Also if a gift was used to buy the home, you can't get that portion refinanced.I've talked to several lenders and they generally aren't aware of this option or have done them rarely. 

Many will do an estimate for free, but you may want to consider a thank you gift if you don’t purchase the home to encourage he contractor to work with you in the future and show you value their time

-Loans from friends and family members : The IRS may look at a loan as a "taxable gift" from a family member/friend and not an actual loan if provided to you interest free. 

Quick question, can I borrow $20k from my mother and have her gift it to me?

My brother was "gifted" some land to build his house, and now will also receive an easement payment.

We don't have our business set up yet so we are assuming we can only get less than 14k from each person as a gift to stay within IRS guidelines.

If I couldn't pull the funds for a diamond in the rough property quickly enough I would get family members to invest cash into my down payment (of course you need to sign off with the bank as a gift and not a personal loan from family/friends). ...You seem like you have what it takes based on your second response, I would chat with a credit union loan officer, they may give you better insight on the leverage you can do with your first property and once you have the actuals you'll be ready to take action once you come up with another good property to purchase.

Note: Funds received as gifts and used to purchase the property may not be reimbursed with proceeds of the new mortgage loan.  

There's two camps on properties:invest for appreciated FUTURE value (ie speculation)invest for cash flow in the here and nowAfter 18yrs of buy & hold for the latter, I am taking the former as a gift/bonus after depositing18*12*6 checks(1296) * avgrent(850) = 1,101,600 USDergo (and obviously) I scoff at appreciation speculation approach

If you want faster feedback, offer a prize for the testimonial (gift cards, etc.).Finally, before posting anything, I would always email it to the original author to verify contents.