All Forum Posts by: Nathan Waters

Any labor jobs. Working on a house. If you have any renovation skills, offer them. If you have no renovation skills, offer to do a home cleaning when the renovation is complete. Perform an open house or offer to take photos and make flyers. These are just a few of my thoughts. I'm sure the ideas are limitless.

Me personally, I have done the "Rent my primary residence" thing. I wouldn't do it in your case. With high end homes where you are not going to break the 1% rule, you are correct that its a gamble. If property values rise another 5% but you may end up with a big renovation after a tenant trashes the place. Not as big of a deal in a lower cost home, but in your case, it can eat up any rise in value you are hoping for. If interest rates go up further, you also might not see as much appreciation as you are hoping for. I'm selling my accidental rental now while the market is good and using the money to buy another rental that has good numbers. I only rented it because I was upside down in 2009. Right now is not the case. Good luck on whatever you decide.

@Elizabeth Wilson, Which company did you use? What was the price and service terms? How many pieces and did it include a list and postage?

Is the loan from a bank or private investor? Just curious what kind of terms you are getting.

I have seen it both ways. Using plugs which seems kind of cheap, or hard wiring into a light switch. There are several youtube videos that break it down. When you say you ran wiring, do you mean a switch is wired and fed to the cabinets? I know the big box doors have both types of under cabinet lighting. You can also find kits on amazon.com. Good luck.

@Craig Rouse

I would use an attorney to draft the contract specific to your state and definitely add a contingency for an inspection. In my state, the sellers attorney often suggests using their own title company, usually because they get some kickback. I prefer to use my own title company because I like tobuild a relationship with partners. If you are offering earnest money, I would want my own title company holding the funds.

@David Nutakor

How long are you planning on holding the property? That's the only other thing to consider. Otherwise I agree with @Sherman Ragland. If you will be keeping the house long enough to recoupe the points and you can afford them upfront, pay them. If you will be selling the house 2 years from now, you probably won't benefit from the lower monthly payment. 

I have contemplated this myself and want to start networking with a builder in my area. It would be nice to have a very good idea of cap rates going in. Very few surprises. But expensive on the initial investment.

You can use a regular lender or private lender for the initial purchase. To do a cash out refinance, it depends on the lender how long you have to wait. Most traditional lenders want a 12 month seasoning period. Some will only require 6 months. If you pay cash or use private money and you don't wait the seasoning period that the lender requires, they may still lend, but will typically only lend up to 75% of the initial purchase price. If you the full seasoning period, its 75% of the appraised value. Some lenders will season within 3 months but I personally haven't worked with any yet. There are a few on here that may be able to help you. 

On another note, if you use a traditional lender, and want to refinance with that same lender, they may have a different seasoning period. For example, my commercial lender requires a 6 month seasoning period for a cash out refinance on a house that I paid with cash or private money. But he wants 12 months of seasoning before he will refinance the house he originally financed now that it has doubled in value. Rather than find another lender that will cash out refinance sooner, I am going to use a private lender that will tie equity to that hose while I go to work on my next aquisition. Hope this helps.

We use zillow and yard signs. We get quite a bit of traffic from those. We also have a website and ask people to sign up whenever they inquire. Then we send out email blasts when a house is almost move in ready and we are going to have an open house soon. We have filled our vacancies pretty fast with this method. We do our own open houses and try to get as many people as possible to show anytime we are there instead of just doing a single showing.