BRRR Financing and Refinancing

[David Lauka]

Hello BiggerPockets Community!

I am planning on investing in my first property in the next 4 - 6 months and I had a question regarding HML financing. I am leaning towards a Buy-Rehab-Rent-Refinance approach and was thinking about using a HML for initial purchase and rehab and then refinance. I listened to a BiggerPockets webinar on the topic and it seemed to make a lot of sense. Are there any major concerns/drawbacks to using HML's to purchase and rehab properties? Is this a fairly standard/viable financing option for REI properties? My understanding is that with a large enough spread between the purchase cost and after repair value this can be an effective strategy.

Also, I've noticed that many of these lenders also offer 30 year rental loans or packages to offer both the initial financing as well long term refinancing.  Is there an advantage to refinancing with the same hard money lender or does it make more sense to refinance with a conventional mortgage?  Thanks!