That would give you the contrast you need without breaking the bank.Good luck!

Originally posted by @Jason Turo: I've purchased a few homes I have lived in, and never owned/lived in them long enough to make up for the closing costs, interest, property taxes and insurance over that time period.Sounds like you have been buying turnkey at full blown retail price, which is a no-no in REI, whether it is your primary residence or not.To contrast, every single property I've ever purchased, I would have overcome the closing costs, interest, property taxes and insurance to make a profit regardless of if I sold the day after I closed escrow or 10 years from that day, or any point in between.

I have investigated home equity loans and i can only find ones that have high fees in contrast to the amount of money I need... do you have any companies you recommend?

Thereby, Having my own tool (which i fully understand the workings) to ergonomically compare/contrast investments is what I need.

This is in contrast to having it in a brokerage account that is investing in dividend paying stocks and takes 3-4 days to transfer the cash out of the account so I can use it.

I just discovered there are paint estimator tools in the Apple Store. if you try one of them out you'll want to compare and contrast the results with a couple of contractors of course.

If you’d like to learn more, I wrote a blog post on BP a while back comparing and contrasting the different strategies here: https://www.biggerpockets.com/renewsblog/2015/09/15/wholesaler­fix­n-flipper­buy­n­hold­investor/

What I am looking for folks is a letter template of what others have used successfully to compare and contrast to what I am using.  

I would say take the loss and cut the cord now, he will alway be ahead in payment or else won’t show up, in contrast, by law a licensed contractor can not collect more money than value delivered and you have a recourse to go after his bond or file a complaint.

The price to rent ratio number does not meaningfully transfer to compare and contrast to other locations/properties 1000 miles away as we see commonly promoted on BP.