You need closing money, down payment, money to start repairs, buffer money for repair overages, insurance, points/interest, utilities ..

Remove the utilities and you may be at $100/mo.If the owner pays maintenance, this is no deal.

We also have lien issues for utilities - I get around this is in one of two ways depending on the property:1. charge a $40-$50/mo utility fee per person in the unit.

I've been looking at some 3 and 6 plexes and they have extremely high utilities costs.

Not a lawyer, but I would assume there could be legal issues if I went in there working, turning it over while they still had rights to be there, especially if they were paying utilities through the 30th.

.- Are utilities included?

I have a tenant that turned off utils and moved out five days ago.

You provide cable internet and utilities they pay one check for living you collect 2-4 times the rental income.

You could also do a second on another property, or several others.I'd suggest too that you start looking at a blanket mortgage on several properties (with a release fee on each) and begin consolidating the debt to free you up for financing.Creative financing is utilizing the assets you have to leverage a deal within the boundaries of conventional requirements, the rules and regs, not getting wild with schemes. :)

Houses in this price range also allow you to better utilize the limited number of fixed-rate Fannie Mae loans you can obtain.