All Forum Posts by: Matt Engle

@Alleia James I am sending you a message now with the guide. I have links to the government website with the landlord/tenant laws on there. 

@Alleia James I have a New Landlord Guide that touches on a lot of this info along with a good amount of Chicago specific info if you want me to email it over. 

3/3 in Chicago and 4/5 in Pittsburgh. 

@Naema N. I'm a Realtor in Chicago and inspections, closings, etc. are still happening. I had clients close on Friday 3/27 and Monday 3/31. I also had an inspection for a client on 3/27. Per the ordinance Real Estate Activity is considered an essential business. There are some restrictions like tenant occupied properties cannot be shown but vacant and owner occupied can still be shown. I'm not sure if things are different in the South Suburbs though. 

@Vipul Vaghela 

Here are a few. Some of these are pretty close to downtown just less developed areas.

West/South of Downtown: East Garfield Park, Tri-Taylor (west of western), Mckinley Park, West Humboldt Park

North West of Downtown: Albany Park, North Park, Jefferson Park, Old Irving Park

Hi @Vipul Vaghela, I bought a 4 unit in Irving Park last year and am currently house hacking. It is definitely still possible to do in Chicago but it really depends on what your goals are. It is very hard to "live for free" on a 2 unit using a 3.5% or 5% down payment loan in most neighborhoods in Chicago right now. If you can get afford a 3 or 4 unit your chances of living for free are much higher. Neighborhood is also a huge factor. If you are ok living a little farther from downtown in some of the fringe/developing neighborhoods you can live for free and even make money living in a building. I have a client who is currently making around $1000/mo living in a 3 unit that he purchased because he also rents out the 2nd bedroom in the apartment he lives in. Ultimately you have to decide what your goals are. House Hacking can still be a great option even if you are not living for free as long as you are paying less than you currently are in rent and if the building would cash flow if you moved out of your unit. Also keep in mind that rents will go up over time and if you use a lower down payment once you get to 20% equity you can refinance out of PMI to reduce your monthly expenses. It automatically drops off some loans but others you would have to refinance.

@Account Closed Would you mind sharing the contractor you used for the dig down?  I am thinking about doing something similar to my garden unit in the next year or so and it looks like they did a great job!

Hi Dmitry,

I currently have an 8 unit building listed in Roger's Park that you could owner occupy one unit.

https://www.redfin.com/IL/Chicago/1454-W-Fargo-Ave...

Hey everyone,

My business partner @James Tassone and I have an single family home in Pittsburgh that we rent out. We are ready to start looking for our next property and are considering refinancing as soon as we are able to so we can pull equity out and use it as the downpayment on our next place. We purchased the property for $55,000 with 20% down. It's appraised for $80,000. Our mortgage, tax, insurance is $482/mo and we rented in out in October for $1100/mo on a 1 year lease. We have $43,686 left on the mortgage. I know that most banks require a specific amount of time before they allow refinancing. Also, we purchased the property in our individual names and would like to put it into an LLC when we refinance. This leads me to the questions below. Any help or insight is appreciated.

How long will we need to wait before refinancing?

When we refinance can we put the property in an LLC?

Are there any Pittsburgh lenders you recommend for refinancing?

Hey everyone,

My business partner @James Tassone and I are searching for lenders that will allow us to use a family members money for the downpayment.  We have one investment property in Pittsburgh that we bought using a conventional mortgage and our own money for the downpayment.  Now we are looking to purchase our second property however we currently do not have the money for the downpayment.  We are looking at properties around the 50k-100k range but need to see if any lenders will allow us to use money from our families for the down payment.  What I've been finding is that lenders that do Fannie/Freddie mortgages do not allow outside funds for the downpayment.  Is that going to be standard for all lenders or are there any that may allow us to use outside funds for the downpayment?  Any help would be greatly appreciated.