All Forum Posts by: Carlos Valencia

Hello Tanner, 

That's great to hear you are already pre approved. A few things you need to consider is how much can you realistically rent out each unit once you move out. Its important to know what the max rents will be so that you can cover your mortgage payment and hopefully also cash flow every month. Look for duplexes that are going to need some rehab work so you can add some sweat equity and bring the value up as well. Also pay attention to the lot size and see if you can add one more unit and make it a triplex in the future. Also look at the area as well in terms of how attractive it will be for people to rent out your units. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hi Brody, 

I would say yes if you are able to purchase that home under market price. I bought my home distressed but just enough where I can live in it. Been slowly rehabbing my own primary residence and debating if I myself would want to rent it out or continue living in it. In my case I would cashflow If I do rent it out but buying another home or renting will cost me more. That is my dilemma. Still trying to see how to use my equity in terms of reinvesting. That is the benefit of buying primary you can rehab at your own pace as long as you still have enough reserves to rehab your own home while living in it. 

@Albert Bui

Hello Emira, 

Flipping can be very lucrative and good way to invest ad get the most ROI from your investment in a short period of time. As long as you understand how to underwrite a property you get from a wholesaler you will be able to get good results. Not sure what market you are in but I recommend looking for real estate investment group locally so you can network with other flippers and pick their brain. Many flippers are open to sharing their experience. You might be lucky that you might be able to maybe shadow an investor on their flip. You can also try to flip smaller unit like maybe a condo or a mobile home where you also own the land. This way there's low risk in the beginning. It will all depend what you feel comfortable in terms of budgeting and the type of repairs needed. Make sure to have your contractor ready and your cash or hard money loan ready as well to work on your repairs.

@Albert Bui

Hello Anshuman, 

I live in the OC area and we help many investors with financing their projects. There many ways to get started. I highly recommend attending real estate networking events to meet more people is this space and pick their brain and learn more from their projects and see what is working and what is not. If you are looking at 4plex you can enter that project with as little as 5% down if you buy it as a primary meaning you will live in one of the units. You can also just buy it as an investment property with 25% down if you have the capital to put that much down on a 1-1.3 million 4plex depending on the area. If you plan on buying these properties using a mortgage its also best to begin the pre approval process and work with an investor friendly lender to help guide and educate you what the best product might be for your projects to make sure you dont already max out your borrowing power after the first deal. You need to know how to enter the deal and how to exit so you can cover your areas and protect yourself from losing money. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hello Alvin, 

We have helped many of our investor clients with Helocs for their investments and primaries. We are also licensed in FL. Let's connect and learn more about how you want to use the Heloc to make sure we review all of your options to help you complete your next project. Typically you can go up to 75% combined Loan To value. Make sure you have enough equity to move forward and also you have to be below 50% debt to ratio income. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hello Michelle, 

In order to qualify for a Heloc you will need to qualify just like you would when applying for a regular conventional loan. Meaning its a full documentation loan and you will need active income to qualify and only can go up to 50% debt to income ratio. If you meet those criteria then you can try to apply. Typically for investments you can go up to 75% of the homes value. But in order to go up that high you will need to be able to qualify. You did mentioned you do not have active income so the other option would be doing a cash out refinance to get money out using a Debt Service Rental Ratio loan. If you meet the guidelines you can potentially cash out up to 75% of the properties value. The way to qualify is we use the rental leases and divide that by the proposed mortgage payment to calculate the rental ratio. If your ratio is 1:1 or better you most likely will be able to get 75% of the value for the cash out plus better rates. Anything below 1:1 will limit how much you can take out and will have a bit higher rate. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hello Nolan, 

Happy to connect and my team and i can discuss your scenario further. We have helped many investors with this strategy using FHA for house hacking. We just helped someone from bigger pockets that reached out to us to help them buy their next investment using FHA loan to purchase in Texas. Make sure you meet the guidelines to use this loan or you can always use conventional 5% down as well. We can provide you with two scenarios so you can decide for yourself which would be the best option for you. Keep in mind you have to live in the property at least 12 months to proceed.

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hello Sam, 

Hard lenders look at the deal and look at your experience on past deals. If you are a new investor they will still will work with you but due to being new you will pay a higher interest rate and more points than an experienced investor. Therefore many people what they do to get around this is partner up with an experience investor to help them get better terms on the hard money and that also helps you gain experience that you can use for when you go solo. Hard money is mostly for flipping properties or using it as a bridge money for a temporary solution if you need more time depending on what type of trouble you get yourself into. Only use hard money as last resort as its intended to be used for short term investments or band aids to get your through. Hope this helps understand better how hard money works. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hello Scott, 

Welcome to the BP community. What would you consider your next thing to be? The beauty about real estate investing is that theres almost endless possibilities you just have to network with the right people and understand the risk of each deal. I would say this to make sure you are planning your financials ahead of time to keep your options open and help you be more flexible when working on deals. We can be of service when it comes to reviewing your financials and help you explore what the best options would be for you depending on your overall goal. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan

Hello Brody, 

That is not a bad strategy and can be a good way to get started. Just make sure you underwrite accordingly so you can make sure you are coming out on top after your rehab. You have to ask yourself what the end goal and how many of these do you plan on doing to reach that goal. Depending on how you are acquiring these properties you may be able to just do one per year but that only matters if speed is an issues. Otherwise not bad. If you are going to acquire these properties using some type of financing its best to begin mortgage planning ahead of time so you can execute with the best precision. We can help with mortgage planning once you are ready feel free to reach out and connect. 

@Albert Bui @Matthew Kwan