Large down payment - why is this difficult?

[Rachel Stewart]

I have an interesting issue - I hope this is the right place to post. I have access to private funding (parents) but we don't know how to structure it so I'm the only one on the loan/deed. It needs to be an non-owner occupied investment mortgage. I know the easy way is to let the money sit in my account for 2-3 months and then the bank considers it mine. 

One issue is we have a fairly flexible budget. We're looking at 2-4 unit multifamily properties that range from 150k-400k with up to about 200k to invest (high COL). We started seriously looking in January and at that point they gifted me the annual exclusion limit (we had our eye on a much smaller property that fell through at the inspection stage). Now a potentially great property came on the market at 400k and the money that has been sitting in my account is not near the down payment amount. Are we just screwed for this property and back at day 0 for down payment seasoning? It seems crazy that at ~50% down you couldn't find some reasonable way to finance it.

Outside of this particular property- what are some ways we can structure this partnership? I think we want to stay in the 2-4 unit (non-commercial) area for now.