As far as renting out rooms, I would be sure to have a written lease agreement and have it translated before signing.

Whether that translates into a rent premium is what started this whole forum thread and still up for debate.Mathew

Translation - non-institutional. 

There's an agent here who {over} uses the phrase "awaiting your decorating touches", which translates into "the shag carpet may be gone, but the appliances are still harvest gold and nothing else has been touched since 1978".  

This translates into a 90k balance on your mortgage, and 10k heloc so there is no actual overpayment since all 100k is still accounted for, it is just split into 2 different balances instead of one singular 100k loan.

Where this is an over/under duplex the ceiling / floor assembly between the two units will need to be fire rated - here that translates into voids filled with fire-rated insulation such as Roxul Safe-n-Sound, resilient channel across the joists and 5/8" fire rated drywall (or the 1/2" dense core fire rated which is super expensive).  

@Nicholas Standford: couple of thoughts to add to above:1) If you have to replace windows, go with the most affordable (reputable) ones. 2) Your property probably has little insulation in the walls, so new windows may not translate to the expected energy cost savings.

Developing a good base of knowledge on BP and meetups which translate to action is probably a better bet than paying some guru thousands of dollars to possibly show you something worth paying for.

Θα μπορούσα απλώς να πω ότι είσαι μαλάκας, αν προτιμάς translated from Greek means "I could just say you're an ******* if you prefer."3.

Assuming all of these pending repairs can actually wait for up to 4 years without penalty or failure, that puts your breakeven point at the end of Year 6... which translates to an IRR of 13%... a little low considering the amount of time you have to wait to get your money back, but not the end of the world.