Within 2-3 years they refinance, returning my principal, though I continue to hold equity in the project.

They then have another realization that “sweat equity” is actually hard and requires tools, time, and a know-how in order to do the job right.When you’re under contract you’ll come up with a scope of work and budget, submit it for approval to the lender, and you’ll be able to make draws once you’ve closed and started the project.

@Chanoch Moller, If your mentor is a real estate investor, you should talk to him about creating a Joint Venture so that he can advise you in your first few projects.

You inject 35% /cash into the project & the lender will finance 65% LTC, set a maximum purchase price, pick a specific location, and property type. 

If you are dealing in retail or larger commercial projects, a NY attorney should be able to help you as long as they have what we call a "local counsel" consultant or a member of their firm with some knowledge in that State, which most commercial lawyers do.

One is a partnership and handles commercial projects, the other is a LLC and handles small projects like kitchen or bath renovations.

There is also a big revitalization project in the Portland area, but I think there is a perception of that part of town and it's relative distance to the other areas already mentioned that make it a hard sell.

We are having trouble deciding whether it makes sense to try to buy an 8 or 10 unit place on a 1031 exchange here in San Diego or just keep the buy and hold strategy on this one and undertake the remodeling project.

We are purchasing the property for $1,050,000 and doing $250K worth of work to it, hence the aquisition price of $1.3mil, but then the loan amount changes, so this is an imperfect analysis. 

I want to try and get as many contacts as I can because from what I’m hearing it’s always good to have different lenders depending on the type of project.