USDA Mortgage Question

[Colby Wartman]

Hello, I will try to keep this as short as possible but provide all the details needed. Wife and I own 2 properties, we are mid 20's—one investment property STR in the Black Hills. Our second is an owner-occupied home we live with a USDA mortgage that I have converted into a rental. We have lived in the property for over a year. The lender we used was a terrible lender and person, just not a good person at all.

My question is this. My next move is to purchase a duplex or triplex to house hack, giving us 1 STR, 1 rental, 1 house hack. Our previous lender says there is a process that we have to go through to inform the USDA that we do not want to live in our current home and get another property that is a duplex or triplex.

1. What is our best mortgage options for purchasing the next duplex/triplex?

2. Is there a process to go through with the USDA to obtain the ability to get out of the current house and into the Duplex/Triplex?

I am sorry if this question does not make sense, the reason for that is, I believe that our lender is purposely being very vague as he wants us to think that we HAVE to use him as a lender because of the USDA process. Again, I do not know much about the USDA guidelines, but we want to get a conventional owner-occupied mortgage and house hack the other units in the duplex/triplex. It would be greatly appreciated if someone has better information/knowledge about this topic! Thank you!