Multi Family Vs Single F Vs Town Home for a given budget.

[Nilesh Vijaywargi]

Team, I've got 3 options for you. I will try and provide enough information for each and interested in listing to your perspective about what would you do. 

Budget: 1.5M

Option A: Buy a townhome in a decent school district. 3b3b cost around 1.3M. The same townhome in an excellent school district would cost 1.5M. Enjoy the benefits of living in a community and pay HOA for maintaining the surrounding. Probably get some passive income through Airbnb and stuff.

Option B: Buy a multi-family(duplex) home in a decent school district as above for 1.7M. Live in one and rent the other. Expenses to renovate the unit you live in would be around 60K.  'Other' unit gets 4K rent. End of the day mortgage is equal to option A(since you have income from another unit). The advantage of this is the passive income, experience as a landlord and buying land. Disadvantage being that appreciation for multi-family is based on the income it generates and the buyer pool is generally investors(I'm not one) and it's a bit risky to bank on rents to go higher than what they are hence affecting the appreciation. 

Option C: Buy a single family in the same decent neighborhood. Don't have to worry about appreciation as long as you can withstand a downturn in the market. Passive income option includes Airbnb'ing a room as option A. This would require a good amount of money ~ 1.5M.

I'm looking at bayarea, Sunnyvale to be specific.