Best practices for newbies starting from zero in Real Estate?

[Tony Moreno]

Hi guys, thanks in advance for all those that respond!

My name is Tony, I am new to the real estate business and I am amazed about all the information I have been learning from BP in the last 3 weeks. I've been reading books, documents/guides and now I am in the process of creating my short-term and long-term plan with real estate. I currently live in Huntsville, AL. With that being said, part of my plan is to have $10k-20k "on-hand" cash available for a down payment and/or repairs for the BRRRR and rental property strategies.

Cash savings is definitely part of my plan and something ongoing as we speak. I already tried a HELOC on my personal property but I don't have enough equity on it yet to obtain a line of credit (I am at 88% equity right now). Currently looking for more options...

This led me to the forum today. What are the best practices/creative ways to obtain this amount of money in the most efficient way?

Any answer is a good answer thanks guys!

(I currently have a mortgage property already, a single-family residence, almost getting married; so I have house hacking as my last option right now. Personal loan is also an option, but the interests rates range from 7%-20% and this is variable. The option for partnership is also in the table but that sometimes requires money as well which still pushes me to get creative).

[Trent Stone]

I assume you are asking about counting the rents towards your personal income? 

Let's say a lender wants your DTI(debt to income) to be under 50%, and you make $10,000/month. That means ALL your debt payments everywhere should be no higher than $5,000/month. Now let's say you want to buy a rental property that rents for $1,000/mo (not including expenses). For the sake of the lender they will count $700 of the gross rents towards your gross income. Now 50% of your net income for DTI will be factored using $10,700, instead of your original $10,000. Hope that cleared it up for you.