All Forum Posts by: David A.

Hey all! I'm hopefully gearing up to buy this really cute 1bedroom cabin in the woods in Connecticut, and am excited to start demo-ing. The roof line looks like this: _/\_, and the building is 20x30 (10x20 on the flat roof line to one side being bedroom/bathroom, and then 20x20 for the /\_ roofline being the living area with the kitchen and dining area under the flat part of it. The entire ceiling inside is just one flat ceiling. 

The ceiling is super wonky and will need to be taken down to studs to make sure it's structurally sound (plus the roof needs to be replaced), so I'm wondering what the process (and cost) of turning the entire thing into a vaulted ceiling would look like. There will need to be structural beams 10 feet in from either side where the flat part of the roof meets the ends of the gabled part, but I would love to do like a shiplap vaulted ceiling - I think it would really add to the 'cabin in the woods' charm. 

I've been trying to learn what the process looks like for this and not seeing a ton of great videos/articles, so as always, I turn to BP :) Would love to hear thoughts, considerations, etc. - I'm pretty confident that the aesthetic change would significantly heighten the appeal and consequent value in the home, but I'm not too confident that this is something I can realistically do myself, so curious to also learn about pricing.

Good tip, trying to get added into some as we speak! 

Does anyone know of a HML who will lend for a "rural" fix & flip? I'm looking at a property that's in upstate NY at Lake Champlain, but there aren't any large cities within a close enough range apparently - checked in with two HMLs and they both said it's a little too rural for them.

Hey all! I'm coming at you with a dilemma I'm experiencing right now about whether I should purchase a vacation property or not. 

Context: I live in CT, and the market is ROUGH for buyers right now - I'm not seeing anything worth throwing my money into, or if something does come on the market at a good deal, it gets snatched up over asking price in cash within a couple days. I'm not too optimistic that this will change in the next six months or so. I'm selling a flip (closing in a few weeks) and profiting ~$50k on it, and looking at what to invest that in. I live in a duplex that I own and rent out the other unit - will be moving in with my partner in a couple months and renting out the unit I'm currently occupying at that point. 

I found a house in upstate NY right by Lake Champlain in a really quiet town. The real estate market in that town seems pretty sad/slow - lots of properties under 100k/150k available, many sit on the market for many many months, etc. This one house is on sale for 65k, has been on the market for nearly a year with no price changes, and has been more or less abandoned during that time. I drove up to see it last week and really loved it - it's a nice and quaint plot of land, the house needs lots of TLC that I can do 95% my own, and it just seems like a really charming place to escape to during summer/fall weekends for a change of scenery. I am fairly confident I can rent this out on AirBnb for around $120/night on weekends during warm months and $80/night midweek and get a fairly decent income from it - I'd estimate conservatively being able to net $1,500/month on average from May - September and $800/month October through April (would love to find monthly tenants, but acknowledge that won't be at 100% capacity during off months).

I put in an offer for $40k, which is what I feel like the house is worth in its condition and location - there are a lot of houses in similar condition but with more square footage (this guy is just 650 sq ft) that have sold in the $20k-60k range in the last year. The seller came back and said she can compromise, but only go down to $55k, which is what she needs to pay off the mortgage. I'm envisioning putting in $25k worth of materials, which would give me new floors, new bathroom, new kitchen, expanded rear deck, drywall in almost the entire house, and updating HVAC and plumbing - this doesn't include my labor of course, but I work remotely, and July through October is my slow season, so it kinda falls into the perfect "pack the dog & your tools and go up to the house for 2-3 weeks to get some work done" calendar for me. 

WHY I'M NERVOUS: The financial insecurity. If I pay 55k for this house, that locks up all my profit from this past flip, and I'll probably need to take out a 15k loan in order to get the work on the property that I want done this summer. I figure I can also refinance the home and take out whatever I've put into it at the end of the year to free up some cash, but the risk just feels rough for me to wrap my head around. I just don't have anywhere in CT to put that money (trying to lean more into buy-and-hold vs. flips in my LT strategy), so I'll be sitting on it until I have to pay capital gains otherwise. I feel weird buying a vacation home for ME when I feel like so much of my strategy is 'work hard, save money, build equity, expand REI' - but at the same time, this could potentially be a small income-generator from AirBNB - I just don't have enough faith in that to really push me over the edge into moving forward. In my ideal world, this is kind of a neutral investment - I get some use out of it, but more or less I'd land even in what I would pay potentially on say an 80k refinanced mortgage down the road and AirBnb income.

So yeah, thanks all for listening to me blab. I just have a lot of thoughts (as you all can see hahaha) and don't know if I'm so eager to move forward with this just to keep myself busy/to have somewhere to retreat to, or if it's because it has the likelihood of being a smart way to spend my money. Appreciate any and all thoughts, pushes, feedback, etc. you want to share!

 The house sits quite a bit higher up the road, so if the driveway were to connect directly from the road, you'd be going up like a 100 degree angle at least - need the longer driveway (which starts at a higher point in the road as well) to ease that angle. 

If the easement/right of way were recorded by the town, does that mean that a mortgage would be able to be put on the property, or still no? 

Hey all - Earlier this week, I checked out a property with a small 400 sq ft cabin on it that I'm super interested in (this is in Connecticut), but there's an issue with the driveway - a part of it is not on the piece of property owned by the guy selling the house (see image below - the driveway is in red, that middle lot (20B-30-2) is the part NOT owned, but the house (on 20B-30-3-4) and the corner lot (20B-30-1) are owned by the same guy and he's happy to deed over the part of the land on 20B-30-1 that contains the driveway to me). Some random woman owns that middle plot of land that the driveway goes through (it's just land, no house or anything), and she is not willing to sell it to the owner or me. The owner of the house says that there's been a right of way for that driveway for over a hundred years, and that I won't be able to get a mortgage for the house (not for me, but for after I flip it and try to sell it down the road) with just a right of way. The house is up a fairly steep hill, and there's no other place to put a driveway besides where it's at now.

I'm curious if there are any ways around this, or if it's just not worth the hassle at this point and I should walk away. Also thinking I *might* be able to hold onto this as a rental in the long term if the numbers really make sense, but still really uncomfortable doing that knowing that I can't sell it to anyone but a cash buyer down the road. 

 Wouldn't this also require at least a one-year residency requirement?

I just bought it ~8 months ago, so I definitely don't have 20+% equity in it to refinance. 

I definitely don't meet any of that criteria, but now I'm wondering - do I need 25% equity in my house before I can get another FHA loan in general? Or is that just to get a second one within that one-year period?

Hi all! I know there's a one-year period where an owner must occupy their FHA (3.5% dp) purchase, but curious how flexible that is. I bought a home with a 3.5% down payment on an FHA loan on December 20, 2019 and moved in that day. If I want to purchase my next home with the same FHA loan, does that mean I can close no sooner than December 20, 2020?

I guess a couple loopholes I'm seeing around the internet that make me ask this question - I know that there's a 30-day grace period to move into a home, so I'm wondering if I could close on this new home NOVEMBER 20, 2020 instead? I also see some language around having to live in an FHA loan property for "at least half a year", so does that mean at any point after JUNE 20, 2020, I would have been able to purchase a new home with this kind of loan?

I just know there's probably some nuance here, so with the November/December 20 deadline coming up pretty soon, I wanted to hopefully get a little clarity, as that means I'll be starting looking again pretty soon. Just want a more concrete timeline and to not run into issues when trying to close. I'm not sure if this is even something that a real estate agent/atty will consider at all during the closing process or if ensuring the residency requirement is being met is a job from someone else in the background,  but... :D