So if you are selling for $500k and want to purchase two properties for $250k, that would be perfectly fine.

@Ben Scarborough Would be the perfect contact for you connect with!

Inland is a perfect example, all that is listed at their site is location, # units and acquisition date.

Seams aren't perfect but are not bad now, looks like it will end up being a regular maintenance task but at least I don't have to pull up the baseboards anymore!

If this works, it would be a perfect way for him to get started in real estate by learning how to house-hack and also building equity while I will get a lower down payment into a high cashflow property.

I kept looking further and further out to find an affordable place where the commute to the city was an hour +.Out of frustration one day I expanded my search to include Hudson County NJ and found that there were great neighborhoods with multi family buildings perfect for house hacking.

In a perfect world the property will need to hit an appraisal of 120k to hit 96k @70% for cash out refi. 

And that's perfectly okay, if someone doesn't contest your views that's going to hurt you in the long(er) run.

We could see the perfect storm in spring though.

Strictly speaking from a financial point of view multi family's almost always make more sense unless your walking into some equity in a single family. creating a 5 year goal/plan makes perfect sense actually. thanks.