If it can be combine with the previous strategy, teach them that.

Good Intentions But Desperate:  These are the contractors who really want to do the right thing, but circumstances (bad at managing money, bad at managing schedules, bad at managing subs or some combination) drive them to do the wrong thing (start slipping schedules, start going over budget, etc).2.  

My plan wasn't to aggressively pay down or seek cash only deals, but I figured if I had a combination of paid off and mortgaged properties (over the long term...15-20 years) I'd have the benefit of both. 

Time is definitely limited.At this time, I'm the owner of a condominium in Malden, MA and 1/2 owner of a two family property in New Bedford, MA - combined, yielding me about $500.00 in positive cash flow per month.

Any loan with less than 20% down is going to require some form of PMI and that, combined with the low down payment, is going to push up your payment.

(DTI = expense / income)You can do a combination of the above to create room/space/borrowing power.In general you are limited to 45-50% of your gross income or bottom number for max borrowing power that you can fill up with your liabilities (home, car, credit cards, other loans, or expenses, etc).The other creative way is to add value to your existing home by adding units (conversion from SFR to triplex) so you can use the other 2 legal apartments rental incomes to help increase your bottom number (income).In the above conversion to a rental scenario you may have to move out and live else where.

The most relevant changes are:• Requires every lender to consider the borrower’s ability to repay the loan• Requires that lenders consider at least 8 factors applied against reasonable underwriting guidelines• The Lender must write a “qualified loan”• Requires lenders to wait at least 120 days of delinquency before foreclosing• Dodd-Frank combined with the SAFE Act in the various states, will require all owner finance transactions (except the exceptions) to be originated by a Residential Mortgage Loan Originator • Prohibits builders from selling with owner financing• Eliminates balloons and negative amortizing loans and requires fixed rates for 5 years with no prepayment penalties• Sellers who sell with owner financing more than 3 times a year will become mortgage originators and must comply with Dodd-Frank• No forced arbitration clause is allowed in the buyer’s note III.

The PITI is $900 and their combined rent is $945.

Combine that with a $25 - $30k per unit rehab and you are talking about an additional $250k investment so you gotta have a fair amount of cash. 

So, this is more of a fix-and-flip model (I have a full-time W2 job)...My terms are a combined 80% LTV on primary residence and 75% LTV (purchase price) on investment with the option of a add-on rehab loan that works on a draw schedule.