If your costs and ARV remain where you say they are, you should be able to actually refi all your $156,300 out, as for 75% LTV you would need to be at about $208k appraised value.

It's not owning the property.Hope your seller remains solvent and not sued so his property doesn't get a new lien against it while you're making all those principal payments.  

a lot of homeowners have low interest rates that they don't want to give up, and competition for good deals remains fierce.I listen to Steve Trang's "real estate disruptors" podcast and have found it interesting.

On top of all that we have about 1 million new multi family units coming online next year (the most since the 70’s) and we should see some markets see significant rent declines while the less bubbly markets likely remain flat of slightly down.

Basically, we are paying an extra 1% point than we would have for the remaining 2 years, but the current interest rate we would refinance to, is already 2% points higher. 

Taking a higher rate, lower pre-pay could make the most sense and flexibility in the future is the way to go.Everyone that I knew that locked up Agency debt after the 2008 crash and did NOT remain flexible regretted it 100% and it really hurt their growth and kept them out of the real estate game for a long time.  

We have turned about half the building in 2 1/2 years; we did some improvements on those units-flooring, paint and appliances-raised rents heavily on those and modestly on the remaining long term tenants. 

Do you think the same remains true with a small marketing budget, say $1000 a month, and perhaps in a different market?

Remaining funds are coming directly from the Investor.Cons1.

My wife and I currently have a remaining $20,000 HELOC available plus about $10,000 cash that we were going to use for our next down payment.