FHA Loans refinance

[Nathan Buss]

Ok say you bought a property using and FHA loan with 3.5% down. You must owner occupy for a year and after that year you plan on refinancing the loan into a conventional mortgage in order to free up the opportunity to purchase another property using a FHA loan(only allowed one FHA loan at a time). During the year that you live there from mortgage payments made and appreciation via rehab, inflation, and demand you have built up to a 20% equity status in the property(after doing some research I have found that generally a lender will not refinance an FHA loan into a conventional loan until you have 20% equity). The question is does the fact that the property has increased 20% in equity from other means besides mortgage payments would this still qualify as the 20%? This may be so obvious that I am over thinking it but who knows this might be something that would be beneficial to know as you pyramid up using a combination of FHA and conventional loans.