Duplex used as a house hack

[Seth Ciminillo]

Investment Info:

Small multi-family (2-4 units) buy & hold investment.

Purchase price: $116,500
Cash invested: $15,000

This is a house-hack deal. Bought a duplex and renovated both sides. I live in one side with my family and rent out the other. The rental income from the other side pays for my mortgage and my utilities. I bought this property with an FHA loan.

What made you interested in investing in this type of deal?

Bigger pockets got me interested in real estate investing. A house hack was the perfect opportunity for me to get my feet wet in the investment realm.

How did you find this deal and how did you negotiate it?

Found the deal using a local real estate agent. The property was in rough condition, and needed a decent amount of work and the sellers basically took the first offer I through their way.

How did you finance this deal?

Financed the deal with an FHA loan and only put down 3.5%. The rest of the money I put into the deal was for renovation costs on both sides of the duplex.

How did you add value to the deal?

I added value by renovating the duplex and raising the rents.

What was the outcome?

Now I have a successful house hack. The one unit is rented out and it covers my mortgage and utilities. By my own estimations I have added 30-40k of equity to the property (and some of that was naturally occurring with our current real estate market being inflated). The plan in the near future is to do a cash out refi, and attempt to pull out my money used in the renovation.

Lessons learned? Challenges?

I did all the work myself, which was very time consuming. I learned that the project is usually going to cost more money and take longer than you initially estimate. My next projects moving forward I am going to budget outsourcing some of the rehab in order to save my time.

Did you work with any real estate professionals (agents, lenders, etc.) that you'd recommend to others?

Garrett Gatton and Jeff Dulmage from Hartsock Realty in Lima, OH.