All Forum Posts by: Yue Lehman

@Adam York

Very simple, save more money until you can buy a primary then house hack. What you can consider doing is find a more experienced investor in your area and work for them part time (I'm assuming you have a full time job). This way you can make a little bit of extra money while gaining field experience in real estate. Alternatively, it might be worth it to sharpen your professional skills and find a better paying job in order to get into to real estate. I don't recommend start investing with no money.

1. No it won't, I'm an agent and I see seller financing being a great option in today's market to bring buyers and sellers together. I caution you to work with an agent who is familiar with this matter. Your agent should understand this concept and there's a chance your agent might end up teaching the listing agent how this works. 

I'll answer 3 first - I work in California and realtors have access to a seller financing document that writes out the terms and this document had been reviewed by CA attorneys. You can ask your agent in your state to show you a sample seller financing document, and decide if you want to go to a lawyer to draft your own. 

2. Speak with an agent who is familiar with this topic, understand the market, and they should be able to explain to you how this can benefit both buyers and sellers, and of course the risks to both parties. 

Hi Jon, this clarifies it. You're essentially flipping the note. I imagine you can put something in the contract saying you can assign the note to someone else and see if the seller / lender would agree. 

Sorry I can't be much of a help on this topic as I've never done this or heard of this. It doesn't mean it can't be done though!

Hello, seller financing is basically seller acts as your bank / lender. Whoever acts as your lender would want to check out your credit and funding source, which is absolutely normal and I would expect nothing less. If I were to finance my property to a buyer, I would probably do a full on background check and credit check and several reference checks. 

If I were you, I would be a little concerned about the quality of work on the HVAC because it could be a big emergency bill later down the road once you take ownership and something breaks, knowing that they didn't do a great job with the aesthetic work. 

Also, do you have an agent representing you? Your agent should advise on at least these topics probably more, this would be someone having fiduciary duty to you. 

Hi Andrew, congratulations on what seems like a huge win for you and your family. It takes so much to carry through a project like this in normal time let alone through COVID time. What you've done here to move into the place, renovate, meet all service professionals, and then rent it out to others is brilliant and it gives you so much confidence to manage it long distance. Huge applaud to you!! 

Sounds like your concern is your lender AKA seller will find out about your future profit that you're worried about. You can put it the seller financing document to pay them out in x amount of years (whenever you expect to sell), while maintaining an agreed upon mortgage amount. If it ends up not selling, have a plan B to refinance with a regular lender to pay out previous lender / seller. 

Once they sell it to you, it's your property and they shouldn't (not that they wont) be concerned with what you do with it as long as you make the agreed upon payment on time. Just my 2 cents. 

Save money for a down payment and house hack. Search it on BP! 

Hi Hansel, 

My opinion might be different from many on BP. If the price in Chino is very expensive already, do you think it'll get even more expensive in 5 to 10 years? If so, you might want to consider getting into the market (or nearby but a little cheaper market) by purchasing a primary residence that you can afford, and get a few roommates to pay down your mortgage and potentially reduce your cost of living. Most primary residence purchase loans require as little as 3 to 5% down, and you would need to qualify for the monthly payment on the remaining amount, as well as property taxes, insurance, etc. The best way would be to talk to a mortgage lender to see if you qualify. 

By starting in your local area, you learn how to take care of a property in person, how to be a landlord, and can put 5% down on a 700k property instead of 20% to 25% down on a $400k property (cheaper areas in CA like Fresno County). Within 2 to 5 years, you'll probably learn a lot about real estate investing and landlording, and hopefully save up more money along the way, and maybe harvest the appreciation on your primary residence to invest on a second property. 

People call this strategy "house hacking", and if you search the term on BP, you'll find a ton more articles and posts on the subject. 

If you can contact the tenants, asking for some photos or videos wouldn't be so bad to start. But if they're ok with sending you photos, they might as well be OK with letting you see the place... If you end up starting with photos and videos for rehab estimates, definitely plan for additional costs for things you can't see with your own eyes (and can't smell with your nose)! 

Congratulations to you and Jonathan!!! Thank you for sharing this story, what a roller coaster but you all did it!!