Primary VA and Househacking Second Home

[Rebecca Miller]

I'm a teacher and new to this so I'll try to make this short. We own 1 house. It's in California and it's financed with a VA loan. We have equity (prefer not to tap into this yet) and the 20% down needed for up to a $80k second purchase. I've been looking into out of state turnkey SF for long term cash flow (through Roofstock), but now I'm wondering if house hacking on a second home is a good option in order to retain our cash to put towards another (3rd purchase) after the second.

My question is can we househack and get an FHA loan on a duplex or triplex if we save one of the units as our second primary residence? Since we have a VA loan currently would this make it possible so we can get lower interest and 3.5% down? To justify it as a second home instead of an investment we'd be looking at either Washington State near Olympia or Central to Northern Florida. We have family in both places and could spend extended periods of time there.

Thank you in advance!