All Forum Posts by: Collin Smith

I am closing on a HELOC next week on my primary home with the purpose of using to buy another property. I am looking at a bank owned house for $70000, but i don't want to pay that much. It needs about 20000 of work to make it great for the area. I am up in the air on if I want to flip or buy and hold. I am wanting to offer 40000 to start, just to see. Is this tip if it is it worth it to find a starting point. I am trying to figure out how much was still owed on it, but I am struggling to find the info. My uncle told me that his business partner for a flip said that banks look to get 70% of what is owed, is that true?

Thank you

Welcome! I am in Florence sc. there is so much to learn here!

I am hoping to boost this question to see what others think. Is it good to buy and rehab with a HELOC and just use that as the loan or should I plan to refinance a purchase with the HELOC once it is fixed and rented?

Sorry for the delay in responding. There is one breaker box for the two units so it would require a complete rewrite of one of the units. Water is done the same way. It is working OK now, so I may just wait it out to see if it is worth it. The annual average for water is $40/month and power $160/month. From estimates I have read about, I could be looking at a solid $10,000+ re-wire/re-plum cost and that doesn't even touch what wall/floor repairs would be needed. I am getting about $150 more a month more per door than a triplex across the street so overall I think it is cancelling out.

I have been wondering about this as well. I have duplex that shares a water meter. Oddly enough,they also share a water heater. So far that has not been an issue. I inherited these tenants and whenever they/one moves out I plan to see how the lines run and see if I can at least get them their own water heaters. I had wondered if there was some inline option to meter after the main line to see use at each unit. The water usage is about $40 a month, though, and I am getting plenty on rent to cover this. I have honestly found that having utilities included allows for much higher rent to compensate and is much more convenient for the tenant (so they are willing to pay) as long as they don't get crazy with usage.

Welcome. I am in Florence, also. North of Evans and East of Irby are rougher places, but there can be some pretty good cash returns on some of them. The two I have in that area are fully paid for (within 2 years) and bring in about 1200 a month. We have been blessed to not have too many issues with them, even though they are not new and up to date.

I am glad this thread got a bump today. I am in Florence, SC and invest in this area right now. I have 3 SFH with a business partner and my wife and I own a property with a duplex and SFH on it. Our goals are investing now to create cash flow in the future (we are not pulling $ from our properties now but building up reserves for purchasing more in the future and paying down mortgages).

As of tomorrow, my personal home will be paid off!! We have worked tirelessly over the last few years to get this done, so we have been paying a lot into it each month. This is going to free up a couple thousand dollars each month, that will make it more comfortable to further our investment purchases. Our goals for our investment properties (buy and hold) is to provide enough income to not need to work as much, but we still want to work because we love what we do. Currently our personal investment portfolio is a single property with a SFH and a duplex on it. There is a mortgage on it, which we just bought back in September. After the mortgage payment on it we are left with $1000 a month to cover our Capex, insurance, taxes,... For funding our next property, there are a couple options that I would like opinions on. One would be to use a HELOC on my primary residence (roughly a $220,000 home value) to be able to buy "cash" and have the rent pay me back until I can use the HELOC again. The second option would be to go the route of a traditional mortgage for our next investment property. What would the benefit of each be? Or do you buy quickly with the HELOC to get it and the refi into a traditional? This seems like it would be a lot of closing expenses, though. I am also tempted to use the HELOC to fund a flip, but I am not sure I am there yet.

I have a duplex that has a single power meter for the two units. As it is now, I pay for power. One tenant apparently likes to keep it near 90 degrees in the winter (thankfully today it was 80 outside so her heater didn't have to work too hard) and I want to know how I can see how much power is going to each unit. This is an upstairs/downstairs duplex. I have been told to split the power lines between the two units so they are each metered separately would be cost prohibitive, is there an inline option that can show me the consumption? I would like to see if I can go to an option where I pay up $xx and anything over is their responsibility. The way I see it, they will certainly care more about their usage if they have to pay some. Thanks.