Get an appraisal and home inspection to cover your bases and you should be good to go.

Our suburban house, appraised last year at $230,000, now has a Zillow estimate of $372,000.

It seems very competitive and I have been told most people are paying over asking price AND paying the difference if the home does not appraise for the contract value. 

Our suburban house, appraised last year at $230,000, now has a Zillow estimate of $372,000.

Therefore, I would not try to get a license whether it’s a real estate agent or a contractor or an appraiser, etc. i’d be investing a few hundred thousand dollars in either a joint venture or syndication.

FHA Pros:-Friendly to lower credit scores (580-680)-Can buy multi-family with the same 3.5% down payment-DTI up to 55% (vs 45-50% for conventional) FHA Cons:-More difficult property/appraisal requirements-Frowned upon by agents, so the offer is weaker compared to conventional-LOTS of additional back-end stuff that makes a lenders job more difficult -If you're in a community property state, you have to include spousal debts even if they're not on the loan-Permanent mortgage insurance (but if you put 10% down, it'll go away after 11 years) -Fixed mortgage insurance (0.85%).

Was told by my loan officer Josh I’d be closed in under 5 weeks if the appraisals came back.

We asked the current lender what it would take for us to refinance and they said to pay off the 20k owed plus after that, pay consistent mortgage for 6 months - 1 year.Could we get the house appraised, find a lender and do a cash out refi and pay off the 20k owed + have down payment money for another property?

If I do a conventional-type rehab loan, after the rehab, I can just get the property appraised and pull out a HELOC afterwards correct?

You wouldn't be financing the reno money, but as long as it could still appraise for $440k, you would be able to use the money saved from the lower down payment to go towards the reno.