Closing costs will eat some of that cash out money up (that is one area you save on a HELOC), but you might make that up with a longer amortization period and potentially better rates with the 30 year refinance. 

So not to spread my eggs into just one basket.

While we are not eating on beans and rice now, we are curious what people's thoughts are on "Starting Out" while having student debt.We currently have a plan in place that we are following to get out of SFH and into four-plex to house hack then do our debt snowball.Would love to hear if anyone else had similar stories or their PO.Mike

Consider a darker brown color so it doesn't stick out as much.I'd be more concerned with the mustard yellow and robin egg blue paint!

They look at me and say they are eating their words.

You would incur holding costs and other costs that would not be in your rehab.Paying for two sets of closing costs on traditional mortgages would eat heavily into your numbers.

. $50 a month) and the rental market tanks so you start operating a negative cash flow which means you're eating into your ability to save.If you have buy weak, a downturn will affect you.

But if you're trying to retire in 5 or 10 years, that's a GOOD thing, and if the only thing getting in the way of retirement is those pesky mortgage payments eating up so much of your rental income, go for it.If you want to imagine a simplified model to retire on rental income, it would start with a higher risk higher leverage acquisition phase early on, a middle phase of optimizing -- 1031 that "meh" property for something good, stuff like that -- and then it would end with you ceasing proactive acquisitions (unless some great deal falls in your lap) and paying mortgages off to maximize cashflow as you ease into retirement, probably paying them off lowest balance to highest balance.Unlike 401ks and IRAs, the government isn't in charge of when you do this, so no reason you can't do it in your 30s to 50s if you can pull it off.... there are people who post on these very forums who are in their 30s and could enter that end-phase if they wanted to.

Keep searching for those golden eggs and structuring deals that will add a massive wealth surge to your portfolio.

The latest agent I am working with is showing us properties that are in up and coming areas and have already been rehabbed but essentially break even or net $100 a month (265k price points and appreciation would be expected.)We are struggling with continuing to buy retail properties for how much it eats your capital for small amounts of cash flow.