Looking to purchase our next MF

[Brian Scott]

Hey everyone,

My wife and I purchased our first multi family home in Feb 2022 for 495,000. We currently own 450,000. We purchased the home with FHA loan at 2.75 %

Our rate is excellent but we are looking to purchase our next MF and need some advice on how to get into it.

I know Fannie Mae has a 5% down MF loan program as long as we move into it. I am not really a fan of the program because we have a very nice situation in our current home.

Putting 20% down for a conventional loan is a steep task financially so I do not think that is an option plus I have been told by many of my friends with multiple MF homes to never use your own money to get into one.

Then there is always using the equity we have built up in this current MF home we live in to purchase the next - I am not sure how that works but have done some research on home equity loans and believe that would be another option.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!

[Robert Rixer]

The problem starts to be more about cashflow. 

When you start leveraging 90%+ especially with today's higher rates and the high cost of multifamily's compared to their rents, the numbers turn upside down real quick. Add to that when you put <20% down, you're going to have PMI on top of the regular mortgage payments. The PMI gets higher as you step up from 85-90-95% LTC.

So even if you can get approved for this, you need to ask yourself are you willing take on potentially years of cashflow loss, for the privilege of owning the property?