I own a condo (that I rent out to tenants) in a trendy (and expensive) Brooklyn, NY neighborhood and rent a separate apartment in the same building.Recently, I've been contemplating selling my condo and buying a multi-unit property as a way of investing but, more importantly, increasing my passive income/cash flow as I am particularly cash poor these days.

thanks for bringing this up.a 4plex in the East Valley of the PHX MSA  just fell through contract and the agent wants me to submit an offer and just sent me the docs to sign but now I'm contemplating not moving forward with this purchase.

I was actually contemplating whether I should go ahead and setup an LLC before acquiring the next property.

It sounds like you're contemplating getting your Broker's license so that you can save $$ on your own deals, right? 

Insurance policies don’t contemplate rebuilding costs rising 50% overnight and 2 years to rebuild.It cost me $165-170K out of pocket for this disaster and I didn’t have enough $$ to cover it.  

I'm contemplating my first deal using hard money, but have similar reservations.

@Kevn Wolf welcome and congrats on your decision to become an investor.I would love to help you.There are many aspects to contemplate.

@Marcus HollowayI’ve been contemplating similar strategies but I decided against them.

But what has not been yet contemplated is the fact that a borrower who does not make their very first mortgage payment causes that loan to be ineligible to be sold to an investor.

Sellers now are in a tough position where they would ; 1) obviously move forward with deal and close of escrow as planned sooner.2) wiling to work with buyers but don't want them to back-out at the end of due diligence period without any compensation for loss of opportunity.3) Seller are contemplating to ask for a non-refundable deposit from buyers if they choose to cancel the deal and walk away at the end of the (90) days extension.4) what is fair and reasonable under these circumstances as I don't want to risk the buyer canceling the deal completely, but also don't want the seller end up with absolutely nothing?