Buying Commercial Property for the first time.

[Austin Glidewell]

Thank you in advance for any advice you can provide me. I have worked for a private equity firm for a few years as an analyst and have  a good understanding of acquisition underwriting for several asset classes. I enjoy retail commercial and multi family apartment buildings. My lack of experience is more related to raising capital, but I am starting to learn more as time goes by.

With that said I am wanting to personally invest in a commercial building and/or an apartment building and need some advice on how to do this as a first time buyer. 

As an analyst for an established company it is easy to underwrite deals knowing that the company I work for has access to capital. However, if I am wanting to buy a commercial/multi-family property for myself how difficult is it to find debt financing, if I don't have enough equity financing to pay for an entire property.

For example if there is a 3 million property that I would like to buy and I raise 1 million from equity investors, how hard is it to find a lender that would provide the additional 2 million in debt, especially coming from a new investor like me?

Also, this might seem like a silly question, but when putting offers on commercial/multi family apartments, do sellers expect that the buyer will have financing in place before even making the offer? Or do buyers raise capital during escrow?

Thank you again,