All Forum Posts by: Doug Fluckiger

A single family refers to a home that has just 1 unit. In other words what you are probably living in now. Technically a single structure with 4 or less units is a single family home from a tax and code perspective. But when I say a single family home I mean the very basic. I building. I house. I family. A residential multifamily is a 2-4 family unit. 

How you use the HELOC and your own money should be part of your business plan and well laid out. But as for me I look at HELOCs as ready short term cash, not for the long haul. If you are looking to finance a property with the equity in something else you may want to consider a cash out refi. In my area if you can't buy for cash, you can't buy. Or at least nothing you are going to make any money on. And the MLS isn't the place to find it. So my approach is to find an off market property to ether buy and hold, usually small multi-family, or a flip, usually a signal family. Then use your HELOC to either buy it in cash or use the HELOC as a down payment with a private money lender. A private money lender's first concern is the property, not your credit score. You will have to show you can pay the note back in 6-9 months and make the somewhat larger monthly payments during that time. But if he is in at 70% of ARV he is usually pretty easy t work with. But you are leveraging your HELOC. Then when you have fixed up the distressed and under-valued property, and yes that is what you ill need to buy, you wither do a cash out refi on the hold and replenish the HELOC or flip it and replenish the HELOC. If you find the right property, which takes a lot of effort, you end up with either real cash flow or a nice chunk of change without risking any of your own money. Now just do it all over again. Oh wait, did I just describe BRRRR?

One last thing. You never said if it was your primary home or an investment property that you were going to pull the equity from. HELOCs on primary are pretty easy to get. Right HELOCs on investments are almost non-existent. I just got one from PenFed but they have stopped taking new applications. TD Bank is still doing them though. 75% LTV and 43% DTI. Matthew Paterno. BP won't let me give you his info so you need to look it up.