the other units to pay off all of my personal debts too? I thought it was worth a shot. The key for me is finding reliable tenants who will always pay on time. 

[Eddie Cottingham]

For one, if you are depending solely on your tenants to pay the mortgage, you may have an issue. Especially if this is a duplex because you will at some point have vacancy.

Also note that what you charge your tenant for rent is dictated by market rates. They pay you, then you pay whatever you want. If it covers the mortgage and your utilities, great. But you can't base what you charge them on whether or not your utilities are covered.

I will be house hacking very soon and even though my tenant will be paying most or all of the mortgage possibly, I still base the financing on whether or not I can afford the payment out of pocket.