Hello all, I'm super new to the concept of real estate investment. I just finished Rental Property Investing and am beginning to see things from a completely new perspective.
My Question: I don't have enough cash to make my first investment, where / when should I get that cash. Details below:
Target: $150k SFH with positive cashflow on the deal. I have a bunch of reasons for this target but for the purposes of this question, let's just assume they are valid reasons and the right choice.
Cash on hand available for investment: $10k (I've spent 20 years saving in tax deferred retirement accounts and paying down my mortgage and don't have the liquidity to pull those funds out)
Equity in primary home: $160k
Credit Score: Excellent (>800)
Location: Central Ohio. Property inventory is very low, investment opportunities are there but not abundant right now.
I have plenty of extra monthly income to get approved for a $150k mortgage on top of my debts
Option 1: Continue saving and use that cash. So I just took a pivot from throwing my extra cash each month into IRAs and HSAs and extra against my mortgage and started saving for the first time which is why I have the 10k available. Obviously, I could continue this effort and get to a point that I'll have the $30-35k needed for a property investment by the end of the year. Maybe the market will have settled down by then. Or maybe it will be crazier... who knows
Option 2: Go get a heloc. Plenty of equity in the house but heloc rates seem to be around 6% which seems high.
Option 3: Cash out refinance. My mortgage is a low rate (3.125) already so I won't improve there much but I would have to pay the closing costs on that refinance which I am estimating to be about $3-4k which is ~10% of the cash that I would need to make the investment
I'm sure there are other options. That's why I'm asking the question here. I know that some of these are specifics to me but I hope that the thought process and answers will help others in similar situations.
