Too much money out of pocket after brrrr

[Jesse Clark]

So I'm looking to brrrr my 3rd property. I'm trying to specialize in higher end sfh rentals. Using money from heloc on my primary residence for down payment and remodel costs. I haven't had luck getting my money back from refinancing the houses. Good tenants and decent cash flow, but the current house I'm looking at would leave me in a $40k hole. Is it expected to not be able to pull all your cash back out after refinancing? I like having nice maintenance free houses with good tenants and cash flow, but it's going to make for slow going to build up a good portfolio. I'm pretty new to investing and it is all a learning experience. I really like the brrrr idea, just slow going bc of the money out of pocket.  Thanks 

[Kristi Gray]

We're doing almost the exact same thing, but are getting all our capital back and then some. Example, we paid 55k cash from HELOC for a foreclosure used 40k remodel (cash from HELOC) and did much of the work ourselves- home looks brand new inside & out. The apprasial was for 166,000, and we were able to pull out 75% LTV (124,500) Which made us able to Pay off all the HELOC, and gave us about 24,000$ extra to apply towards capital of the next. I would not buy a deal that left me in the hole, it would take to long to recapture the capital, and apply to the next. Just curious, was this something you analyzed on the deal and expected? Or did unexpected things come up? Are you buying good deals for your area or just average? We are also looking for really good forced appreciations with our fixer uppers with ours to increase the likelihood of higher appraisal at the end.