If you're using your investment cash to live and do not currently have stable income, I suggest to wait until your cash reserves are replenished and you have at least 6 months of stable income (w-2 or 1099) to begin working with a lender. 

Down Payments, renovations, Reserves and so forth. 

It would be my first deal and I don't have a mortgage currently, so I've got traditional financing pre-approved at 4.8% with 25% down.Here's what my numbers are looking like:Mgmt fee:  $75 (going to manage myself)Maint: $50 (renovated in the last 3 years)Replacement reserve: $50Taxes: $113Insurance: $110 PI: $377 (assumes $95k purchase)Total:  $775 (not counting vacancy)My spreadsheets show a cap rate of 5.7% and COC of 3.49% with vacancy included.  

But short term, you need the cash flow, especially if you don't have a lot of cash reserves.

In my experience, a HML may allow equity partner funds for a down payment, cash-to-close, and loan reserves and also may allow gift funds. 

Rebecca Martin Maybe you can just ask for the amount of reserves the association has at the moment as well as a list of any special assessments from the past 24 months.

You need cash reserves as well as a DP.

They will require 12 months on title for the cash-out, as well as 6 months reserves.

Having that these both are going on almost of year of being rented out I have built up some good cashflow/reserves in my bank account.

I set aside ALL of my cash flow for the first few months and years to build up a sizeable reserve account.