Transferring deed AND mortgage balance?

[Emily Phipps]

I posted this on the RE Rookie fB page, as well as the BP FB page, but figured I might as well as here too 😬....We would be grateful for some advice on the following scenario 😊:

My husband and I have lived in a house 🏡 in Memphis, TN that my parents bought for us in 2012. We essentially pay them rent 💰each month. The house was bought for $117,000 with a 50k down payment. The house is now worth approximately 160k-170k. We are in the 8th year of the 15 year mortgage and owe roughly 37k. Once the house is paid off in full, my parents plan to gift it and transfer the deed to us.

We are new to the real estate investing world but for the last 4 months have been binge listening to Real Estate Rookie and Bigger Pockets podcasts, as well as reading the BRRRR book and following the FB forums. My mom has even started educating herself on the basics of REI and she is on board with our plan which is to get the house in my name, refinance, and use that cash to begin our real estate journey. My questions are :

***Is there a way for my parents to transfer the deed and the remaining 37k on the mortgage loan to me without having to go through the formal process of selling it to me and having to pay closing costs and getting a new loan for 37k in my name (additionally, I hear it is difficult to get a mortgage loan under 100k, at least going the traditional route)

***Or would it make more sense for me to get a new loan for market value of around $150k and have my parents give us the cash from the sale minus the 37k owed and then use that cash to either turn right back around to pay down the mortgage and THEN refinance? Or take the cash they give us from the sale and use that to start investing?

As I said, all of this is new to us… I am a nurse practitioner by trade and my husband is a paramedic. It is highly likely that I’m missing something obvious or confusing the way things work… Any and all advice is welcomed and appreciated!

Edited to add: what does everyone think about us using a hard money lender to pay off the 37k mortgage, then have the deed transferred into my name, get it refinanced and use that money to immediately pay back the HML and use the rest of the refi cash to start investing... Good idea? Or not so much?