@Irina BelkoferI’m not investing in California, I’ll be investing in lower valued housing around the 50k range in other areas.

IF you overpay a little on a buy and hold, the return might be a little lower, but over time you will pay down the mortgage, rents will go up and you will have capital appreciation. 

So if he wanted to make more money off the deal he'd need to negotiate a lower price with the Seller.

The price has been lowered $5k, and it's pushing mid-September.

The rate is lower if you will be living in one of the units.Hope that helps, best of luck!

I would prefer a safe first investment with a lower return to high risk.

Is now the time to get a HEL or HELOC since rates are lower than if they are a rental? 

Stay out of bonds in a rising rate environment, but get chunks out of mutual funds/equities for sure.I'd convert to a Roth or withdraw more during lower income years if I could.

I’m buying a property subject to the existing loan and would like to refinance it in 6 months to cash out the owner and pay off the current mortgage. ( because i know i can get a lower interest rate than what he’s paying) How would I go about doing that?

We price based on $/sqft of the comps in the area, which is close to $1/sqft, but highly dependent on the property...for instance, we have a 5 bd rm property at 2100+ sqft that has avg on the lower end.