All Forum Posts by: Aaron Carter

Welcome! I'm from northern MN too! 

I am not understanding this completely... So where is the "old well system" water being routed to and how is it heating? Is this in floor heat? baseboard hydronic heat? Is there forced central air ductwork in the house?

If you purchase a property for significantly below appraised value, you can hold the property for a year and refinance. This would allow you to get rid of the PMI and pull out a HELOC for another investment. I would check with some credit unions in your area to see if they would do an in-house loan. One downside is the closing costs of the refinance and the possible risk of increased interest rates that the fed has been threatening over the last year. You would have to run the numbers to see if the savings would be worth the cost. I have used this strategy successfully.

Originally posted by @Stuart Birdsong:

@Reuben Mathews one thought that has been shared from lenders I work with is to put 10% down and take a second for the other 10% to stay at the 80/20 in order to avoid PMI. Just a thought.

This is also a very good suggestion.

I had a very similar issue in my duplex.

I am also a big proponent of the mini split system. I have two Mitsubishi hyper heat systems in my house in northern Minnesota and they work down to -17 F. These systems are expensive but well worth the investment in my opinion. I have been very pleased with them. They have cut my heating bill by about 75 percent and the side benefit of having air conditioning which costs practically nothing to operate is a huge bonus.

One thing to consider is whether or not you will be having them run on off peak electric or not. If so, you will need to have some type of back up heating source, which you currently have with the current gas system in place, in other words use the mini-split as the new main heating and cooling and the old gas as a back up system, if they will allow you to keep in in place. You would also require a back up system whenever the temperature drops below the rated threshold of whatever heat pump that you are purchasing. It is important to do some research here.   

The natural gas direct vent space heaters that are currently available on the market and one of the main issues is that they are only approximately 73-83% efficient and usually not available for tax credits or rebates. There are few units that are more efficient but are very cost prohibitive and frankly not worth the investment.

@Erik Stewart I am an ER RN right now but like you looking to get into investing much more full time. Likely won't be for a while though, slow and steady as they say... Yeah that smoke from the fires hung around for a couple of weeks I couldn't believe it! Glad to have you here!

Welcome to BP! I am just down the road from you in Bemidji, MN, I get over there pretty often. Also in the health care field.

J. Scott's book on Flipping houses is very good. I am making an offer on my first flip soon and this book had a lot of great information. Good luck!

I am in the Bemidji area... looking to expand my reach a little bit.

 Thanks for the info, you are right. I actually just made my own pressure test gauge last night for my compressor because this is the second house that i have had these concerns with and I am sure that I will run into them again. I always plan for the worst to be conservative in my numbers... again thanks for your time and input!

@Steve Babiak

The house was built in 2003, so it is practically new construction for all intents and purposes compared to my other homes that I have rehabbed.

@Mark Elliott

The property is outside of city limits and remains under the jurisdiction of the county. As long as you are the owner of the property you can do whatever work you want yourself to the property. However, I would likely hire out most of the work as I don't have the time to complete all of the rehab myself. I have learned my lesson after the first two I have done but will budget for it...