New to bigger pockets from Baltimore

[Evan Mason]

Hello Everyone,

My name is Evan. I'm a  33 year old real estate investor located in Baltimore, Maryland. Over the last few years I finally got over my fear of investing in real estate. I currently have 8 residential properties with 7 of them paid in full. I'm on a course to expand to 20 by the beginning of 2020 and would like to some day venture into commercial real estate . I signed up intending to seek guidance and wisdom from the successful and not so successful. I have a decent understanding of credit, business and micro-economics but am here specifically for the purposes of learning and networking . Full time,  I work as a Captain of a fire station just outside of Baltimore. Please feel free to drop me a line with any guidance.

Good day

[Ned Carey]

Welcome @Evan Mason to BP.  You certainly have done a great job of getting over your fear. 

This is not necessarily true. Another option is one credit lien or loan on multiple properties.  I wouldn't take your friends advice about the S corp. without some serious research.  First whether a bank will loan depends on the collateral and the borrower not the entity. Next with the new tax laws the advantages of various entities have changed and an S corp may not be the based compared to older tax law, 

Your best approach is to talk to multiple smaller banks, Howard bank, Eastern Savings bank, Columbo etc. They will be more flexible with the alternatives they can give you. And don't believe what one bank tells you applies to others.  We had a branch manager and commercial lender tell us the you couldn't put multiple properties under one loan - a Dodd Frank requirement. The next bank we went to offered us exactly that.