All Forum Posts by: Cory O'Dell

FHA at 3.5% down you'll pay PMI over the life of the loan. That part sucks. But using FHA for a year then moving, renting it out, and buying with a VA loan after that would be a way to quickly get two loans with basically no money out of pocket.

Just have to make sure the properties would still cash flow with so little money initially toward principle. Ie: make sure it’s a good deal!

Instead of selling you could list it for rent. Or the completely hands-off approach (since you're running out of time to deal with it) is to hire a property manager and let them get it rented.

You can use FHA. Like others said you'll have PMI though. You can also use a second VA loan, but there are dollar amount limits, just talk to your lender. For FHA, here are the stipulations for military out of HUD 4000.1:

"(7) Military Personnel Eligibility

(a) Standard

Borrowers who are military personnel, who cannot physically reside in a Property because they are on Active Duty, are still considered owner occupants and are eligible for maximum financing if a Family Member of the Borrower will occupy the subject Property as their Principal Residence, or the Borrower intends to occupy the subject Property upon discharge from military service.

(b) Required Documentation

The Mortgagee must obtain a copy of the Borrower’s military orders evidencing the Borrower’s Active Duty status and that the duty station is more than 100 miles from the subject Property.

The Mortgagee must obtain the Borrower’s intent to occupy the subject Property upon discharge from military service, if a Family Member will not occupy the subject Property as their Principal Residence."

I'd do another VA loan before using FHA personally. PMI sucks. But the option is available if you want/need it. Like VA, there are stipulations for condition of the house though, working windows, appliances, 2 years left on roof, etc. Talk to your lender!

I mean, anything is possible. But I live in Europe, so mailing out targeted fliers to people would be crazy expensive unless I paid someone to do it for me from there, but that’s another cost as well. Just not very practical. 

Good to know, thanks for the feedback. I imagine we'll be pursuing other options as well to get there quicker. For now just going to focus on what's in front of me and getting the first one under the belt, which has proven more difficult than I originally expected. But we'll keep putting in offers on what makes sense and go from there.

Thanks for your feedback, I feel better about seeing $150 in the cash-flow cell if the more experienced guys are targeting that as well. Though, it would take a lot of capital to turn that into early retirement...roughly $1.5m in leveraged debt for 20 units at $70k to equal $3000 in monthly income, yikes.

 Unfortunate for us newbies trying to get some skin in the game...patience is key I suppose!

@Kyle Neff Small multi-family seems to have a lot of popularity on the site, and @Brandon Turner advocates for them as well. 2-4 units is a good sweet spot for cash flow and will still keep good financing options, as they are still considered residential. The SFRs I've analyzed in Dayton usually have less than $150 cash flow, where the 2-4 unit properties (depending on area/price) you can still meet $100 per door criteria. My experience so far though has been extremely competitive trying to get those properties though, so don't expect to just jump on the MLS and find an easy deal paying way less than market value.

 Fair point.