Where to go from here? The future!

[Kevin Andujar]

Good afternoon everyone. Not sure if this is the correct spot to put this in but I was wondering if I could get some guidance on what I should do going forward. My family and I have 3 properties located in Perth Amboy, NJ. Two of them are multi-family properties and one single family. My mother lives in the single family one and the other two are fully occupied.

House A - multi-family:

Monthly income: $3,450.00

Expenses: $3,000 a month including mortgage, Heat, and water.

Mortgage balance: $160,000.00

We will need to redo two bathroom and two kitchens in the near future and improve the exterior. Not sure how much that would be honestly.

House B - multi-family:

Monthly income: $4,300.00

Expenses: $1,600.00 a month including taxes, insurance,Heat and water.

No mortgage and this houSe is in better condition. Some exterior work will need to be done to freshen up

House C - Single family:

Expenses - $1,600.00 a month including taxes, insurance, and all utilities.

House is in great condition. My mom lives here and I use the money from the rentals to help pay her stuff.

So we played with the idea of selling house a and house c and keeping b. Getting my mother out of that town and finding her a house in another town. Selling both a and c can probably get us around $700k and after paying off house a and taxes we would hope to have around at least $500k. $300k would be used to find my mother a new place and to any work if needed and the remaining $200k would be used to start flipping homes.

So my issue now is worrying about my mother. She doesn’t really earn much and the income we get from the rentals is mainly to help pay her stuff and take care of whatever she needs. Having the rentals is a guaranteed and we never had a vacancy. I am honestly not worried about having a vacancy but the dealing with the tenants has become troublesome. Might be my fault for being a bit too nice. Rental income could increase as well as they are getting harder to come by in town.

So the questions I have in my head are the following:

1. If I sell house a and c and do what we plan will the $200k be enough to start buying and selling in Central, NJ?

2. Would the income from house B be enough to cover expenses there and also a new place for my mom? I would try to keep the expenses about the same as what they are now.

3. I also considered just selling house c, getting my mom into another town and just keeping house and b. It’ll be the similar situation we have now, just having her in a different location.

4. Would taking a out a HELOC on the already paid off houses be crazy? I would like to do this to be able to fund the flipping of homes. Or would that just be a dumb idea?

Not sure exactly what to do and to be honest my mind is all over the place, so I apologize in advance if this doesn’t make much sense. I am willing to answer any questions. Thank you in advance and hope someone can help guide me.