Also be sure to have both taxes and insurance escrowed to avoid a high price mortgage loan, or HPML https://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201603_cfpb_tila-hpml-escrow_compliance-guide.pdfBob

When I factor in insurance and property tax my monthly expenses add up to $950.

Realize this is the historical norm and if the future behaves similar to the aggregate of the last 60 years this is by far the most likely scenario.Property is fairly stable: Tenant purchases and has some of the rent applied to the purchase. 

My day job is a commercial insurance broker (P&C) for a large multi-national brokerage.

I'm having trouble getting a 3 family + storefront commercial property in the Bronx insured.

I don't want to put 3.5-5-10% FHA because the total monthly mortgage including property tax, and home owners insurance can be between $2200-2900 not even including utilities.We do live in southern california so housing prices are high.

I have a accepted offer on a two family in MA with knob and tube wiring, but I'm finding it difficult to locate a company for insurance.

This our first insurance claim, so I’m not sure how this goes.

Do you have actual taxes, insurance quote etc ?

Pretty reliable income and the tenant population is reasonably stable.