All Forum Posts by: Blair Murphy

Hi everyone,

Just curious...I live in Japan, I'm from California where my first and only rental income property so far was purchased and I have a really trustworthy friend who is a real estate agent residing in Arizona who I'm thinking to contact in regards to my next rental income property purchase because of the affordable prices in Arizona compared to California. Is this advisable or generally do you want to keep your properties in the same vicinity if possible?

Hi,

I have a noob refinance question. I bought my first property (4-plex) 3 years ago in California and my plan has been to play the long game and try to cash-out refinance every 2 or so years to put towards another like property. I’ve filled out some refinance applications and have found out that with the increase in value of the property over the last few years among other factors, I am able to get about $40,000 - $50,000. My current interest rate is 4.125% and I’m being quoted that the cash-out rate would be around 4.8%. I currently owe about $162,000 which I’m assuming any cash-out amount would be added to the $162,000. Would this new amount (cash-out + $162,000) then be at 4.8%?

This is all happening fairly quickly and I don’t want to make any major mistakes as I’m trying to set this up for my son. What are some things that I should watch out for? It seems like all it is is, I qualify for a cash-out refinance, I put that amount towards a down payment on another duplex or 4-plex, and I would then be making 2 mortgage payments instead of 1 currently. My internal alarm is going off telling me that there’s something that has to complicate this as it all seems too simplistic.

Thanks in advance for any input!

thanks Patrick!

Hi,

Question...I bought my 4-plex in California 3 years ago and at the time I was (and still am) married. My wife is Japanese (non-US citizen), we have a kid with dual citizenship and we live and work in Japan. When we were buying our property, my wife signed off on sole and separate property to me because at the time we were on a strict timeline and we didn't have the flexibility of being able to have all the necessary checks the lending company wanted to conduct on her. I'm curious if in the event of anything happening to me, would she get the property even though she's not a US citizen and signed over the sole and separate property rights to me? I definitely would want her to get the property.

Thanks in advance!

Thanks Darren!

hi,

I'm wanting to invest in a second rental property. I was contacted by a refinance guy and he's asked me two questions that I don't know what/how to answer: 

What is the first mortgage debt on it ? Did you pay for it or do an installment sale ?

I've googled these terms but really only got further confused. Can anyone help me with this terminology?

Thanks in advance!

Best,

Blair

Hi,

I need advice from the seasoned vets in here. I have a property I bought last year in February in the Sacramento area for $232,000 on a 30 year fixed at 4.1%. It just started cash flowing which I am ecstatic about. I am following the buy and hold strategy and looking to use cash from a refinance on the mortgage towards another property.

I was contacted by a mortgage loan officer regarding refinancing to which after I gave the information requested on my property, I received: ''On a non-owner 4-plex to do a cash-out loan, the maximum loan to value is 70%. Based on a $232,000 value you wouldn’t be eligible yet to take out any cash as 70% of that value is an amount less than you currently owe.'' 

Admittedly, I'm new to the game and everything is a ''first'', however, when would someone in my position be eligible to refinance and put that money towards another property (and so on and so on)? It seems from everything I've read that you buy a property, wait a year, refinance, put that cash towards another property, and rinse and repeat until you've reached your goal (whatever that may be). I can't help but feel like I'm falling behind a bit which is worrisome but I really don't see any other way of doing this other than buying and holding in a place like Texas or somewhere else where the property values are so much more user friendly which doesn't seem like a viable option. Being in California, should my expectations on this popular strategy be different (i.e. in reality it will take longer due to housing costs in CA)?

Thanks in advance!

Best,

Blair

Hi there,

After a couple of months I've managed to get my 4-plex fully rented. Super excited about this! Is there any general time-frame I should look at in regards to investing in a second one? Of course, from the bank's perspective any re-fi options would be after a year from purchase and I'm definitely playing the long game strategy of buy and hold, but I want to be prepared for the time when I can purchase another multi-family residence. Does anybody follow a strict guideline that seems to work for them/keep momentum flowing? Every year? 2 years, etc.? Thanks!

Thanks everyone for the replies. I really appreciate it! The property is/has been rent-ready and I keep in touch with the PM on regular weekly to bi-weekly basis to touch base (email). I have family in the area who are able to be my eyes and ears for me and we're all starting to get the feeling that we need to look elsewhere. I'll be visiting the property in the Summer to get a look for myself.

Just curious when would be a good time to start looking elsewhere in regards to a new Property Manager. My property (purchased in February), a 4-plex in Sacramento, was vacant to begin with and has not had any luck in aquiring tenants and I'm not sure if it's due to in part to a lazy PM or said PM with too much on their plate to put much attention to my property. I live in another country and was referred this PM by my Real Estate agent who I worked with to get the property.

After researching the PM, I noticed a "rip-off report" with this person, however that was on the disgruntled renter side and not the owner side. I'm starting to think about shopping around for a new Property Manager and was wondering if I could potentially black ball myself within the Property Management world or if it is even worth the hassle to change PM's as how much value added do they really provide when the property is vacant to begin with?

Does anyone have any experience with this?