Is it time to get HELOCs on everything?

[Michael A.]

Hello,

Here is a bit about my situation: 

In Los Angeles, California, here. Family owns 3 income properties in LA, all free of debt:

• 19-unit Multifamily ~ 3.8M
• Single family Home ~ $1.6M
• Single Tenant Commercial ~ $1.1M

They also own their own home which is $1.7M and has $430,000 of debt (fixed 30 year mortgage, payments are $3K a month). 

All the income properties cash flow.

My goal is to have money set aside for real estate investment properties. As far as what or how much, it would depend where the market goes in the coming year. Also, we don't have a huge amount of savings. At least not enough where I'm comfortable taking a chunk to buy real estate with. 

So here is my question:

Would you guys recommend taking out variable rate HELOCs on everything to have money set aside so if opportunities do come up, I can act quickly?

I would prefer HELOCs over just taking money out because I really don't know when a good real estate opportunity will arise, maybe a month from now, maybe 2 years. And I don't want to be making monthly payments, especially during a pandemic that could effect cash flow. 

At this point only spoken to one bank but the reason I'm leaning toward variable rates is because the locked in rate nearly doubles the interest rate to 6.5%. I know banks are already tightening things up and they are currently overwhelmed but still figure I should try.

Thoughts?

Thanks