I started looking at commercial property in Billings and somehow wound up in Great Falls.

In the hopes of getting some videography work (side hustle), I made a phone call to a previous BP podcast guest, Terry Adams (episode 134), and wound up talking with him for over two hours about real estate investing.

I wound up calling the the NY State MLS and they told me that they cover the entire state and many of the brokerages are migrating over to them over time and are poised to becoming the default MLS for the entire state where they said the smaller MLSs will go away after some time.

It's anyone's guess but time heals a lot of wounds in buying RE...I bought my first 'flip' in March of 2008 and rode the value down over $150K, lost easily $10K on rent learning to be a LL and eventually sold that home around 10 years later for just about what I originally purchased it for.

I wound up contracting my expansion/renovation for about $750K.

See if this may rectify the situation and if not, lick your wounds, eat some birthday cake and keep moving forward.

By your own formula, you could NEVER EVER buy mulifamilies in Connecticut, unless of course you are willing to suffer gun-shot wounds as another uncalculated expense ;).And even in the ghetto, I'm not sure your number would work.

Anyway, even after prepaying insurance, setting up escrow accounts, covering closing costs, I wound up coming out of the closing with a check for $200.00, a "new" house mortgage to the hilt, and payments less than I was paying in rent and 6-months taxes and insurance paid or in escrow.

I wound up just get a home equity loan at 80% on the property.  

I wound up not doing a BRRRR though so I don't have first hand experience with a cash out refinance with them.