All Forum Posts by: David Eiges

I think a great option in your situation would be to rent it out and either refinance or get a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC) against your home. The latter would set up a revolving credit line that would allow you to quickly access money to purchase other properties. It would not require you to sell the property or make any additional tax payments. If it were me, I would use it to make cash offers on properties to purchase, get conventional mortgages after closing, and re-deposit the money back towards your after the conventional financing is complete. BTW, I'm also an engineer living in Pasadena :)

@Mario F. The ballpark for new construction is $200/sq ft I think.  If you're looking at big additions, you might find yourself needing more funds (as I feel right now).  Case-by-case, but there is also opportunity in taking the existing structure and re-configuring to turn duplex units into smaller triplex units.  Sent you a PM yesterday

Again, I happened to be literally looking into this today. Contacted a mortgage broker and she worked with a program called a Homestyle Renovation mortgage. For her company, they would fund a primary residence duplex, and would require 15% down relative to the ARV. The program would allow the construction funds to be accessed for 6 months following purchase. I believe different lenders may have different programs available that may allow construction loans on 4-plex or conversions. Check out FHA 203k loan

You would need to get it changed to R3 which allows one unit per 800 sq ft.  Your best bet is probably to reach out to the city that the property is in as this is probably a case-by-case situation.  If you do, I'm curious to hear what you find out.  Also, if the property has tenants under rent control, make sure you consider that you'll have to have a plan to move them out.

If it is in fact R2, you would have to get the zone changed, which based on my limited understanding is not a process that's very doable.  On the other hand, if it's RD2, you can have 1 unit for every 2,000 sq ft of lot space.  I'm not an expert, so hopefully someone else can chime in to confirm.  

I've been trying to learn a bit about this myself in the same area as you.  Are you sure he was talking about changing the zoning code?  Or was it just that the the property wasn't maxed out for the zone that it is already designated for?  What zone is the property?  LAR3?

Also, you can find summaries here: https://planning.lacity.org/zone_code/Appendices/s...

@Susan O. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that laweekly article talks about adding in additional oversight to the "cash for keys" arrangements in Los Angeles.  Landlords must inform their tenants of their rights in an RSO unit, provide a specified minimum relocation amount ($7.9k-19.7k), provide copies of the buyout agreement to the city, and allow tenants 30 days to back out of any buyout agreement.  Still allowed, just a little more process needed now.

@Sue Reynolds I've been looking through the Tucson mls and haven't seen a single multi-family north of River Road. It looks like all SFR or condos up there. I figured this was due to zoning. Am I missing something?

Thanks @Chris Mason that makes a lot of sense.  Do you know the logistics of how that would go as far as getting Bill on title?

I'm looking to purchase small multi-families with a partner and we will be 50/50 on the deal.  How can we structure this so that we both get the benefits of tax deductions while still leaving open the possibility of getting 4 Fannie Mae loans each (for a total of 8)?  Is there a way that only one of us will be on each note, but both of us will be on each title and still get up to 8 properties through FM loans?