All Forum Posts by: Jevon Shaw

Congrats on taking the leap, Sophie! A common thing we see on the forums is first time house hackers think they've bought a bad deal if their mortgage isn't completely covered by the rent. This is not necessarily the case. If you are only coming out of pocket $700 per month, whereas rent for the unit you occupy would otherwise cost $1400, that's a pretty solid deal!

It is also worth mentioning that you should be doing analysis on both while you're living in the property and while you're not living in it. If the property does not cashflow while you are not living in it, it may be a bad deal. 

Welcome to BiggerPockets! You may get some bites in the general forum, but there's also a classifieds forum you may want to check out/post in https://www.biggerpockets.com/...

Sorry for your loss, Alicia and welcome to BiggerPockets!

You could try the Neighbor storage app. It won't generate as much money as house hacking with a person living on your property, but it is a way to make some money off of your property. If the lot is large and you don't mind animals, you could also rent the space on Sniff Spot.

The alternative would be to build an in-law suite but that would be a much, much more expensive route.

Ideally you start how Justin said: look on apartments.com, zillow, etc or speak to a realtor who is familiar with the area. If you can't find any comps in your town, another starting point would be comps in towns that are comparable to yours in terms of population and economic activity.

In addition to making sure your credit is good, I'd also try to pay off most of my consumer debt before or while hunting for that first rental. Banks utilize your debt to income ratio (DTI) to determine how likely you are to make your payments. If your ratio is too high, it could prevent you from qualifying for the cheapest loans.

The lowest would be an FHA loan, which is 3.5% down. You must occupy the property to obtain this loan. If you are occupying the property, be sure to look into local home buyer programs as well. Some of them will give you a certain percent to use toward the down payment.

@Austen Mueller killed it with his answer, so I'll just add a couple of tidbits from experience:

Banks loooooove full time W2 jobs. They view them as very low risk. However, it's not a requirement. They'll probably ask for your previous 2 year's tax returns to show that you've been making money from your small business.

Maybe not 18, as I wouldn't have qualified for anything, but I'd tell my 22 year old self not to sell. Buy and hold and keep for as long as possible. Cash out refinance if you need the money, but do not sell. That's just a personal preference.

Also keep in mind that even if you were to find a better rate somewhere else, it would probably only be trivially better. You're probably not going to go from 7.625% to 7.15%. It'll be more like 7.625% to 7.55%, if that.

Yes, I think @Lawrence Potts is correct. You can only depreciate the portion that you are not living in.